Quote:
Originally Posted by tomato coupe
It seems to be a weird Corvette thing. I have test driven many high performance cars. Sometimes a salesman rode along, and sometimes they just tossed me the keys and asked that I bring the car back in an hour. The only other car I was unable to test drive was a Viper, but that was a one-time thing.
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The salesman doesn't care, he/she will never be footing the bill if something you do puts undue wear on the car that will only manifest later. (E.x. burning up the clutch on the test drive, the car will still seem fine but whoever buys it might have to replace the clutch earlier than they should have)
I do agree it's probably way less likely you're going to damage an automatic transmission/automated manual car, and if the manufacturer really has a break in like restricted RPMs until you hit a certain mileage/hours then they should be programming that into the computer.
The stereotype of the Corvette owner is very easy driving though I guess.
You want to see a tough buying experience go try and see if anyone will let you test ride a high performance sport bike.
At one point I was allowed to test ride a used sport bike.. after I had many years of experience with the dealership and they knew I was skilled & responsible. I was never ever able to test ride a brand new bike though.
For good reason, it's so easy to find those videos where the new buyer totals the bike < 100 yards out of the dealership when they pick it up.
Speaking of break in a couple of the motorcycles I owned had severe break in guidelines, one was so severe you couldn't go on the highway till the break in procedure was done because it limited you to 50mph for the early break in. Almost all bikes like that will do 75mph in first gear, many do 100mph in first gear, so a clueless test ride would absolutely blow right through those RPM limits.