Beautiful Corvette Out of Long Term Ownership in Dark Claret Metallic. ONLY 853 Corvettes Were Produced In This Color Out of All The Different Variations and Total Production of 25,407 Corvettes! WOW!The last year of the body style that was introduced in 1968 as well as the frame that was introduced in 1963. No manual transmission cars were built this year, the first time since 1955. The new Cross-Fire fuel injection was introduced with computers controlling two fuel injectors making up to 80 adjustments per second to enhance drivability and fuel economy. This was the first fuel injected Corvette in 20 years, it also raised horsepower by 10. A solenoid operates a small flap in the hood allowing fresh air into the engine during full-throttle acceleration. A new automatic transmission has locking in all but first gear. The exhaust system was re-engineered to use smaller catalytic converters. 1982 was the first year a Corvette base price exceeded $20,000. This was the collector edition and 6,759 were produced. The Bowling Green plant closed in October of 1982 to begin re-tooling for the new 1984 C4 Corvette.