I am a new Corvette owner (1995 standard coupe) and am not familiar with some of the terminology.  What is the significance of the Jake emblem and the history behind it?  What are some of the major differences between a regular Corvette and the Z06 and ZR1 models?  Or how are they designed to be different or what is their purpose?  I am sure veteran Corvette owners know all the differences, but as a new owner I haven't got it all figured out yet.

I found a neat article about the Jake Emblem http://jalopnik.com/5249746/the-history-of-jake-corvette-racings-mascot
I had also wondered about that but thought it was just a marketing thing.  Corvette racing is cool.

 


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|UPDATED|2/7/2013 10:46:13 AM (AZT)|/UPDATED|

Regular Corvette = Oh...that's nice!"
Z06 = "Oh St!!!!" 
ZR1= "Holy Mother of God!!!" 

The C5/6 era Z06 was originally intended to be a low cost, no frills, bare bones racer for the public....similar in concept to the L88 way back when. However, the Z06 wound up being a lot more cushy, and costly than intended. Still a great starting place if you wanna go racing.

The ZR1(current iteration) is a no holds, Katey-bar-the-door supercharged beast. It's only real intention is to make money for, and give some prestige to GM, tho I doubt it will ever do that.

The C4 era ZR1 was, and still is, a great car for the money. 32 valve Lotus designed engine that will make you pee your pants on full throttle....and/or if you have to pay someone to work on it.

The original Z06, from 1963, was absolutely a bare bones, no frills, rattle your teeth racer....or the best they could sell at the time. Those bring LOTS of $$$ these days.

The original ZR1 from '70-'71 was also a fairly bare bones, rattle yer teeth racer in disguise. VERY few of those built. Basically an LT-1 engine with some serious suspension/braking hardware. There was also a ZR2, which was the same car with the big block engine. Very few of those built, too. Either one of them is highly valued today.

Thanks, I think I have a better understanding now.  Maybe what I need to do is get a good book that covers the history of Corvettes.  Would be happy to accept recommendations for a starting point.

Check the Supportiing Vendors on the left side of the page.  Mid America has some and the Vette Bookstore has plenty.

For a new owner, here are some suggestions to start, I'm sure others will chime in also.  If you go to Amazon and type in Corvette books , there are pages and pages

May be the best Corvette model descriptions ever, you should work for GM.  Still LMAO, good one Joel.  Did some really spirited driving in a friends new ZR1, not sure Holy Mother of God is enough, that car is freaking scary.

Thanks Jimmie!

As far as McLellan's book....I had a hard time reading a lot of it.....it just got waaaaaaaaay too technical for me. I'm not an engineer, so some of it is just too far over my wee little head.

Any of Richard Newton's books are good reading, and informative.
To get a decent, overall idea of the different generations, you really need something like the "Corvette, 50th Anniversary" books, that cover all of the generations. There are a couple by Randy Leffingwell, Mike Mueller, and others.
I have a boat load of books....just can't remember the titles of all of them....now Imma gunna hafta go look....

Thanks for the link to "Jake". I never knew the origination of that logo, much less that it had a name. The NCRS National Judging Chairman uses a "Blue Devil" version of Jake as his avatar on the NCRS TDB. Based on what I just learned, and that Roy previously owned a Jetstream Blue ZR1, I now understand the correlation.