Everybody has an opinion on auto-start/stop, that aspect of modern cars that’s become weirdly politicized. I say “weirdly” because it’s largely optional now, and there’s nothing intrinsically political about saving money and making air easier to breathe at the same time. That’s not to say I love the feature, or think it belongs in everything. Because as soon as it announced itself to me in the Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray I’ve been driving for the past few days, I shook my head laughing.
On some level, there is a very practical argument for giving the E-Ray auto-start/stop: 6.2-liter V8s burn a lot of gas, don’t you know, and the E-Ray isn’t like a plug-in hybrid with a big battery that can supply decent all-electric range. It can run for few miles on electrons alone, but you’re spraying fuel into those cylinders pretty much the entire time. As it happens, the E-Ray is one of two C8 models to have the technology, the other being the mighty ZR1X.
The issue with a Corvette having such a feature is that the engine is quite loud, and starting it shakes the car in a way I find satisfying but don’t really need to experience once or twice at every stop light. I very much enjoy the LT2’s rasp emanating inches from my spine, but I also know that the sound of someone’s car is typically welcome only to them. Sitting completely still and hearing the V8 repeatedly fall silent and roar back to life—especially as it gets warmer out, and the motor needs to kick back on to feed cold air into the cabin—is almost a public nuisance. It feels silly.
Auto-start/stop tech has gotten so good that, when it works as intended in a car with good sound insulation, you barely notice it. You want something like that in a comfortable, smooth, and quiet luxury vehicle, like the Land Rover I drove immediately before this. A car that feels like a spaceship, hovering over the road surface on a cloud, where you can go 80 mph and feel like you’re barely moving. The exact opposite sensations that a midship V8 supercar intends to evoke.
And then there’s the other problem with the way GM has implemented the feature in the E-Ray. It’s a little harder to defend auto-start/stop in vehicles that don’t let you turn it off permanently. The E-Ray offers a grand total of six drive modes, but even if you switch off auto-start/stop while in your customizable “My Mode,” it will flip back on the next time you fire up the car.
At least the toggle is very conveniently accessible on the left-side touch control panel, since you may find yourself tapping it before every journey. This will be a dealbreaker for some people, and to them, all I’ll say is you’d be missing out on quite an incredible machine in exchange for one minor inconvenience. Yeah, it shouldn’t work that way, but believe me: Considering everything else the E-Ray gives you, it’s an annoyance I’m willing to accept. Not to say I wouldn’t recommend GM reconsider this decision when the hybrid Vette becomes the even more powerful Grand Sport next year.
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