Mega gas guzzling dittos! Ford "427" concept

Car Design News ^ | christopher Sawyer

[austinite]

Ford 427 Concept Car.

Make a nice Police cruiser.....

[dljordan]

Eye of the beholder and all that. The designers must be H1B workers.

[Petronski]

Nice power, ugly body design...like if a
Cadillac CTS was raped by a Peterbilt.

[Petronski]

Be still my heart!

[knews_hound]

I agree with you about new cars.

My 89 Mustang 'vert with a 5.0 motor will blow away any of the 60's Mustangs.

The fact is, engine management (computers) and fuel injection along with much improved engineering in the suspension make it an all around better car.

I will see if I can dig up a Car Craft artice I read where they compared, head to head, a 67 Mustang and a 97 Mustang.

The results were a real eye opener to those who think the old muscle cars were the be all and end all in automotive engineering.

The results were, the newer one had more HP, more torque, better handling, faster acceleration, a more sure footed ride and required less maintainance.

As far as the 351 vs 281 is concerned, it all sounds good in theory, however, the added weight of the 351 does bad things to the geometry of the Mustang and moves the balence point far forward. Any additional HP or torque that might be gained would be offset by the increased weight and poorer handling.

I agree with you BTW on your Cobra.

Mine, although not a Cobra (officially) has had one or two little additions under the hood also.

My 69 GTX (a Roadrunner clone) with a 440 and 3 two barrel carbs would lose in any sort of competition. Not to mention one glaring issue which is, have you ever tried to sync 3 carbs? I have bad memories of me sitting with vacuum guages all afternoon trying to get the draw through all 3 to equalize.

*Shiver*

No thanks, I LIKE fuel injection!


Cheers,

knews hound

[billbears]

Any additional HP or torque that might be gained would be offset by the increased weight and poorer handling.

You have got to be kidding me. As someone with a 95 that went from a 302 to a 351 the difference in power is massive. A fuel injected 351 with a moderate setup is going to get you into the high400s/low500s. You point out to me a streetable 281 supercharged, that's going to be getting the same power 50,000 miles later and I may go along with you. But I doubt you will. And yes I read Car Craft as well

[King David]

I can already hear the drumbeat from Led Zeplin... this car looks just like a Cadillac.

[MatthewViti]

hehe

[HELLRAISER II]

I own a 67 Mustang with a 289 a 66 Chevy C-10 and a 97 Tahoe, but I also own 2 rice wagons on steroids as you call them and your right My Mazda MX 6 turbo & 90 Ford Probe will spank them all. It's amazing what these little rice burners will do, but I really like the old lines and beef of my classics.

[HELLRAISER II]

Your right about the Super chargers and Turbos, those bad boy's are expensive but you have to admit they can take a mediocre car and make it a bad @ss car with just a few bolt on's.

[Yardstick]

Re: #22

Nice! That's a Fairlane isn't it? Even the Galaxies looked cool back then.

American car designers could do no wrong from about 1965 to 1970. Everything rolling out of Detroit during that period was gorgeous.

Re: #11

After 35 years, it looks like Ford is *finally* going to make a good-looking Mustang again. The "face" on the new 2004-1/2 looks more like a '67 than a '65 to me.

Re: #1

The 427 concept is hideous but intimidating -- perfect for a police cruiser.

[lentulusgracchus]

The 427 concept is hideous but intimidating -- perfect for a police cruiser.

Room enough in back for transport, though?

Agree with you about the Mustang, it's a knockoff of the '67 Mustang 390. Eight cylinders, four barrels, four gears, four pipes.

If people are going to go around testing '60's muscle against new models (I'm always suspicious when the car mags do that, as when they "tested" a Holden Monaro against a real Goat), go back and pull the old C&D, R&T etc. to get the real numbers that the magazines ran in these cars when new.

One factor that might give newer cars a performance edge is rotational inertia of the tires and wheels. Lighter alloy wheels and less-massive, low-profile tires probably help quickness a lot. Like the night a couple of years ago when my '70 Z-car and I got surprised by some blonde Amazon in a new white Impreza. A week later, I had a starchy conversation with the guys who'd tuned me up, about why a ricebox rated at 130 BHP and no doubt weighing a couple hundred pounds or more than I did pulled me off the line, if my Z's inline six was still delivering the specified 151 BHP. They assured me my mill was giving me full power and tried to convince me that 130 HP + fuel injection + chip > 151 without. I still don't believe them.

