Chevy Corvette Dash Cam Busts Valet Joyriding During Car’s Break-In Period
Exceeding a certain rpm limit during the break-in period may void the Corvette owner’s factory warranty.
At some point, valet parking attendants and dealership mechanics have to learn that a lot of new performance cars from General Motors—including the eighth-generation Corvette—can be optioned with a factory-installed dashcam. It's called the Performance Data Recorder. Taking a 2023 C8 out on a joyride is a bad idea for that reason, but it didn't stop one Alabama airport valet from taking to the streets in a customer's brand-new Stingray.
The employee got caught, obviously, and the worst part of it is that the car was brand new at the time and was revved well past its break-in RPMs during the stunt. The vehicle's owner, Tim Scherer, is justifiably upset.
This recently happened at Birmingham airport, as local news station WVTM 13 reports. Scherer dropped the car at the valet and took off for his flight as normal. When he returned, he noticed the odometer had flipped from 300 miles to 304. Out of curiosity, he checked the car's PDR. It turns out the valet had taken the vehicle for a short spin around the airport, and while the speeds weren't necessarily excessive, the rpms definitely were.
GM recommends that new Corvettes do not exceed 4,000 rpm for the first 500 miles of ownership. Whether or not that's actually necessary is debatable, but the automaker does base warranty claims on this information. The valet in the video can be seen revving the car well past the limit more than once. The driver even brags on the recorded interior audio that he has given such treatment to other cars, including the "top surgeon in Birmingham's McLaren." A straight shooter with upper management written all over him.
Scherer spoke to the valet company after the incident. It initially assured him that the business would be responsible if anything went wrong with the car. Later, however, he received a letter stating that the company would not accept any liability or admit to any wrongdoing, as it claimed no damage was done to the vehicle.
Airport officials have said that they are "looking into this matter" and that they will "cooperate in any way possible to ensure the responsible parties are held accountable for any misconduct." That may sound like a nothing-burger statement, but at the very least, Scherer has been told by the valet company that the individual responsible has been fired for his actions. That's probably the best he can hope for.
We've seen a very similar incident in the past, albeit more extreme. Back in 2021, a dealership mechanic was caught taking a customer's C8 up to 148 miles per hour in a street race on a California highway. The owner of the dealership went above and beyond to make the situation right, however, firing the technician responsible and even giving the aggravated owner a brand new Corvette. Scherer certainly can't expect that kind of treatment, but his goal of warning other car enthusiasts about this kind of behavior has definitely succeeded.
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