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vietthaimeco · 5 years

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2019 Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 First Drive: More Accessible Performance

“Make it more confident and intuitive to drive.” That was the feedback current owners of Ford’s wild-child, track-rat, flat-plane-crank, manual-only Mustang Shelby GT350 offered when the development team went asking. Although buyers of the Shelby GT350R tend to be pretty accomplished shoes, buyers of the “base” GT350 are more likely to drive their cars daily and take them to a track much less frequently. As such, these owners tend to be less practiced and more fearful of wadding up their babies. The team kept this wish in mind as it pushed the current Mustang platform to new levels of performance while developing the forthcoming GT500, and is now rolling out a new GT500 with higher performance limits that are easier to reach. (The GT350R remains unchanged for 2019.)

Assisting with the aforementioned development was veteran race driver Billy Johnson, who’s spent three years working with the team while also racing Ford GTs and prepping the Mustang GT4 race car, which he’s campaigning this year. Billy apparently shares Randy Pobst’s knack for articulating how a car feels and helping direct changes to make it feel better.

Perhaps the lowest-hanging chassis-development fruit is improving tire grip. Tire Rack can help you do that to your car right now, but when you’re the Mustang team you don’t call Tire Rack—you work with Michelin to custom-tailor a tire for your car, and then you re-tune the entire chassis to take full advantage of the newfound grip. Let’s start with the tires.

Upgrading from Michelin Pilot Sports to Pilot Sport Cup 2 tires represents a serious performance and technology leap. The GT350R has used wider-section versions of this tire from the start (305 front/315 rear to the GT350’s 295/305), and the tires look rather similar. Both feature a broad, featureless outer shoulder for lateral bite, three shallow tread channels (the old Pilot Sports had four deeper ones), and large tread blocks. The tread-wear rating is 180, down from 300 for the old Pilot Sports. We’re told the new ones should last 12,000-15,000 miles on the street (track days will shorten their life—a lot,). The tread compound differs from that of the GT350R. To make it more street-friendly in the “shoulder seasons” (this IS a summer tire), its “glass-transition temperature” (when rubber turns from grippy to hockey-puck slippy) is lower—but never drive on them under a frost/freeze warning. The more angular sidewall profile shape and construction contributes to the way the tire performs in lateral maneuvers (and serves to protect the rims from brushes with the curb). The scant shallow treads suggest these tires would be a handful in the rain, but Mustang chief program engineer Carl Widmann swears they meet the same wet-traction standards as the old one. Ford Performance-engineered tires wear an “FP” mark on the sidewalls that buyers need to insist on when replacing their tires. Frequently. (Tire Rack price: $1,822.74 for a set.)

Working up from the tires, the spring rates are stiffened 10 percent in front, where the anti-roll bar remains unchanged. In back the spring rates soften by 6 percent to coordinate with a larger, stiffer, hollow rear bar (now 24mm, up from 22mm). The Magneride shocks are completely retuned to suit these changes and the new tires, and also to take advantage of improvements in the software and algorithms that have simply come with the march of progress.

One more chassis enhancement: The electronic programming of the stout Brembo brake system is totally recalibrated. It can now dynamically alter the proportioning from front to rear and side to side to a greater extent than it used to, which is said to improve the way the car feels when braking into a corner.

The Shelby GT350’s one big non-chassis-related update is to aerodynamics. To help boost the confidence of drivers whose tracks include longer straights and higher-speed bends and sweepers, front and rear aero-mods help to better settle the car at speed. In front, the main upper grille opening is blanked off more. They basically realized the cooling pack didn’t need as much air as it was getting, and the surplus air was just getting trapped under the hood and causing lift. There is still a hint of front-end lift at speed, but less than before. In back there’s a new “s’wing”—a hybrid spoiler/wing that leverages lessons learned on the GT500 program in a rolling ground-plane wind-tunnel in North Carolina. Think of it as a spoiler with two big vents that allow the highest velocity air to slip straight through, reducing drag, while the rest rides the s’wing surface to develop positive down-force.

