Sometimes a set of spy photos drops onto our digital desks that leave us scratching our heads trying to figure out what we’re looking at. At first blush, this did not appear to be one of those times. What you’re looking at above looks like it could be a plug-in hybrid Chevy Corvette. As you can see from the images in the gallery, there’s some sort of wiring harness dangling out of an opening in the car’s front trunk along with a big red electric kill switch. While that looks like it could be for charging purposes, an Autoblog commenter suggests it might instead be for easy jumpstarting location.
Either way, we expect that a plug-in hybrid Corvette is in the works, even if we don’t have all the salient details. For instance, beyond the fact that there’s surely an internal combustion engine mounted in the middle and, assuming this is indeed a hybrid, at least one electric motor contributing thrust, we don’t know what the gas engine’s displacement may be or even how many cylinders that engine contains. The spy shooters who witnessed the car drive by say they thought it sounded like a V6, but that’s not a lot to go on. Speculation on an electrified Corvette in the past has also included talk of all-wheel drive with an electric motor powering the front wheels and a traditional engine sending ponies to the rear.
Back when the mid-engine C8 was first unveiled, GM President Mark Reuss suggested this latest Corvette worked into GM’s “strategy of 0-0-0: zero emissions, zero crashes, zero congestion.” Reading between those lines, we wouldn’t be surprised if a plug-in ‘Vette would be able to travel solely on electric power for short jaunts. But we’d also expect any electrification to contribute to the car’s overall acceleration, considering the Corvette’s role as GM’s high-performance flagship.
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