A year later they were pulling bits of fuel-pump diaphragm out of my fuel lines, left over from an old shade-tree fuel pump R&R job (I hadn't got it all in time, apparently), and it was my work, so I guess they're off the hook -- for the embarrassment, but not the inequation, which I still don't believe.

[Yardstick]

Well, they may have to raise the roofline a little bit to make room for the perps. Right now, it's menacing low -- looks like it ought to have tommy guns sticking out of the windows. It really does look like a "bad guy" car, which I guess is why it's fun to turn the tables and picture it as a police cruiser.

I saw a few pics of the new Mustang concept, and my opinion of it is a little more mixed now. The convertable still looks great, especially from the front, but somehow the hardtop's roofline isn't quite right. Maybe they'll get it tweaked out (or maybe it'll grow on me).

Love those first generation Z cars, by the way. Classic lines (I love cars with an overbite, which, now that I think about it, is part of why the new Mustang concept appeals to me) and it's hard not to like an inline six.

[lentulusgracchus]

Nice power, ugly body design...like if a Cadillac CTS was raped by a Peterbilt....

LOL -- great line! And yes, I agree, I think you captured it.

[lentulusgracchus]

It's amazing what these little rice burners will do, but I really like the old lines and beef of my classics.

These guys like to run Westheimer Road (the strip, if you will, in Houston), even on Saturday night in heavy traffic, and they drive the cops crazy -- cops went nuts and busted everyone in sight last summer, arrested hundreds, even kids coming out of K-Mart. The captain and sergeant that led the bust are on trial now -- official oppression.

I was over there a few weeks before the bust, and the lots on either side of the road were pullulating with bikes, rice burners, and old muscle, every kind of ride. Thousands of people gathering for an American automotive passeggiata, just like in the old world, but with wheels. The kids on the bikes and in the tweaked Civics were the guys who wanted to run, and they made a lot of racket.........but as one who is old enough to remember, it was nothing, nothing, next to the dinosaur roar of American big inches duking it out. It literally sounded like dinosaurs mating -- you could stand on a street corner anywhere in America on a Saturday night, and you'd hear them a half mile, two miles away, cranking 5500 RPM at the light and popping the clutch in every gear and letting the rubber catch up. No wonder those cars didn't last! They poured their guts out in battle before the red-eyed, bat-winged, hellbound gnomes of insurance-company and public bureaucracy could get them, and left it all on the road at 1000 intersections.

"When dinosaurs ruled the Earth", indeed.....and they did rule, and they still do. Go on, run a restored and tweaked, blueprinted-and-balanced '67 4-4-2 sometime, and see if you can keep your nice new Acura's pink slip! Then you'll understand why there are kids in London who are fools for old American iron.

[rambo316]

Ford is made up of a bunch of Commies. When speaking of Ford, do you know who and what Commie groups the Ford foundation backs? All Fords can rot in hell.

[HELLRAISER II]

I tell you the only things I don't particularly like about the rice burners and quite honestly there's only a few. I'm a big guy 6'2" about 280 lbs, so my head hits the roof but suprisingly enough other than the head room I fit well in my Mazda MX 6. I also worry about being able to go so fast in such a little car with no metal around me to take the brunt of a wreck. But i'm telling you I can take most V-8's in my town with my little Turbo car, but again you have to love the lines of my 67 Stang. It'll need a couple of years of TLC on her, but then she'll be smoking my Mazda & shining on.

[Centurion2000]

Why would we want cops driing something that nice ? Let them deal with a LTD Crown Victoria or something.

Interesting car. They finally are looking at bringing a full size cruising coupe back. I'm thinking someone's expecting gas prices to fall.

[lentulusgracchus]

It'll need a couple of years of TLC on her, but then she'll be smoking my Mazda & shining on.

Good luck to you on your Mustang restoration project. You'll have a nice car when you're done, but of course only the 390's and the later Boss 351's were intended to be muscle cars.

[HELLRAISER II]

Yes I must admit that I would love to have a 390 in my Stang, but I don't so I will have to make do with what I have. I do know that an Aluminum intake, Holley Carb, Hooker comp. headers and duals with Flowmaster 40 series mufflers should crank up my Horsepower to approximately 250 to 275 H.P. which isn't as much H.P. as the big blocks, but neither do I have the added weight. My brother has a Cobra 390 in his 67 Stang so I'm well aware of what the big blocks are capable of.

[Woodman]

Since everyone is complaining, might as well get some pictures of it here.