The Corvette SS

The Corvette SS was the brain child Harley Earl, who was GMs styling.

  He began this project in 1956 with the idea that Chevrolet would try to compete with top competitors in international endurance racing.

The basic conception was to create a racy body design and put the D Type chassis from the Jaguar in it. They would replace the Jaguar 6 cylinder with a Chevrolet V8.

Zora Arkus Duntov, Corvettes engineering genies didn’t want to use the Jaguar chassis, but wanted to create a new one that would use ground breaking concepts. Duntov’s main reason for wanting a new design was that there was no real way to use the Jaguars chassis.

Duntov decided to purchase a Mercedes Benz 300SL frame to gather information and ideas. He designed the Corvette SS frame and structure from Mercedes.

After he finished that design, he added a new braking system, and designed it to include the V8 and a new rear axle.

Unfortunately the Corvette SS’ debut was too hasty and ill prepared. They had many developmental delays which proved to be quite substantial. Racing stars at that time Stirling Moss and Juan Fangio were going to debut the Corvette SS in 1957. After all the delays they both had second thoughts and backed out, and Piero Taruffi and John Fitch were going to debut it. It was a major let down when they were unable to complete the race and bow out after only 23 laps.

Although they had all these problems, engineers and developers decided to keep on with the project. After a short time they were going to enter the car in the LeMans race. At that time however, was when the AMA (Automobile Manufacturers Assoc) started the racing ban. The Corvette SS had now become a show car.