Is the C6 fun to drive at legal speeds?

Or, pretty much any extremely capable modern sports car?  I’ve been thinking of going back into debt on a daily driver, and used C6 Corvettes are in the range I’d consider spending.  New leftover 2017 Mustang GTs are there, too.  But, is there really much fun to driving them on the street, or are they so powerful and good handling that they aren’t entertaining unless they are being autocrossed or tracked?  

I’m not likely to attend many (if any) track days, and even if I do, I’d assume I should start with something somewhat slower.  There’s the potential for an autocross or two a year, but not a ton of them, I’m more of a rallycrosser.  To that end, I’ve kind of though maybe a WRX would be more practical, and hopefully more fun at less than felony speeds.  Not to mention, I could consider rallycrossing it once it’s paid off.

So, anyone daily a Vette or something else extremely fast, and is it still fun when you are staying out of trouble?

In reply to eastsideTim :

I'm sure it's all a matter of perspective, but I don't find my 85 Vette to be fun on the street at all. Conversely, my 96 Miata was very fun, although once I prepped it for ST it was a little too capable for the streets as well.

In reply to Pete Gossett :

Your comment about the Miata is very topical, too.  I’ve got a 96 in the garage that I’m mostly just trying to make sure it’s reliable, and I’m planning on stiffening the chassis up a bit.  It’s got aftermarket shocks, but nothing too aggressive.  It’s very fun on the street, both with 14” all seasons, and 15” TW200 autox tires, though I think it’s a little more fun with the all season tires 

My Abarth was pretty fun on the street, too, and part of it was getting that little kick from the turbo, but not accelerating so fast that I’m at the risk of a reckless driving ticket if stay on it just a bit too long.

I find C6s and base C7s fun on the street. They handle great, have enough power to throw you back in the seat but not so much that a split-second of full throttle puts you way into "Lose My License" territory, and give a pretty good soundtrack. 

eastsideTim said:

So, anyone daily a Vette or something else extremely fast, and is it still fun when you are staying out of trouble?

I have a C5 Z06 and it's not at all what I expected. Completely docile, comfortable and very easy to live with when you want, and absolutely insane when the urge hits. I have no problems staying out of trouble with it.

2010CTS-V 6m.....

Corvettes has no FIZ for me on the street at least at normal speeds. They are also ridiculously fun at illegal speeds. 

My Fiesta ST with the Mountune mp215 kit is one of the most fun street cars I’ve driven, and you can toss it around at speeds that won’t get you locked up.

It also gets 32mpgs average, so that’s nice. I’d recommend driving one, or the Focus if you need a little more room. They seem to be the best driving hot hatches out there. I’ve driven cars that are much faster, but this just puts a smile on your face when you drive it.

In reply to Saron81 :

When I was shopping for my long gone Abarth, I also test drove the Fiesta ST, and thought it was a total riot.  At the time, no one within a couple hundred miles had one optioned the way I wanted it(Recaro seats, no sunroof), so I passed.  I may consider them and the Focus, too.

That's a tough question. With almost any modern car the fun limit on cornering is tires. Modern 200tw tires are absurd on the street as the limits are just so high that you're playing a different game than everyone around you. Cars that are balanced are more fun closer to the limit no matter what the tires. 

As far as acceleration, it's also complicated. My V wagon is violent and grin inducing very very briefly every time I drive it. When I drive the Accord I wind the motor up to 5500rpm in second at basically every light and largely stay with traffic. I heel toe into corners and mat the pedal coming out of corners. The Accord is more engaging because I get to actually play with it, but the fun I'm having is much more sedate than in the V. Both fun, but very different. All depends on what you're in to and how you feel about things like speed limits. 

Speaking C6 Z06 specifically...nope. Too much power and way too much grip to do anything interesting on the streets legally and safely. Maybe for the average person who likes to put their foot down from 0-45 mph but not to me who has been lucky enough to track it somewhat extensively. I have a lot more fun wringing out a Miata on the streets and the best part of it is that nobody takes notice. 

Quick cars are more fun on the street than fast cars. That's why Miatas and classic Minis and CRXs are great little street cars. You can play with them and wind them out and they chatter back at you. Or, in the case of the Mini, yell in your face.

Although there's something about just tickling the accelerator and getting that instant shove in the back from big displacement. My M5 is a Bob Costascat to drive all the time, but if you let it off the leash it's a totally different car. You forget just what it can do which is why it's so shocking when you bury the throttle. I suspect the Z06 is the same, although it doesn't act quite as much like a four door sedan in sedate mode.

edit: "Bob Costacat" . Thanks for the morning laugh, GRM filter.

I haven't owned anything that fast, but personally I find the MS3 a bit more than you "need" if you poke it on the street - it's going to be breaking the law in short order. I've been looking around for something with lower limits.

mazdeuce - Seth said:

 All depends on what you're in to and how you feel about things like speed limits. 

I live in Ohio, so how I feel about speed limits is less relevant than how the infamous Ohio Highway Patrol feel about it .  Usually try to keep it to 5 over or so at the most, in order to avoid drawing attention.  Most of my street fun is the backroads near my house, including a chain of 3 near 90 degree turns, a few quick split seconds of acceleration when no one is in front of me, and the occasional burst of speed up an onramp.  My wife's GTI is pretty fun for that kind of stuff, but it's her car, so I don't have unlimited access to it.  My current daily driver is a GS430, and the acceleration is nice, and handling is nice for its size, but not great compared to anything I'm looking at(except maybe a Jeep Wrangler, but that's a dark horse).

