2018 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE: Chevy Sharpens Its Lead Pipe
On this episode of Ignition presented by Tire Rack
Category
🚗
MotorTranscript
00:00 (orchestral music)
00:02 (engine revving)
00:16 - Hi there.
00:22 I'm up in nowhere Washington near the Canadian border
00:25 driving the brand new 2018
00:28 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE.
00:31 Before I can tell you what the 1LE version is like,
00:34 let me refresh your memory about the ZL1.
00:38 (engine revving)
00:40 (upbeat music)
00:46 (phone ringing)
00:55 (birds chirping)
00:58 The 1LE moniker is Camaro shorthand
01:03 for tracked up versions that can stop and turn better.
01:06 Though, there's no increase in power.
01:09 Currently, Chevy will sell you a V6 1LE,
01:12 a V8 powered SS 1LE, and now this,
01:16 the ripped, snorting 650 horsepower ZL1 1LE.
01:21 How do you tell if the Camaro you're looking at
01:24 is part of the 1LE family?
01:26 The telltale sign is a blacked out hood.
01:28 Other than that, the body's the same.
01:30 Same grill opening, but the grill itself is more aggressive.
01:34 In fact, it flows more air.
01:36 Why do you want more air?
01:37 Well, more cooling, more aero,
01:38 whatever you wanna do with clean air, you got it.
01:40 (engine revving)
01:43 They also removed the DRLs, the daytime running lights,
01:46 which saves seven pounds.
01:48 In fact, this car is 60 pounds lighter than a regular ZL1.
01:52 But by removing those DLRs,
01:54 the openings are bigger,
01:55 so you can now flow more air into the intercooler,
01:57 into the brake ducts, whatever you wanna do with it.
01:59 Speaking of air flow, up front,
02:01 you've got that giant splitter
02:03 flanked by those insane canards, or dive planes.
02:07 In fact, they're so aggressive,
02:09 you can't sell this car in Europe
02:11 because it'll fail pedestrian safety standards.
02:13 How cool is that?
02:14 I mean, that's reason enough to buy the car right there.
02:17 (engine revving)
02:22 Moving to the back, you have that giant rear wing,
02:24 which was co-developed by Pratt & Miller,
02:27 and that's Chevy's race partner for Le Mans.
02:29 At 150 miles per hour,
02:31 this thing creates 300 pounds of downforce.
02:35 You might be thinking, when will we ever need that?
02:37 Well, if you watch the Nurburgring lap video,
02:40 you'll see that the ZL1 1LE
02:42 goes over 155 miles per hour four times,
02:46 and over 165 miles an hour three different times.
02:50 So, there's that.
02:51 Also, don't forget,
02:53 this freak is a 650 horsepower force of nature.
02:57 150 miles an hour will happen.
03:00 (engine revving)
03:03 Number one rule of business is know thy customer,
03:05 and Chevy knows that track rats
03:08 like nothing more than adjustability.
03:10 Even if the cars don't need it,
03:11 they love to tinker and adjust their cars.
03:13 So, there's three places you can adjust the 1LE.
03:17 You can raise and lower the ride height by 10 millimeters,
03:19 although I would suggest against lowering the ride height
03:22 10 millimeters if you're on the street, track only.
03:25 But, if you wanna break your splitter off,
03:26 hey, it's a free country, do what you like.
03:29 Out back, the stabilizer bar has three positions,
03:31 neutral, understeer, oversteer.
03:33 Why would you want understeer?
03:34 I'll tell you something,
03:36 high-speed stability is increased by more understeer,
03:39 so sometimes you want it.
03:41 But hey, if you're a real tough guy,
03:43 put it in oversteer mode.
03:44 Plus, also, every track is different.
03:46 You do wanna set a car up based on the track it's on.
03:49 The final and coolest part of the 1LE's adjustability
03:52 is camber, and lots of it.
03:54 Normally, the car has negative 1.7 degrees of front camber.
03:58 However, if you jack it up,
04:00 remove three bolts from the blue
04:02 anodized aluminum camber plates,
04:04 and rotate 'em half a turn,
04:05 you suddenly have up to 3.7 degrees of negative camber.
