Here's the story:
Illustrated Corvette Series No. 23 - 1964 CERV II -
"Chevrolet Engineering Research Vehicle"

CERV II was Zora Arkus-Duntov's most exotic experimental car. Like the CERV I, this car was built with one thing in mind, competition.

For many years, Duntov's little rocket car held the Milford Proving Ground track record with an average speed of 206 mph! With short gearing, the CERV II would run 0-to-60 in 2.8 seconds. With Duntov's patented 4WD power train, the car wanted to be driven faster!

The original plan was to build six cars, three for competition and three spares. The construction of the car was truly ahead of its time. Some of the advanced features included four-wheel drive using a Powerglide torque converter for each end of the car, side-mounted fuel cells, a monocoque frame, low profile Firestone racing tires, and a 377 cubic-inch all aluminum V-8 using Hilborn injection, single overhead cams, making 500 horsepower.

The body was styled by Larry Shinoda and Tom Lapine. Unlike the Grand Sport, the CERV II was stable at speeds over 200 mph. It only needed a small spoiler on the rear deck. The wheelbase was only 90 inches, front and rear tracks were 53.5 inches, making the CERV II a short, wide car.

Jim Hall and Roger Penske both liked the car's unique handling and driver's position. When pushed to the limit, the CERV II would go into a very fast, flat spin. Much of the CERV II's technology was later used in the Chaparral 2D.

In 1970 a ZL-1 engine was fitted into the car for some "tire testing." Later, in 1989, the car was valued at over $1.5 million. All I can say is those dragster headers must have sounded awesome! - K. Scott Teeters

Here's the story:
lllustrated Corvette Series No. 38 - 1969 Manta Ray Show Car Corvette

The 1965 Mako Shark II may well have been the most exciting Corvette show car of all time. This one show car had more direct impact on future production Corvettes than any other. The car was a world traveler as General Motors trotted the Mako Shark II all over the automotive globe, wowing car lovers everywhere it went.

By 1968, with the debut of the new C3 Corvette, the Mako Shark was old news. But when your pockets are as deep as GM's, why not make a great thing even greater? Even though $2.5 million had been spent on the Mako Shark II, the General spent almost another $3 million on the Manta Ray!

The biggest change was the long, tapered tail, a 'la the Astro Vette Show Car. Endura bumpers gracefully covered functional metal bumpers. The roof line featured a beautiful, sweeping, tapered style, similar to a Sting Ray roof, but scooped out with a small slot for a rear window. For hard braking and turn signaling, flip up lights popped out of the rear deck. Four taillights were fared in under the rear bumper line with a center-located license-plate holder.

An awesome show car should have an awesome engine. The Manta Ray used the new, all-aluminum, ZL-1 engine with a special air cleaner. Side pipes were beautifully crafted into the side rocker panels and sounded great. This was part of the Bill Mitchell trademark.

The nose of the car was basically unchanged, except for an extended bumper ring around the air inlets and a small chin spoiler. Normal sideview mirrors were deleted in favor of small, bullet-shaped mirrors that were attached to the top of the A-pillers. Like the previous Mako Shark cars, the Manta Ray was painted dark blue with pearl white fogging along the lower edges. Special badges and Corvette crossed-flags insignias completed the car.

This may have been the last "pure" show car Corvette. Later show cars were serious engineering studies. Cars like this sure got a lot of us juiced up for the "next" Corvette. Ah, the stuff of daydreams! K. Scott Teeters

lllustrated Corvette Series No. 40 - 1970 XP-882 Corvette Show Car
"Experimental Corvette - Bad Timing

It was a great day for Corvette fans. When the crowds piled into the New York Auto Show on April 2, 1970, they had no idea what Chevrolet was proposing as the next Corvette. The XP-882 Mid-Engine Experimental Corvette had almost everything a Vette lover would want... big-block power, huge wheels and tires, exotic suspension, drop-dead looks, and the engine located in the middle of the car, exactly where an exotic car engine should be.

But we all know how the story ended; they didn't come close to making the car. Forward thinking just couldn't overcome bad timing. Duntov's design team started working out the mechanical challenges for the XP-882 in 1968. Styling penned up a new look that screamed "Corvette!" It was crisp, edgy, modern, yet it "looked" like a Corvette.

New Chevy General Manager John Z. DeLorean stopped work on the XP-882 to pursue making Corvettes based on the new, inexpensive Camaro chassis. DeLorean met with fierce resistance from styling, engineering, and sales to NOT take the car in that direction. So the project was stopped in 1969 and was warehoused until 1970. When Ford announced a similar mid-engine project with DeTomaso, DeLorean resurrected the XP-882 and had it finished for the show car circuit. Because there were no press releases, everyone was stunned. The car magazines were all over it, initiating a feeding frenzy of speculation.

