Take a quick look at the ad for this Canadian Corvette and it looks like a pretty clean example of a C5. You might even look at the year in the ad and assume it's just the usual classified typo, but then you see the line that bisects the front fender. That ain't right. Wait a second, that hatch doesn't look quite right either.

So you keep clicking on the photos, and everything looks almost right, but not quite. Then you see the interior, and it hits you. This isn't a C5. It's a C9.



That's right, it's a 1992 C4 Corvette fitted with most of the bodywork needed to make it look just like a C5. It looks really well done, too, even wearing the right wheels.

What has us confused, though, is why? Even in 1997, when the first C5s began to arrive, a five-year-old C4 and all this bodywork couldn't have been cheaper than a new or gently used C5, could it? Not with proper fitting and paint, at least. And as the car aged, surely the price gap would have gotten smaller, wouldn't it?



Apparently, somebody thought that this made sense, and what might surprise us the most is that the seller makes no mention of the custom nature of the car. Just calls it a red six-speed 1992 Corvette. That year means a 300 hp LT1, and while that's less powerful than a 345 hp LS1 C5, it's not that much less.

The seller originally wanted $27,000 for this Canadian car, listed on autoTRADER.ca, but now the asking price is down to $22,000. That's in maple syrup dollars. In Ameribucks, it's a bit under $17k, so does that make this C9 a nice deal, or a pass the pipe?