[VIDEO] Tony Hawk Shares His Electrified 1964 Corvette on Jay Leno’s Garage

If you take place to see a black 1964 Corvette convertible that sounds like, properly, like the motor has been stolen, it may well just be Tony Hawk driving his now-silent electrified Sting Ray.&#13
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Again in 2019, the now-retired legendary skateboarder sent his ’64 Corvette to a California organization named EV West that specializes in changing gas-run automobiles to electrical electricity. Now, just after delays brought on by the pandemic, he’s ultimately having to see the car or truck for the initially time in a few a long time, and together for the trip is former Tonight Clearly show host and automobile buff Jay Leno.&#13
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Jay quips that they could elevate the hood, but there’s absolutely nothing underneath there but batteries, replacing the initial 327 V8 fuel motor that when resided there.&#13
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“We can nonetheless open up it up just to piss off all the purists,” Tony suggests with a superior-natured chortle.&#13
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“It seems like a coffin,” Jay suggests afterwards, on the lookout at a silver box entire of batteries and topped by an evil-on the lookout cranium emblem. He notes that you can not even see the new motor mainly because the back of the motor vehicle exactly where it is found doesn’t open up.&#13
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The Corvette is now powered by a Tesla modest drive unit that puts out 300 horsepower and helps make 2270 lb-ft of torque, with a one-speed transmission, though it can all be converted back if in the foreseeable future, his grandchildren may get a wild hair and say, “My grandpa mistakenly produced it electric…”&#13
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“I really do not believe the Corvette purists are gonna like this very substantially,” Tony surmises, “but I have by no means been a single to hold on to just all the initial parts. I necessarily mean, we even now have ’em…”&#13
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“Nothing’s been minimize,” Jay interjects. “The body hasn’t been modified. You can set the unique motor and transmission back in at any time.”&#13
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“So my apologies to all the GM purists out there,” Tony quips. &#13
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“And they will hunt you down…” Jay jokes.&#13
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Plenty of talking. Now it’s time for the two adult men to go for a brief trip in the electrical Sting Ray, and following a minor though powering the wheel, Tony says the dealing with still feels quite identical. “It feels the similar as it did,” he states. “I have this unconscious want to swap gears, like suitable now I want to downshift so badly!”&#13
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This fashionable consider on a classic Corvette definitely is a good deal distinct from the 1977 Honda Civic CVCC hatchback that Tony initial learned how to generate on. He purchased the automobile for $1,500, and his dad drove it to Tijuana and experienced it painted purple for his birthday.&#13
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“My father preferred me to find out how to tune up my auto, which I didn’t discover,” Tony admits.&#13
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Hawk says his family members was incredibly supportive of his skateboarding vocation, nevertheless his father handed absent in 1995, just right before Tony’s large wave of results.&#13
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“But my mother utilised to literally end strangers in the airport and say, ‘My son’s Tony Hawk!’ It is awesome when I’m not with her, but when I was with her, it was awkward.”&#13
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A World War II Navy veteran, his father was a “jack of all trades” and even shaped the National Skateboard Association when there was no sanctioning physique for skating activities “so he was a large supporter,” Tony claims.&#13
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Immediately after an ultra-productive 17-yr skateboarding career, Tony spends a lot with the Tony Hawk Basis that in excess of the previous 20 decades has invested much more than $10 million to enable make extra than 900 public skate parks in lower-money, underserved places.&#13
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So if you have manufactured it this much, Mr. and Ms. Corvette Purist, what do you consider about this conversion?&#13
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https://www.youtube.com/enjoy?v=8O6n2fsBPDg&#13

Supply:
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Jay Leno’s Garage
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