Mid-engine cars were very exotic in the '60s. Not only was the engine midship located, but it was transverse mounted. By using the front-wheel drive, automatic transmission from an Olds Toronado, Duntov was able to quickly get a working prototype. Suspension and brakes were obviously independent and disc. Wheels were spun-aluminum, with vent slots, and tires were E60x15 on the front and G60x15 on the rear. The interior of the car was basic prototype fashion, no frills and no real design at that point. The XP-882 was never officially tested for speed and performance.

Many other Corvette show cars have been more thought out than the XP-882, but the car was rushed into service and not fully developed like show cars of the '60s. But the timing couldn't have been worse for an all-new Corvette. The new platform was going to be expensive to make, requiring new transmission, suspension, body, and interior parts. Actual production wouldn't have started until '72 or '73, just in time for the first Arab oil embargo. Also in the brew was a GM internal push to develop a Wankel-engined prototype, so the second XP-882 chassis was made into the 1973 4-Rotor Aerovette.

All things considered, the XP-882 didn't have a chance, but it sure was exciting. - K. Scott Teeters   

Here's the story:
lIlustrated Corvette Series No. 42 - 1964 XP-819
"Experimental Rear-Engine Corvette"

Car companies make prototype cars all the time. Most of these machines are never shown to the public. Corvette prototype cars often become very high-profile machines. Only a few were never shown, for good reason. The XP-819 was an engineering study used to prove a point concerning the correct direction for future Corvette development.

The XP-819 was the result of a clash between Zora Arkus-Duntov and engineer Frank Winchell, who'd been involved with the Corvair project. Winchell contended that you could make a balanced, rear-engine, V-8 powered sports car by using an aluminum engine and larger tires on the rear to compensate for the rear weight bias. Duntov adamantly disagreed. A loose design was drawn that received some very unflattering comments from Duntov and Dave McLellan. Winchell asked designer Larry Shinoda if he could make something beautiful with the layout, to which Shinoda told him that a tape drawing could be shown after lunch. Shinoda and designer John Schinella sketched out the basic shape shown here. Duntov asked Shinoda, "Where did you cheat?"

It didn't look "too bad", so a working prototype was ordered. Shinoda supervised the styling and Larry Nies' team of fabricators built the car. In only two months the XP-819 was on the test track.

It turned out that Frank Winchell's theory about rear-engine, V-8 cars didn't work out very well. However, Shinoda's design was well received. They were obviously into the "shark thing" and picked up styling points from the Chaparral cars. It even had wheels from a Chaparral.

This car was definitely a Corvette, even though the back end was big. Unfortunately, with all that weight behind the rear axle, it was only a matter of time before it crashed during a high-speed lane change test. The question of stability was answered, and the XP-819 was send off the the scrap bin...almost.

Oddly enough, GM sent the car to Smokey Yunick's shop in Daytona, Florida. The chassis was cut in half and usable parts were removed. What was left was stored in an unused paint booth as just "old junk." Years later, a Corvette collector was buying some parts from Yunick and offered to buy the junked XP-819.

So the pile of car scrap was rebuilt and finished as a streetable car, like a kit car. A cast-iron V-8 was used in place of the original all-aluminun engine. We're talking serious rear weight bias here. It's quick and now does awesome wheelies! - K. Scott Teeters

Here's the story:
lIlustrated Corvette Series No. 36 - 1968 Astro II Mid-Engine Experimental Corvette

Almost from the beginning, racing has made the Corvette a living legend. Sports car development in the 1960s was explosive, and at the cutting edge was the Ford GT40 and the Chevrolet-backed Chaparral, both using a mid-engine layout. The Astro II (XP-880) was the first of several experimental, mid-engine Corvettes that kicked off years of exotic sports car anticipation.

Ford started the race by first offering a street version of their GT40, called "Mark III" and then by unveiling the "Mach 2" experimental mid-engine car in May 1967. Designers at Chevrolet went right to work on their own version of a mid-engine Corvette. After 11 months, the Astro II was shown, immediately initiating a blizzard of speculation asking the question, "Is this the next Vette?"

By using off-the-shelf parts, the designers were able to deliver the car quickly, and at a relatively low cost. However, because of a lack of serious commitment by Chevrolet, the car was made using an out of production, '63 Pontiac Tempest, two-speed transaxle. Ford, on the other hand, had a race-proven, four-speed manual gear box for the Mach 2. The big question was, if pushed into production, would a two-speed automatic Corvette be taken seriously. Probably not.

Despite its built-in design weakness, the Astro II was a very interesting effort. It certainly looked exotic and screamed "Corvette" with its body styling. The Astro II used a central backbone frame and thick doors that housed safety beams. The 20-gallon fuel cell was located in the center of the frame. The engine, suspension and drivetrain were all attached to the central frame. With a 427 engine, this made the car more like a Can-Am racer than a street car. Even with production Camaro and Corvette suspension parts, and performance street tires, the Astro II generated 1.0 g of cornering grip. This was part of the magic of a mid-engine sports car. Astro II weighed in at 3,300 pounds, 300 less than a production Corvette, yet had almost the same external dimensions.

