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2007
Ford Shelby GT500 Road Test
It
rained the whole day.
We were invited to the newly renovated Ford
Proving Grounds in Dearborn Michigan for a chance to put the new 500
horsepower Shelby GT500 through it's paces, but the claps of thunder
served as a constant reminder that mother nature was not with us
that day.
Because of the weather, we learned something about the new Shelby
GT500 that we would have never suspected. Despite the 1/4 inch
film of water that covered the entire 43 acre Vehicle Dynamics Area,
this car demonstrated that the spirit of the original Shelby
Cobra GT500 is alive and well.
 The Vehicle Dynamics Area was as flat
and level as a pool table, so there
was no place for the rain water to go. It just sat there making
it look like the largest reflecting pool I have ever seen. We
were actually surprised that the Ford personnel gave us the green
light to take the GT500 out and snake it around the cones. It
was a weird feeling to look out the windshield and see all the water
as though we were in a boat instead of a high performance car.
The first lap of the course showed me that my concerns were
unfounded. These cars gripped the corners with a vengeance and
the 500 horsepower was making itself felt in no uncertain terms.
By the second lap, I completely ignored the water and tried for some
decent lap times, which were easy to achieve. By the third
lap, I was feeling a bit over confident when I felt the rear end start
to let go, but as soon as I let up on the throttle, the car came
back into line with nary a cone out of place.
After getting out of the car at the end of my three laps, my
first inclination was to see what kind of tires this car was wearing. As I watched, most
of the other journalists had the same inclination after finishing their laps.
I have driven many cars in the rain, so I can tell you that the GoodYear
Eagle
F1 tires on this rocket sled were impressive. There wasn't a
hint of hydroplaning for any of us and traction around the course
remained consistent. I'm sure that our times would have been
better if the pavement were dry, but not by much.
On the handling course, which simulated a winding country road,
the GT500 was balanced and had a good steering feel. The ride
was firm, but surprisingly compliant and directional stability was
spot on. The front seats had extra bolstering to hold you in
place during spirited driving. The driver's seat is 6-way
power with manual recline and power lumbar support.
The Shelby GT500 is essentially a Mustang GT that has been
massaged by a team of grand masters. In fact, most of them
were at this event to answer our questions, including the maestro
himself, Carroll Shelby. The folks at the SVT
(Special Vehicle Team) arm
of Ford worked together with Carroll Shelby to put together a
no-holds-barred super car for a price considerably less than
anything else in this mega-performance category.
Nowhere on the car does it say Mustang, nor is there any mention
of the word Cobra,
although the logo of the venomous snake prominently displayed in the
grill and front fenders leaves no doubt as to its heritage. Up
close, the emblem looked like an exquisite piece
of jewelry.
| With the Mustang GT as a starting point, a number of body modifications
were made to give the
Shelby GT500 its own unique identity. These changes include: |
- Powerdome hood that was needed to make room for the
supercharger sitting on top of the engine
- Heat extractors on the hood to help remove heat from the
engine compartment
- Unique upper and lower grill openings
- Over body Le Mans racing stripes
- Rear ducktail spoiler
- Cobra gas cap emblem
- Special 18 inch wheels with Goodyear F1 performance tires
|
 Under
the hood, SVT engineers were able to extract a full 500 horsepower out
of a 5.4 liter Ford Triton V8 making it the most powerful factory
built Mustang ever. Much of the design for this
engine came from the pioneering efforts by the SVT group when
building the 0,000 Ford GT sports car. In fact, the
Ford GT was another project that Carroll Shelby had his hand in. (not to
mention the Dodge Viper some years back)
While the 550 horsepower Ford GT engine was all aluminum, the
engine block for the Shelby GT500 was done in cast iron in order to keep the costs down.
However, the DOHC, 4 valve per cylinder aluminum heads from the Ford
GT were used for exceptional breathing.
A Roots-type supercharger complete with
air-to-water intercooler
keeps this powerhouse well fed. A new intake manifold channels the pressurized
fuel-air mixture to the cylinders and is fed by a dual-bore
electronic throttle body from Ford’s 6.8-liter V-10 truck engine.