04:10 Though, Chevy thinks negative 2.7 is best.
04:13 But hey, do what you like.
04:15 Now, it's true, 3.7 degrees is hell on your tires,
04:19 but again, man, it's your car.
04:21 Destroy 'em.
04:23 Speaking of tires, the Z01 1LE rides
04:25 on the new Goodyear Eagle F1 Supercar R3,
04:29 and it's the first race compound street tire
04:32 that Goodyear's ever sold.
04:33 Their target, of course,
04:35 was the Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2,
04:37 and from where I'm sitting, they basically got there.
04:40 (upbeat music)
04:43 (engine revving)
04:45 The most significant difference between this car
04:48 and the regular Z01, if you can call that monster regular,
04:51 are the shocks.
04:52 They're made by a little company in Canada
04:54 called Multimatic.
04:55 They're referred to as DSSVs, or spool valve dampers,
04:59 and you will find them on F1 cars,
05:01 the Aston Martin 177, the new Ford GT,
05:05 and this here Camaro,
05:06 and it is exotic advanced race car technology.
05:10 The big advantage with spool valves is this.
05:12 The same damper at low speed
05:14 can do a completely different compression
05:16 and rebound profile than at high speed.
05:19 So you can actually tune the damper
05:21 to make sure that the wheels are in contact
05:23 with the ground as much as possible, no matter the speed.
05:26 They are non-adjustable in the traditional sense,
05:28 so you do give up a little bit of ride quality,
05:31 but again, this is a track car.
05:32 You wanna give that up so you can get more control.
05:35 (engine revving)
05:38 I was being too kind.
05:40 Over rough surfaces, the ZL1-1LE's ride sucks,
05:44 especially when the rear dampers run out of travel.
05:47 Stay away from potholes.
05:49 And then Chevy took those awesome dampers
05:52 and hard mounted them to the body.
05:54 There's no rubber in the suspension.
05:56 There's no bushings.
05:57 It's just metal on metal, and it's severe,
06:00 and it's abnormal, and it really makes this thing
06:02 an uncaged race car, and that's totally cool with me.
06:06 (engine revving)
06:08 (upbeat music)
06:11 This car is so analog.
06:16 It's just a machine that you drive.
06:17 You're doing everything.
06:18 (upbeat music)
06:21 And when you get it right, I mean, just yeah!
06:27 Yeah!
06:28 (upbeat music)
06:31 It's just awesome.
06:33 Oh, what a machine!
06:35 What a beast!
06:38 It's way too much for this road.
06:40 I've gotta find a race track.
06:41 (engine revving)
06:45 You can tell that we must be really close to Canada,
06:48 that the people are really friendly,
06:49 because this whole area is infested with hitchhikers.
06:53 There's one right there.
06:54 Bo Bandi?
06:59 Randy?
07:03 Johnny?
07:04 What are you doing here?
07:06 - Well, I was on my way up to this great new race track
07:09 in Canada, just over the border.
07:10 It's called Area 27.
07:13 I got in a little hot water, and now I'm walking.
07:16 - Well, what a coincidence, because as both fate
07:18 and our script would have it, I'm in search of a race track.
07:22 - Well, can I ride with you?
07:24 - Yeah!
07:25 - Can I drive?
07:27 - You always say that.
07:28 - Thanks, Johnny.
07:29 - Yeah, yeah, yeah.
07:30 - This is my lucky day.
07:32 - Yeah, yeah.
07:35 (dramatic music)
07:38 (engines revving)
07:41 (dramatic music)
08:02 (engines revving)
08:05 - All right, we made it to our race track.
08:18 Randy, let me ask you, you spend a lot of time
08:21 tracking the ZL1, the regular car,
08:23 if you can use the word regular to describe that thing.
08:25 - Yes.
08:26 - How does this one differ from the regular ZL1?
08:30 - It's got more race car in it.
08:32 It's a lot firmer suspension.
08:34 - So you notice that the Multimatic DSSV,
08:38 or as they're called, spool valve shocks,
08:40 they make a big difference compared
08:41 to the magnetic dampers on the ZL1.
08:44 - Yes, they do.
08:45 They're very firm.
08:46 The car is completely controlled.
