Romeo Ferraris Builds a Savage, Supercharged Chevrolet Corvette Z06
You gotta feel for Chevrolet Corvette Z06 owners. Until last year, theirs were the fastest , most powerful and most exclusive Plastic Fantastics you could buy new, featuring the 7.0L LS7 V8 with 505hp, an aluminum chassis (rather than the base Vette’s steel skeleton), and wider bodywork enclosing a tweaked suspension and bigger, grippier rolling stock. The Z06 was, and still is, an incredible car.
Of course, as we now know, “incredible” wasn’t enough for GM; hence the Corvette ZR1. But the advent of a new top-of-the-line Vette doesn’t mean the Z06 is no longer competitive; if anything, the high performance aftermarket is making it even more formidable. The latest tuning house to get in on that action is the rather confusingly named Italian outfit Romeo Ferraris.
The beast you see here (known as the Z06-RF) may look like it’s been rebodied with an unpainted carbon fiber skin, which would be a very pricey and expensive proposition. However, Romeo Ferraris didn’t have to worry about either of those things; that woven composite skin is actually a 3M DI-NOC vinyl wrap. Other visible tweaks include a set of Zone wheels, body-hugging sport seats (in place of the notoriously flat chairs found on all four grades of stock Corvette), a sport steering wheel and a billet shift knob.
While the exterior and interior have been given significant makeovers, the biggest news is under the hood; there you’ll find the battle-tested LS7, but with a Vortech centrifugal supercharger, intercooler, and high-flow injectors. Add a custom exhaust system on top of (or rather, underneath and behind) all that and the end result is 667hp and 607 lb.-ft of torque, gains of 29 and 3, respectively, over the ZR1’s 800cc-smaller, Rootes-blown LS9.
Naturally, numbers like that lead to numbers like these: 0-60 in 3.3 seconds and a top speed of 211 mph. Hoooo-boy. Good thing Romeo Ferraris also upgraded the brakes too (15” rotors with 6-piston calipers in front, 13.5” rotors and 4-piston calipers out back); stopping power is pretty important, especially in a vehicle capable of such insane speeds. Another important thing is how much this all costs, but Romeo Ferraris hasn’t put a pricetag on this monster. Considering a new unoptioned Z06 will set you back $74,305, a price in the neighborhood of the base ZR1’s $111,100 tab wouldn’t be to hard to fathom. Which would you rather have?
Source: Romeo Ferraris