Photo: Vengeance Racing

As most of us have seen by now, several lucky people now have a gorgeous 2015 Z06 sitting in their garage, and that’d sure make for one awesome holiday season!

Photos: High Tech Corvette

So far, we have seen a burnout in a Chevy dealership parking lot, and a dyno (dynamometer) pass from the guys over at Vengenace Racing. Although upon viewing a short clip of another dyno run from High Tech Corvette, we began to wonder if there is more here then meets the eye. It is not uncommon for the manufacturers of all things with internal combustion engines to tend to round up when it comes to their numbers. Maybe an engine that puts 493 hp out at the crank would be marketed at a clean 500 hp, or a motorcycle with a displacement of 437 cc would be a “450 cc engine.”

The thing that got our minds turning about GM’s newest Z06 was the amount of drivetrain loss (or lack there of) when comparing Chevrolet’s reported crank numbers to rear-wheel dyno tests. Chevy is claiming the new Z06 is belting out 650 hp and 650 lb-ft of torque at the crank. Well shown here, in a car that is probably far from having a full break-in, are real-wheel figures of about 572 hp and 590 lb-ft of torque, and they admitted this was completed as more of a “driving conditions dyno pull” with a hot engine.

Vengeance Racing did a dyno test as well showing 585 hp and 617 lb-ft. Between the two different tests, we have worst power loss of about 12-percent and a best of about 5-percent. Case in point, either Chevrolet is being rather generous with their reported figures compared to what the LT4 is actually producing, or the 2015 Z06 has one hell of an efficient drivetrain.

Which do you think it is and why?