Extensive work was also done on the exhaust to get the sound of this
engine just right and also to reduce back pressure, Remember,
it won't do any good to have a great capacity to inhale if you can't exhale.
Floor the throttle and pop the clutch and you are greeted with a
symphony of sound that is music to the ears of every red blooded
performance car lover. You will, of course, hear a few hundred miles of rubber being burned off the rear tires as they try
in vain to bite into the asphalt, then you hear the ever present
supercharger whine as the blower force-feeds each cylinder.
Finally, you will hear the wonderful exhaust sounds bringing up the
rear. Within an instant, the bright orange SVT light glares
from the tach face telling you that it is time to give second
gear its turn at managing the 500 galloping ponies.
Despite the awesome power that the new Shelby GT500 has on tap, it is
as docile as a kitten when driven conservatively. At idle, you
can't even hear the engine running. Accelerate normally
from a light and the engine is as smooth as a Lincoln. This is
a far cry from the Shelby Cobras of the sixties where the idle was
course and loping and you had to be careful to feather the throttle
and clutch
to prevent the car from lurching forward or stalling. Some
people might like this "tiger by the tail" feeling, but with today's
computerized engine management technology, it is simply a thing of
the past. Not only
is this modern day version of the Cobra more civilized, it is
considerably faster than the fire breathing Cobras that came before
it.
 The Shelby GT500 transmission is a special animal as well.
There are not many gearboxes that can handle the power generated by
a 500 horsepower engine. The SVT folks upgraded a Tremec
TR6060
six-speed manual box and set up the gearing to make the best use of
the supercharged engine's power band.
When it is time to shift, the SVT logo on the face of the tachometer
becomes a very
handy shift light. When the engine RPM pushes into the red
line, SVT lights up a bright orange, telling you it's time to shift.
While we are on the dash, let me point out some differences
between the GT500 and
the standard Mustang. The most obvious difference is the use of
light-faced gauges. This is a tradition on SVT vehicles and
Ford says that it can improve readability under a variety of
lighting conditions. Another, not so noticeable change is that
the speedometer and tachometer are swapped to the opposite sides of
the gauge cluster.
The SVT engineering staff insisted that the tach be on the right
because the Shelby GT500 is only available with a manual and a tach
positioned on the right,
according to Keith Rogman, SVT design manager, was easier to use
while shifting.
When the new Mustang came out a couple of years ago, there was considerable talk
about possibly going to an independent rear suspension system for a
performance version in the future, but the original suspension
layout on the new Mustang proved to be very competent, so it was
retained for the Shelby GT500. There were simply not enough
gains in handling to warrant the added expense of a custom
independent rear suspension.
SVT chassis engineers went
to work on the Mustang GT to come up with a chassis setup that was able to handle the immense power output of the new engine and
give it handling capabilities that Carroll Shelby would approve of
and be willing to put his name on.
The first problem they encountered was the added weight of the
larger engine with the cast iron block. Since the ideal weight
distribution, front to rear is 50-50, this was going in the wrong
direction. To maintain neutral steering characteristics and
prevent the car from plowing straight ahead (understeering), stiffer
stabilizer bars were used front and rear. The rear bars were
different for the coupe and convertible to give each car the proper
balance.
 When I had the GT500 out on the handling course, I was very
impressed with the result, but the surface was completely smooth, so
there was no way to evaluate whether the live rear axle would cause
side-stepping problems on rough pavement cornering. That will
have to wait for a more extensive drive on real world roads.
For those who are not sure of what I am talking about,
Click Here for an explanation.
Stopping power is handled by Brembo brakes with four-piston
calipers and huge vented 14 inch rotors up front, and with single
piston calipers riding on 11.8 inch vented rotors for the rear.
The
brake pads are also special to this car and can handle some heavy
stopping during competition driving, while remaining civilized for
highway and around town use.
Of course, the brakes are only there to stop the wheels from
spinning. It is the tires that stop the car, and to that end,
the shoes selected for the Shelby GT500 are more than up to the
task. As we mentioned earlier, the test cars were
equipped with Goodyear Eagle F1 tires mounted on 18-inch x 9.5-inch
wheels. The tires were different sizes front to rear for a
balanced feel with 255/45ZR18 tires on the front and meatier 285/40ZR18
tires on the rear.
