Peitz Performance Tune will offer a manual gearbox conversion for the C8 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, priced at roughly $60,000 to $70,000 on top of the cost of the car. Company founder Alex Peitz outlined the plan in a new video, saying the conversion is currently compatible only with the base Stingray.
Chevrolet has said repeatedly that it has no plans to add a manual to the mid-engine Corvette, leaving the job to the aftermarket. The C8 was the first Corvette in the model's history to launch without a manual option.
What the conversion involves
Fitting a clutch pedal and shifter to a car designed around a dual-clutch automatic is not a bolt-in job. Peitz says the Tremec-supplied transmission was designed to fit the C8, which simplifies installation, but the car still needed a clutch, a shifter, the associated hardware and software to make the system work.
The Corvette's existing MoTeC control unit helped the team work around the car's locked-down electronic controls. Inside, the upgrade reshapes the centre tunnel to take the shifter. Each converted car gets a new centre console that hides the PRNDL controls, keeps the row of buttons and retains the drive-mode selector.
At $60,000 to $70,000 before the price of the donor car, the conversion costs more than many new vehicles. That matters because it narrows the appeal to buyers who specifically want a three-pedal C8 rather than those simply shopping for the cheapest way into mid-engine performance.
Timing and availability
Peitz says Tremec will begin producing the manual transmission next summer, in mid-2027. Until then, Peitz will keep refining the package and plans to handle all installations itself, rather than handing kits to other workshops, until the company is confident the conversion can be offered as a complete kit.
Chevrolet has not announced any factory manual for the C8, so the Peitz car is the only route to a self-shifted mid-engine Corvette for now. Buyers outside the Stingray range, including the higher-performance C8 variants, are not yet covered by the conversion.
Why Chevrolet dropped the manual
Chevrolet's decision came down to cost and buyer preference. Tony Roma, the C8's chief engineer, said the manual transmission offered in previous Corvettes was "mostly paid for", and the company kept it in production because the cost was reasonable. The C8's new mid-engine layout prevented Chevrolet from reusing that gearbox.
Building a manual for the C8 would have meant designing an all-new transmission, which the automaker could not justify after C7 buyers overwhelmingly chose the automatic. Vehicle engineer Josh Holder said in March: "The market was voting with their wallets, and we didn't get enough votes".
That reasoning explains why the aftermarket, not Chevrolet, is filling the gap. The C8's sales success came overwhelmingly with two pedals, so a manual was always going to be a niche product. Peitz is effectively betting that a small, devoted group will pay a premium for the experience Chevrolet decided not to sell them.
