Plant News - 3/17/02

[N4C5S]

Been a couple weeks (I think there was a subscription problem) but we're back on track. Not a whole lot in this one, but some cool C5R info......

Enjoy.....



On track: C5Rs open season at Sebring

GM’s Corvette Team continues to improve a highly successful racing
machine, the Corvette C5-R, in preparation for the upcoming 2002 endurance racing season.

That season begins with this weekend’s 12 Hours of Sebring set for March 16 - the first of a ten race 2002 American Le Mans Series (ALMS).

In addition to the full ALMS schedule, the team will also return to Le Mans, France, to compete in the historic 24-hour race in June. Last June Corvette finished 1-2 in the GTS class at Le Mans in what many term the “world’s toughest road race.”

“We’ve put a lot of miles on both cars, somewhere near 1,000 miles per car at the most recent test,” said Doug Fehan, GM’s program manager for Corvette Racing. “By using both cars, we can test something on one car - then validate it on the other car. We can accomplish more in a shorter period of time using both cars this way.”

During 2001, Team Corvette won six of the eight ALMS races earning the Manufacturers Championship trophy for Chevrolet in the process. Corvette also finished 1st overall and 1 - 2 in class at 24 Hours of Daytona.

Brit Oliver Gavin will join Corvette regulars Ron Fellows, Johnny O’Connell, Andy Pilgrim, Kelly Collins and Franck Freon to handle the driving chores for the 2002 season. Gavin joins Fellows and O’Connell in the No. 3 GM Goodwrench Corvette for the four longer races on the schedule.

Pilgrim, Collins and Freon, who teamed to win final race of 2001, will again handle the No. 4 GM Goodwrench car.

This year’s ALMS series features three new race venues for 2002 - Miami (downtown), Washington D.C. (RFK Stadium) and Road America at Elkhart Lake, WI.

The Corvette C5-R racing program continues Chevrolet’s tradition of racing production-based vehicles and “racing to improve the breed.” Engineers working on the Corvette C5-R race car work closely with production car engineers to ensure that lessons learned on the race car will be used to benefit present and future Corvettes.






On the Job

C. Woodward is the last person to put the final touches on the cockpit of the Corvette before it goes to the Trim line. Woodward installs the hush panels under the steering column as well as installs the glovebox in every Corvette. As the carrier brings the dash through the 17-30 line, Woodward screws the hush panels, the panel located above the gas and brake and just beneath the steering column, to the rest of the dash and then moves on to bolt the glovebox in place. Once the glovebox is in place, she secures the sun visor wires and then begins her routine all over again.

A native of St. Louis, Woodward’s father, C***, worked at the St. Louis Corvette facility before he transferred to Bowling Green in 1981. Tebbe retired in 1998 and two years later Woodward started working for GM on the cockpit line. She has been on the cockpit line for a year and a half but is signed up to join the Cadillac team when production begins.

When not busy at work, she likes to spend time with her husband, *****, and her two sons, **** and *****. She also likes to help others in the community and at her church where she serves as a Deacon’s Wife, (an outreach program) and as a Sunday school teacher. An avid bowler, she has also coached Special Olympics bowling for the last six years. Other hobbies are fishing and cross stitching.

Says this busy lady of her work at Corvette, “I enjoy working on the Corvette line and the people I work with, but I’m looking forward to moving to Cadillac.”