The steering was beefed up with an added brace that connects the
lower control arm bushings side to side. The steering gear was
also modified to improve steering feel and precision.
Extensive testing was done to make sure that the steering feel would
bring a smile to Carroll Shelby's face. It did.
The Shelby GT500 comes as either a coupe or a convertible, but
only the coupe will be available with the wide over-the-top Le Mans
racing stripes. Taking a cue from the original GT500 in 1968,
only the coupe was available with the stripes, so the designers
decided to pay homage and leave them off the convertible this time
as well.
Another difference with the GT500 convertible is the top
material. They went with a premium cloth top like the ones used on more
expensive cars like the Thunderbird and Jaguar for a better quality
look and feel.
When I look at the convertible with its top down, I keep thinking
that it would look so much better if it had a built in roll bar like
the '68 GT500 had. In fact, when ford first unveiled the
Mustang convertible concept more than a year before it went into
production, it had a very nice roll bar. I guess for the
number of convertibles they expect to sell, it wasn't economically
feasible to invest in the engineering to make it happen.
Hopefully, the aftermarket folks will come up with a remedy for this
shortcoming.
You would think that with the federal standards for rollover
protection, a convertible would need a roll bar to keep the
occupants safe. I checked into that and found that fewer than 1% of rollover deaths happen in convertibles.
This is because convertibles have a much lower center of gravity
than other vehicles. For this reason, convertibles are exempt
from federal rollover standards.
Click Here for more information on these standards and where
they are heading in the future.
 I remember my first experience with a Shelby Cobra
in the late '60s (yes, I'm dating myself) when a
neighbor friend of mine purchased a new one in 1967. It was the
smaller engine version called the Shelby Cobra GT350. When I
asked him why he didn't go all out and get the GT500, which had
a larger engine with considerably more horsepower, he told me that the smaller engine was
lighter and the car would feel more balanced.
Well, the first time he took me for a ride in that "smaller engined"
car, I gained immediate respect for Mr. Shelby and his ability to
wring unbelievable performance from a small Ford V8. The car was
absolutely fierce and snarled at anything that would dare to get in its way.
You had to be a good driver in order to control this snake. If
you made a mistake while blasting around with this monster, you
would have found it very unforgiving.
My friend was the type of guy who could not leave well enough
alone, so he added his own personal touches to his new ride. He customized the
body with a flat black paint treatment on the rear and the rocker
panels, added racing seat belt harnesses and replaced the original
shocks with exotic Koni shocks, among other things.
I believe that the original Shelby Cobras were only sold by
authorized Shelby dealers. The modifications were made at the
Shelby factory to a new Mustang coupe or convertible that just
rolled off the Ford assembly line.
Once the upgrades were made, the car was shipped to the dealer.
The 2007 Shelby GT500 is a separate Ford model now and is built from
the ground up on a Ford assembly line. Carroll Shelby helped
with the engineering and signed off on allowing Ford to use his
trademarks, but otherwise, these cars are all Ford.
Color choices for the new Shelby GT500 include:
- Torch Red Clearcoat (which can be paired with White or Silver stripes)
- Alloy Clearcoat Metallic (with Silver or Tungsten stripes)
- Vista Blue Clearcoat ( with White or Tungsten stripes)
- Performance White Clearcoat (available with Vista Blue or
Tungsten stripes)
- Tungsten Grey Clearcoat (with Silver stripes)
- Grabber Orange (with White or Tungsten stripes)
- Ebony Clearcoat (also with White or Tungsten stripes).
Most of those colors were available on the original GT500 as
well. Beside the seven exterior colors, you have a choice of two interior colors, All Black or
Black with Red seat inserts and door trim panels
The only transmission is the 6 speed manual. An
automatic is not available. Ford plans to build between 8,000
and 10,000 Shelby GT500s for 2007. Not nearly as exclusive as
the '60s Cobras, but my guess is that there will be a waiting list
for some time.
If you are looking for a super performance car, but need four
seats and have a limited expense account, the 2007 Ford Shelby GT500
is hard to beat. Remember, this car turns lots of heads, so don't get yourself into trouble trying
to show off its capabilities to your friends. |
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