Faults:

It was a retirement dream for me to own a 2 seat sports car; my favorite being the Corvette. It turned into a nightmare with these specific problems.

Strong gas smell in car. There are a couple of reasons for this, but mine can't seem to be fixed properly.

Interior is a rattle trap due to cheap materials.

Broken bushing on the shifter cable. Had the car towed because it would go into reverse only. This was the most recent problem.

Under heavy acceleration the air bag light comes on. I won't even bother having this issue looked at.

Another transmission problem was that the "propeller shaft bolt" came loose and screwed up the bearing inside the torque tube. Lucky enough I caught the noise in time before more damage could happen, and it was a month before the powertrain warranty expired. All the other repairs were out of pocket at the dealership, because independent private owned shops don't want to touch these cars.

General Comments:

I love the car, but wouldn't recommend it. Very hard to get in and out of. Dealer repairs are not cheap. It's not like I rag on this car. It's only a part time fun car.

Faults:

Loose and rattling trim.

Targa roof leaks occasionally.

General Comments:

I bought this Corvette during the GM employee pricing event, since it was over $20k cheaper than list.

The 6.2 V8 LS3 unit is one of the best engines out there; bulletproof, sounds great, loads of power and torque, and will handle almost unlimited tweaks.

Now, why can't Chevrolet build a Corvette interior to do that engine justice? The dash appears to have come out of a Daewoo, with cheap, crappy, ill fitting plastics everywhere, buttons that feel like they will break if you even look at them, and a LCD dash display that looks to have been copied from a Citroen I had about 15 years ago.

The air conditioning could be better too; with the engine so close, it does get more than a little hot in the cabin on sunny days; it would better to have air conditioning that didn't feel like an asthmatic midget blowing on you through a straw from inside the dash.

Those gripes aside, the Corvette is an absolute hoot to drive, with blistering acceleration, decent handling in sport mode (though expect to pay for dental repairs after using this, as your teeth will spend most of their time being jarred together every time you hit even the slightest of bumps), and a semi-auto that responds as well as any non-dual clutch system out there.

The head-up display works well (though the G-meter is a bit gimmicky), and I never get tired of the burbling snarl that accompanies a quick jab on the push button start.