2023 C8 Corvette Z06 Experiences Engine Failure at Just 621 Miles

It’s an exciting time in the world of Corvette as the C8 Z06 has just begun to find its way into the hands of enthusiasts. With an awesome spec sheet, this car has been highly anticipated and it’s finally time for the push to come to shove to see just how it stands up against expectations.

For one particular Corvette owner who goes by the name of steelankles on YouTube, it seems as if comparing reality to those expectations is going to have to wait a little bit.

After taking ownership of a C8 Z06 of his own, our host would quickly find that he had what essentially amounts to an expensive paperweight on his hands. After 621 miles of driving, the engine powering the Corvette would blow up. The owner tells us that this came after the recommended street driving break-in period of 500 miles.

Not too long after this break-in, the owner of the car had a GoPro ready to capture whatever sort of driving he had in mind. What he caught, instead, was a quick acceleration followed by the “clunk clunk clunk” sound that the vehicle’s owner described.

The man behind the Z says that he has had a number of high-performance vehicles and typically doesn’t really pay much attention to the break-in period. This time, though, he says that he was much more careful and decided to take it easy on his new Corvette. That simply wouldn’t do enough to change the fate of the American supercar, unfortunately.

Shortly after the failure, the owner headed over to Rick Hendrick City Corvette and Charlotte, NC. It was at this point that General Motors expedited the shipping of a replacement engine which was ready to roll in just two weeks. I’m sure that this isn’t how anybody wants to start their stint of ownership of such an expensive car. However, at this point in the timeline, this particular machine is already getting its second set of break-in miles.

Maybe this time the owner will exercise even more extreme caution and take the car up to the 1500-mile period that General Motors recommends before any sort of track use.