2 Promising Engines Rumors for Next GT500 Mustang
I should start by stressing that Ford Motor Company hasn’t offered up any official word at all on the future of a new Shelby GT500 Mustang, but does anyone really believe that Ford will just go on letting Dodge brag about having the most powerful muscle car ever without any competition? I don’t think so, and neither do most muscle car fans. Even though the new GT350 will likely be the best-handling muscle car ever, the longstanding popularity of the supercharged top of the line Mustang and the demand for a street-legal, straight-line beast leads everyone to believe that, sooner or later, there will be another big power Shelby Mustang from your local Ford dealership.
Based on that belief, there are two interesting rumors that have popped up online, both of which offer fairly possible scenarios for which engine will motivate the next Shelby GT500 Mustang. There are probably a great many more than just two rumors about the GT500 Mustang engine possibilities, but these two seem to be the most popular and – at least in my opinion – the most likely to come true.
The Ford GT EcoBoost V6
It seems hard to imagine a premium high performance Ford Mustang with a V6 engine, but the new twin turbocharged EcoBoost V6 that powers the new Ford GT supercar would make a lovely powerplant for the next generation Shelby GT500 Mustang. The GT is expected to deliver at least 600 horsepower and 600lb-ft of torque, and even if the actual numbers stay at 600 and 600, that would still make for one mighty quick new Shelby Mustang.
Were the new GT500 Mustang to have an EcoBoost V6 with 600 horsepower and 600lb-ft of torque, it would not pack more power than the Hellcat Challenger, but it might make the Mustang the quickest of the modern muscle cars. The Hellcat Challenger weighs around 4,500lbs while the 2015 Mustang GT weighs just 3,700lbs, so that 800lb advantage could help the Mustang fight the Challenger on the quarter mile – although it would be a tough fight even with the 800lb advantage. Maybe, just maybe, the GT500 could benefit from the many weight saving efforts of the 2016 GT350, so it could be more than a thousand pounds lighter than the Hellcat cars.
The two problems with this rumor is that a 600hp GT500 Mustang wouldn’t allow Ford to dethrone the Hellcat Challenger as the most powerful muscle car ever and it is still hard to imagine the most powerful Mustang in the lineup coming with a V6 engine – even one that has 600+ horsepower.
Twin Turbocharged Flat Plane V8
The 2015/2016 Shelby GT350 Mustang is powered by a new flat plane V8 measuring 5.2 liters and offering 526 horsepower and 429lb-ft of torque with the naturally aspirated induction setup. With the production numbers of the new Shelby GT350 and GT350R expected to be fairly limited, it seems unlikely that Ford would go to the trouble to develop this flat plane V8 for just the GT350.
Well, it just so happens that Ferrari uses a flat plane V8 in the new California T. That engine is only 3.8 liters, but it delivers an awesome 551 horsepower, so were Ford to take their new 5.2 liter flat plane V8 and add some forced induction – the power levels could very easily rival the Hellcat Challenger. Figure that the Ferrari California T features a volumetric efficiency figure of 145 horsepower per liter. Were Ford to achieve similar efficiency from their boosted flat plane, they would have a 5.2L V8 that delivers 754 horsepower – more than enough to knock the Hellcat Challenger from its high horse.
Best of all, there is no clear reason why Ford couldn’t come up with a twin turbo GT500 based on the flat plane V8. They have the engine, they clearly have the turbocharging knowledge and they have already shown off their take on a twin turbo V8 Mustang with the old Cobra Jet Twin Turbo Concept from SEMA a few years back. Ferrari has shown that the flat plane construction can be used to create big power with forced induction, so there is seemingly no good reason why a boosted 5.2L V8 couldn’t power the next Shelby GT500 Mustang.
Our fingers are crossed.
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