Sounds like Vettes and such are nice and tame on the streets when you aren't pushing them, which I kind of figured, but maybe not as fun as other options could be.  Still, I like the looks of the C6 quite a bit, and they are new enough that Bubba hasn't really gotten to them yet. 

I don't think it would be fun for me unless you put four space saver spares in it like Chris Harris did on that amg Mercedes. I have no direct experience with a C6 but have driven a C5 a bit and while extremely capable, when driven at normal road speeds it's not very engaging. Double the speed limit, or more, and it's very engaging. Our speed limits are 75 around here.

If be much happier in a C3 on the street if I had to have a vette. 

mazdeuce - Seth said:

That's a tough question. With almost any modern car the fun limit on cornering is tires. Modern 200tw tires are absurd on the street as the limits are just so high that you're playing a different game than everyone around you. Cars that are balanced are more fun closer to the limit no matter what the tires. 

 

Alright SETH put it better then I did here. I am going to steal this FYI. 

Frankly there are a lot of other very very interesting things out there that are more fun on the street for the price or less then a C6. 

I’ve had a C6, C5, C4 and C3.  The C6 was a daily driver even in Miami traffic with a 6 speed manual.  Perfectly acceptable.  I averaged 27 mpg.  Never tracked it.  The build quality was definitely GM but I liked the car.  My C4 and C5 were and are primarily track toys.  The C5 is just about the perfect cost to fun ratio IMHO.  It has a rebuilt engine putting 440hp to the rear wheels, upgraded cooling, brakes, shocks and sway bars.  I find it to be a much faster car than I can take 100% advantage of.  I drive it to and from the track.  Great gas mileage on the highway.  At this point a good C5 is just about the same price as a C6.  Parts and aftermarket are great.  Forums are plentiful.  I recommend either one.  There are tons available, take your time and buy the nicest one you can afford.

Only ticket I ever got in the C6 was for tinted taillights...

Whatever the automotive equivalent to a supermoto is would probably be the most fun street car ever and it would not be a vette. Small, good visibility, light, quick acceleration but not necessarily high top speed, a suspension that lets you hit bumps/ruts with abandon.

Jaynen said:

Whatever the automotive equivalent to a supermoto is would probably be the most fun street car ever and it would not be a vette. Small, good visibility, light, quick acceleration but not necessarily high top speed, a suspension that lets you hit bumps/ruts with abandon.

323GTX?

The original Subaru 25RS on stock suspension. The GTX is pretty good in that regard too.

Hmm.  Overwhelming power is fun, but the issue today is that most of us live in areas far to populated to be able to exploit said overwhelming power.

My last DD was a Cayenne Turbo S, 525hp.  Lots of fun to mat it on an onramp.  Everywhere else I was using maybe half that power and feeling like everyone around me was driving slowly.  Plus getting 13mpg.  Not so great.

My current DD is a Cayenne Diesel, which has enough punch to be entertaining, keeps up with traffic without issue and gets 27mpg. 

My E36 M3 is probably the right mix for a fun street car, even though it's my track car.  It's probably making close to 300hp, has great brakes, great handling, makes great noises.  You can unleash it in the first few gears and not be thrown in jail. 

My 02 wrx is way more fun than i ever had in my corvette doing legal things.  I kinda feel meh about anything on the street anymore but the wrx actually makes driving fun if i want it to be.  Corvette was great to get you beyond 100 quickly and making that feel like 65 when you got there, 

I was thinking more about this driving the kids around. I think there's something about the number of interactions with the car and how good each of those is. Autocross is fun because you're always doing something fun, turning, mashing the gas, braking. Driving on track adds shifting and the element of speed. Rallycross adds the uncertainties that come with a lose surface.

Road driving is most often driving in a straight line with other cars, so the difference between good and bad is how well it does that combined with the few times a day you get to go around a corner or accelerate. If you live in twisty country then you turn more, if you live in the middle part of the country, you drive in a straight line more. Stop and go sucks for everyone. 

My Mazda2 was brilliant at all the turning and rowing the gears and all of that, but the wheelbase and gearing and lack of cruise made it suck for the straight line stuff. The R63 is brilliant in a straight line and a rocket at accelerating but you don't get to shift and turning at any sort of speed makes me sad. The 911 is about perfect at everything except it's leaking oil and keeps increasing in value. Finding a great street car is hard. 

We had a manual trans C6 for a short while.  It was a nice car in normal driving because it was comfortable, had decent features, and enough acceleration to thump most other cars anytime you need/want to.  On our local mountain roads, it was too fast and had too much grip to be 'fun' within the bounds of sanity.  Our NA Miata, by comparison, was much more fun to drive on the same road because you could cane the nuts off it and not worry so much about going to jail or dying in a fiery crash.

Interestingly, our NA has since grown into a track car that has enough grip that it now has the same problem.  Fortunately, I have a stockish NB to fulfill that role.

Another anecdotal thought:  I recently drove a friend's Porsche GT3 over the same roads.  It was incredibly fast.... faster than the 'Vette, but where the 'Vette was 'bull in a china shop' fast, the GT3 was like driving a Miata... with 475hp and race tire grip.  It was incredible... but it also had the same problem:  having fun requires speed that's stupid on the road.

Having all the capability of a C6 in a DD would be fun, because you always know it's there, but it would also be frustrating from the standpoint of how rarely you can use it.  

I think this is why the "hot hatches" are so fun on a backroad