A chronology of the Corvette LS engines

[6 Shooter]

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The debut of the LS1 engine, which happened just before the introduction of the C5 Corvette, came with all the usual GM hype at a New Jersey press conference. "This is the new Corvette motor." Yeah, right. We all knew this was really a new truck motor, but the food was good. We also liked the fact that the Corvette would get the first LS engines released by GM. The trucks would have to wait.

Over the last dozen years, this LS engine series has gotten rather lengthy and even a little confusing. As we suspected on that morning in New Jersey, this engine was not designed just for the Corvette. Rather, it was going to find its way into a huge variety of engine compartments.

The Generation III, or LS, small-blocks replaced the LT family in 1997. They shared the same basic displacement and bore spacing (4.4 inches) as the earlier engines, but almost everything else changed.

Corvette Fever article...

 

[Hib Halverson]

The debut of the LS1 engine, which happened about a year before the introduction of the C5, came with all the usual GM hype at a New Jersey press conference. "This is the new Corvette motor." Yeah, right. We all knew this was really a new truck motor, but the food was good. We also liked the fact that the Corvette would get the first LS engines released by GM. The trucks would have to wait.

What a bunch of crap!

The "debut" of the Gen III V8 was not at "a New Jersey press conference." It was introduced on 11 June 1996 at a two-hour media preview event at the Airport Marriott Hotel in Los Angeles, California, about nine months before C5 went on sale. The event drew press from all over the world and was only the second time in the history of General Motors that a major media presentation was staged solely for an engine.

How do I know that?
Uh, well...
I was there.

"Corvette Fever" retained me to cover the event and write a feature-length story on the new engine. The article published in that magazine's August 1996 issue. The text of that CF article is archived at: The Millennium Motor - Inside C5's, LS1 Engine.

As for: "...it was really a new truck motor..." and the "...food was good..." Oh, Pa-leeze! Nothing like distorting the facts and minimizing of the impact that engine had on automotive history. Makes one wonder what the heck's going on at CF...appearently, not much credible journalism.

Reality is that, at the time, only a few who attended the 11 June '96 preview understood that the way GM "paid for" a new Corvette engine was through a simultaneous development program run with the Truck Group. It wasn't until the publication of Jim Shefter's All Corvettes are Red the following year would that fact become more widely known.

In fact, the all-aluminum, high-performance, 5.7L version of the Gen III V8 was exclusive and specific to Corvette. The LS1 block, pistons, oil pan, heads, camshaft and intake manifold were unique to the Y-car application. The truck versions, initially with iron blocks, different pistons, oil pans, heads, cams and intakes, appeared in MY99 (GMT800s) and MY00 (GMT820/830s).

As for the food...as I recall, no meal was served at that media event.

The CF article excerpted in "6shooter's" OP– "The chronology of the Corvette LS Engines" lacks one act of very basic research...ie: a writer reading past issues of the same publication.

Fortunately Source Interlink is going to kill that magazine before what's left of its past, storied reputation is completely soiled.