Fun Ford!
Friday, October 28, 2011 at 5:22PM Out of the 6 dozen or so cars I’ve owned only 3 have been Fords. My first car, a hand me down 1954 Customliner with the first overhead valve V8 Ford ever built. It was a great first car, sold it at a profit and with the proceeds bought 2 cars. The second was an ’88 Ford F-250 Super Duty 4X4 pickup with a snow plow, never snowed the entire 2 years I owned it! It was an intimidating truck- great around the farmette I owned at the time and sold it for a tidy profit. The last Ford I owned was a 1964 ½ Mustang- 289 2 bbl. with 3 on the floor. It was most interesting that any, and I mean any part I needed was available. The catalogs and Mustang sites had so many NOS parts available you could literally build another car from the catalog and it would not contain one original 1964 part. It needed minor cosmetic work and was really not much fun to drive, I sold this car to an exporter and last I knew it was in Denmark. Again, I made a tidy and quick profit. Interesting, I never held onto any of the Fords.
The Mustang has been a huge part of the fabric of the pony-muscle car error. When Ford reintroduced the retro Mustang several years ago, it was obvious that they had a winner. They did not reinvent the 1970 Mustang merely had updated it. Now the refinement gets better with age. The interior remains very true to its heritage. The dash and gauges are merely modernized pieces resembling the 40+ year old counterpart. Even the center console is similar in design and function. I have never found a Mustang to be a comfortable cruiser, the seats are stiff and not well cushioned- a set of knock off Recaro’s would solve that problem. You sit pretty low in the car adding to the “hot rod” feel.
The 2012 Ford Mustang is a real head turner as well as a barn burner. Our test car was covered in the now infamous Grabber Blue. Forty years later, it is still an attractive color. It forces the car to stand out from the rest of the crowd. At the rear wheels it lives up to its history and produces a very tight and quick true muscle car.
Shift Point Phil and I drove it to the NHRA event in Englishtown, NJ. While it was no match for the John Force Racing Top Fuel Funny car Mustang’s I think it endeared us to him when the director of Ford Motorsports Tim Duerr explained that no one in America sold more Mustangs than John Force.
Ford has an incredible line of cars, the V6 Mustang has over 300 horses. Our 2011 Mustang GT is rated at 412 hp and 390 ft/lb – You will feel it in the seat of your pants. Edmunds.com was able to get a pre-production 2011 Mustang GT on a Dynojet dynamometer and after several pulls was able to achieve 395 hp and 365 ft/lb at the rear wheels. Assuming a 10-13 percent power loss through the drivetrain that would mean that the '11 Mustang GT is actually making 440-455 horsepower at the flywheel! So that leaves a question in our minds, was the pre-production Mustang they received for testing unusually powerful or is Ford's claim of 412 horsepower very conservative?
This car alone puts the Pony Car wars back on the battlefield. We were not able to make any passes at Old Dominion Speedway as it rained both Wednesday and the Friday we had use of the car. With a 6 speed close ratio transmission, the short shifts were fast and hard. It by far is the most pleasurable Ford and the quickest I have ever driven. I imagine bone stock out of the box its ¼ mile times are in the high 12’s- it is quick- super quick.
At less than $35,000.00 there is no competition for this car other than the Challenger SRT8 and the SS Camaro- I suggest you spend a Saturday and test drive all three. Don’t forget to bring a buddy- Shift Point Phil is always ready.
POWERTRAIN/CHASSIS
Drivetrain layout Front-engine, RWD
Engine type 90-deg V-8, alum block/heads
Valvetrain DOHC, 4 valves/cyl
Displacement 302.1 cu in/4951cc
Compression ratio 11.0:1
Power (SAE net) 412 hp @ 6500 rpm
Torque (SAE net) 390 lb-ft @ 4250 rpm
Redline 6800 rpm
Weight to power 8.8 lb/hp
Transmission 6-speed manual
Axle/final-drive ratios 3.73:1/2.42:1
Suspension, front; rear Struts, coil springs, anti-roll bar; live axle, coil springs, anti-roll bar
Steering ratio 15.8:1
Turns lock-to-lock 2.7
Brakes, f;r 14.0-in vented disc; 11.8-in vented disc, ABS
Wheels, f;r 9.0 x 19-in, cast aluminum
Tires, f;r 255/40R19, Pirelli PZero
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