While the Astro II was being track tested in Spring 1968, Duntov and his crew were busy working on their solution to the transaxle problem, the stunning XP-882. This one almost made it to the showroom. K. Scott Teeters

Here's the story:
lllustrated Corvette Series No. 35 -1968 Astro I Mid-Engine Experimental Corvette

Almost from the beginning, there have been those at Chevrolet who wanted the Corvette to be "something else." Along the way there have been proposals to soften the Corvette, add a back seat, and to use steel for the body. The Astro I proposed using an opposed, flat-six, Corvair engine. Fortunately, this was one for the history books.

The official purpose of the Astro I was to study aerodynamics and new features. Engineers had long known that frontal area and shape were major factors in how slippery a car is in high-speed air. Much of what we take for granted in aerodynamics was new territory in the mid '60s. For this study, function followed form.

To keep the front profile as low as possible, a modified, flat, opposed-six Corvair engine was placed behind the rear wheels. Although a far cry from the rip-snort'n 427s of the day, the little 176 cubic-inch enginewas made of alloy aluminum with steel cylinder sleeves and featured single overhead cams, hemi heads, Weber carburetors, and made 240 horsepower. That's 1.4 hp per cubic inch!

The unibody construction had large boxed side sill members that added stiffness as well as housing a fuel cell on the passenger side. The bulkhead behind the driver and the forged aluminum windshield header provided rollover protection.

The front and rear suspension used double wishbones and four-wheel disc brakes. Wheels and tires hadn't gotten fat yet, so 5.5 inch and 7.0 inch wheels were used front and back.

Note the absence of any normal door lines. The entire canopy hinged up from a pivot point behind the rear wheels. Since the car was 35.5 inches tall, 12.3 inches shorter than a '68 Corvette, the seats were fixed to the canopy and actually raised up so that you could step into the interior. This was not a rainy day car.

The Astro I had many styling tricks that were standard for GM study cars; a closet at the base of the windshield for wipers, pop-up spoiler brake lights, access panels on the hood for servicing fluids, and periscope rear view mirrors. The interior had the gauges, warning lights, and twin-grip steering control device. Trick stuff in 1967.

At only 35.5 inches tall, the Astro I was as low as a Countach, 15 years earlier. Too bad it wasn't packing a 427. Oh well.

Here's the story:
lllustrated Corvette Series No. 51 - 1973 XP-892 Mid-Engine 2-Rotor Experimental Corvette "Rotor-Motor Wankel Corvette?"

The XP-892 just flat-out caught everyone short. It didn't "look" like a Corvette, and used an engine that most of us had never heard of. "What's a Wankel?" Despite its unusual styling, it was a very well done prototype. However, due to the Corvette's sales success, GM was in no hurry to make an all-new car.

GM was hot on the new Wankel rotary engine, and was scheduled to offer the rotor-motor in the Vega for '75. Since 1953, people inside of GM have wanted to make the Corvette something else smaller, bigger, a four-seater, etc. So a Wankel powered prototype was ordered. Actually, two prototypes were made, the XP-892 two-rotor design, shown here, and a four-rotor design using the chassis from the '70, mid-engine, V-8 powered XP-882.

The XP-892 was small, about the same size as a Dino Ferrari or a Datsun 240Z. But when pressed for inside information as to the possibility of this being the next Corvette, the ever cagey Duntov was quoted as saying, "Maybe, but there are no plans to produce it."

The problem was that at 2,600 pounds, with only 180 to 250-hp, performance wouldn't be anywhere close to Corvette standards. Since the Wankel engine had serious heat problems, the XP-892 was more of a study to see if the engine was feasible for a small sports car. Power-to-weight ratio aside, everyone was very pleased with the way the car turned out.

The XP-892 was designed by Chevrolet and built by Pininfarina. Unlike a production Corvette, the XP-892 was a steel, unit-body construction. Duntov referred to the McPherson-strut, independent suspension, and disc brakes as "run of the mill." The 266 cid engine had a single Rochester four-barrel carburetor, and was mated to a modified Hydramatic transmission. Duntov clearly wanted more when he said, "Add three more inches of wheelbase... and maybe a 300-cid engine, and we'd have a good car." As always, he had "something else" up his sleeve, a larger, four-rotor version.

For a prototype, the XP-892 had a very well designed and finished interior. The seats were fixed while the seat backs, steering wheel, and pedals were all adjustable. Between the engine and interior there was a 8.1 cubic foot storage space. The spare tire was under the front hood. It seems that the press never drove the car, as there was never a mention of how the car performed.

GM privately showed the XP-892 and the V-8 powered XP-882 to potential Corvette buyers in '72. The test groups wanted to see something in between. Duntov's opinion was, "When we finally decide what the new Corvette will be, it will be for our own reasons." The man knew what he wanted. - K. Scott Teeters