08:49 No sense of body roll, squat, dive.
08:51 Everything is so controlled.
08:54 (dramatic music)
08:59 - What do you make of these tires?
09:01 'Cause these are the tires that Goodyear developed
09:03 to compete with the legendary Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2.
09:06 - Well, I think the grip is very good, Johnny.
09:09 It's a tire that is just kind of safe, right?
09:13 - So what are you feeling is the dominant characteristic?
09:17 Understeer, oversteer, neutral?
09:19 - The car seems to be extremely well balanced to me.
09:22 It's stable, so it's got enough understeer to be stable,
09:26 but not enough to be annoying or frustrating.
09:29 I mean, that's a lot of power to put down, Johnny,
09:31 and it's a sign that the Goodyears are working.
09:34 Look.
09:35 That's second gear flat out, 650 pound-feet of torque,
09:40 and it just bites.
09:41 - Yeah, it really does.
09:42 - It just bites.
09:43 - Yeah, the car gets serious all of a sudden.
09:45 (car engine revving)
09:47 What do you make of the brakes on this car?
09:49 - You know what?
09:50 The car stops really well.
09:51 I'm not feeling fade.
09:53 The tire grip is amazing in braking.
09:55 I'll bet we got a really short stop in this concern.
09:58 (rock music)
10:01 - Okay, so tell me about the aero.
10:03 - We do know that we've got 300 pounds of downforce
10:06 at 150 miles an hour.
10:08 - Yeah.
10:09 - Right?
10:10 - Yeah.
10:11 - So to honestly say that we're feeling downforce,
10:13 we're gonna be going well over 100.
10:15 (rock music)
10:17 - So we need to be at the Nurburgring
10:20 to really take full advantage of what this car's capable of.
10:23 - Oh, it'll be a good setup for the Nurburgring.
10:25 Even though we're not at the Nurburgring,
10:27 maybe it's time for you to set a hot lap in this car.
10:30 - Yes, please.
10:31 - Okay, but not here.
10:33 How about at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca?
10:36 - Oh, yeah, I know the line there.
10:38 - Before we leave Canada,
10:40 I should mention that Randy was able
10:42 to beat the Camaro engineer who set the Nurburgring lap
10:45 on area 27 by a tenth of a second
10:48 after only half a day on the track.
10:50 As for knowing his way around Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca,
10:54 well, Randy has set and broken the production car lap record
10:57 there close to 20 times.
11:00 Here he goes.
11:01 (car engine revving)
11:04 (car engine revving)
11:07 (car engine revving)
11:11 (car engine revving)
11:14 (car engine revving)
11:17 (car engine revving)
11:25 (car engine revving)
11:32 (car engine revving)
11:43 (car engine revving)
11:46 (car engine revving)
11:53 (car engine revving)
12:12 (car engine revving)
12:15 (car engine revving)
12:21 (car engine revving)
12:31 To put one minute, 34.30 seconds in perspective for you,
12:41 the lap record for a production car back in 2012
12:44 was 134.43 set by a Corvette Z06.
12:49 An Audi R8 V10 Plus is seven hundredths
12:52 of a second quicker, hundredths.
12:55 Last year's Best Driver Car winner,
12:57 the mid-engine carbon-tubbed McLaren 570S ran a 134.58.
13:02 Remember the fifth-gen Camaro Z28,
13:06 the super track-focused freak
13:07 with one speaker and no air conditioning?
13:10 It could only muster a 137.82
13:13 and cost about $4,000 more than the ZL1 1LE.
13:18 What Chief Engineer Al Oppenheiser and his team
13:20 have achieved with this fiend is remarkable.
13:23 Again, a Camaro, any Camaro,
13:25 is quicker around Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca
13:28 than a McLaren, any McLaren?
13:30 Do you believe it?
13:32 I don't even know if I believe it, and I was there.
13:35 The ZL1 is an ear-shattering full stack
13:38 of a car to begin with.
13:40 The 1LE version grabs the knob and cranks it past 11.
13:44 The only lame part of the new Camaro ZL1 1LE is this,
13:51 this X sticker, and really it's just stupid.
13:54 The good news is, it peels right off.
13:56 (whooshing)
13:58 you