The new 6.7-liter LS6 makes 535 horsepower and 520 pound-feet of torque, setting a new bar for the base Corvette Stingray.
Displacing 6.7 liters, GM's new small-block V-8 makes 535 horsepower and 520 pound-feet of torque, the highest output of any Chevy Corvette base engine.Dubbed the LS6, it features a lofty 13.0:1 compression ratio plus new cylinder heads with water jackets that enable targeted cooling.
A large 95-mm throttle body feeds a tunnel-ram plenum with intake runners that are tuned to increase air speed into the combustion chambers.Mighty 409-cubic-inch, big-block V-8s may have rocked drag strips back in the day, but those motors never made it into the engine bay of any factory Corvette. That changes with the introduction of a new LS6 V-8 displacing 6.7 liters as the base engine in the 2027 Corvette Stingray and the newly announced Grand Sport and Grand Sport X. General Motors says it went with the LS6 nomenclature because this new mill adopts port fuel injection and is the sixth generation of the small-block V-8, which means it has 4.4-inch bore spacing and retains a cam-in-block design with rocker arms and two valves per cylinder. Like the 2026 Stingray's 6.2-liter LT2 V-8, the LS6 also features direct injection , with Chevrolet referring to the new dual-fueling setup as PDI. The New LS6 Raises the Bar Where the outgoing LT2 V-8 produces up to 495 horsepower and 470 pound-feet of torque, this new 6.7-liter LS6 makes a cool 535 ponies and 520 pound-feet. That's the most horses—and the highest naturally aspirated torque—for any standard Corvette. Sharp-eyed readers will note that both engines produce roughly 80 hp per liter. For the LS6, GM left the bore intact at 103.25 mm, but increased its stroke to a nice round 100.00 mm. Still just barely over square, piston speed goes up significantly as the 6500-rpm redline remains, which necessitated a switch to forged pistons and connecting rods. The longer stroke brings with it a massive increase in torque, and the peak twist now arrives at just 4600 rpm versus the LT2's 5150 revs.Mike Kobica, assistant chief engineer of small-block engines, says that the compression ratio was raised to a healthy 13.0:1, up from the LT2’s 11.5:1. 'If you get the CR up, it helps everything, but it can be a nightmare.' He went on to explain how they offset this with new cylinder heads that have a two-piece water jacket, with targeted cooling around the hottest parts of the combustion chamber, namely the regions surrounding the spark plugs and the exhaust valves. 'If you'd have said at the beginning that we'd end up with a higher compression ratio than we had in the leaded fuel days, we'd have thought you were crazy.'You have to move a lot of air to make this much power and torque, and that's where the LS6's new tunnel-ram intake comes in. The throttle body has been upsized from 87 to 95 mm, and it feeds into an unrestricted plenum with 11.5 liters of volume and 130-mm intake runners, somewhat less than the 14.2 liters and 220-mm runners of the LT2. The idea is to get the speed up to 'encourage the air to get to the cylinder heads at just the right velocity at the right time.' He went on to explain, ' did some bake-offs. We had the computers coming up with their models, and then we had the graybeards in the flow lab. These are technicians that don’t even use gauges. They use their ears to listen, and they know that it's flowing right when it's really singing.'Other changes include a second oil feed to the crankshaft to combat the risk of oil starvation at the higher connecting rod pressures. The LS6 also sees the return of 'tri-Y' exhaust manifolds, which were done not so much for improving power but for producing a ferocious exhaust tone. Also, there is no performance exhaust system on LS6-equipped Vettes, so you won't need to option anything to get the full power and torque. There is an available center-exhaust setup, but that doesn't affect the output. It does, however, make the V-8's wail sound that much more glorious, so you might want to check that box. Finally, the new base Corvette Stingray retains its final drive ratio of 4.89:1, but Z51-equipped models and the Grand Sport twins adopt the Z06's ratio of 5.56:1. Of course, the Grand Sport X supplements the LS6 with 186 hp of front-axle electric power, for a combined wallop of 721 hp. ➡️ Skip the lot. Let Car and Driver help you find your next car.Shop New Cars Shop Used Cars
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