This basic s’wing helps plant the rear quite nicely, but if you want it planted with deep roots on the fastest tracks you’ll spend another $850 for a handling package. It includes an aggressive Gurney flap that bolts to the stock s’wing via four simple torx-head screws (removing this gas-mileage killer is worth a couple highway mpg on the drive home from the track). Also included are a pair of front strut camber plates that allow for easy swapping between tire-preserving street alignment and a max-cornering negative-camber track setup.

Naturally the cars we were invited to drive on the 1.5-mile Champion Motor Speedway course at suburban-Detroit’s M1 Concourse had all the performance goodies dialed up to max-attack mode. I drew first drive in a white-with-blue-stripes GT350 on a 50-degree morning. Sure enough, until these tires warmed up I experienced entry understeer and/or power oversteer in several of the track’s 11 turns, but after about a lap and a half they warmed up and started biting harder and harder with nary a stomach-knotting squirm or wiggle. This did encourage me to charge deeper into each turn, and even to roll onto the gas more aggressively on the exits.

I’d be lying if I claimed to detect the savvier brake proportioning, but my confidence did indeed build quickly on what is still a fairly unfamiliar new track to me, so perhaps Widmann and team can hoist the “mission accomplished” banner on that customer wish. One thing that happily remains utterly unchanged is the frenetic sound of this uniquely big-lunged flat-plane V-8 in sport-exhaust mode. Without any of the fourth-order “wuffle” that traditional V-8s make, the resulting sound is akin to a pair of Suzuki Hayabusa motors shouting in unison down a sewer pipe. Long may this glorious sound echo down these stainless, sport-tuned sewer pipes.

The GT350 is on sale now starting at $61,435—just $3,295 more than the 2018 model, and according to Tire Rack, $449.28 of that is the tires.

2019 Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 BASE PRICE $61,435 VEHICLE LAYOUT Front-engine, RWD, 2-pass, 2-door coupe ENGINE 5.2L/526-hp/429-lb-ft DOHC 32-valve V-8 TRANSMISSION 6-speed manual CURB WEIGHT 3,750-3,800 lb (mfr) WHEELBASE 107.1 in LENGTH X WIDTH X HEIGHT 188.9 x 75.9 x 54.2 in 0-60 MPH 4.1 sec (MT est) EPA CITY/HWY/COMB FUEL ECON 14/21/16 mpg ENERGY CONSUMPTION, CITY/HWY 241/160 kW-hrs/100 miles CO2 EMISSIONS, COMB 1.18 lb/mile ON SALE IN U.S. Currently

The post 2019 Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 First Drive: More Accessible Performance appeared first on Motortrend.

source https://www.motortrend.com/cars/ford/mustang/2019/2019-ford-mustang-shelby-gt350-first-drive-review/

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robertkstone · 6 years

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Feature Flashback: Remembering the Malaise Ferrari

Ferrari is riding an ever-growing tsunami of success with nary a clunker among its many new offerings of late—the Motor Trend Best Drivers’ Car–winning 488 and its latest Pista variant being terrific cases in point. Who knows—at this rate, the SUV they’ve long threatened to introduce may even connect as a home run. This wasn’t always the case, however. To illustrate this let’s take a look back at what may rank as the ultimate malaise Ferrari—the 348. The car that replaced Magnum PI’s iconic Pininfarina beauty 308/328 was the first Ferrari I drove as a cub reporter, during which time the seat back broke and we experienced antsy limit handling and poor cross-wind stability. See, this was the last Ferrari developed before the Acura NSX showed the world that sexy mid-engine supercars didn’t have to be finicky, fragile, ergonomic disasters. Here’s what Motor Trend had to say about the 348.

Beer-goggle Beauty

“How do you replace a classic? It’s tough, but it needs to be done eventually. Ferrari’s transformation of the 328 into the 348 is much more interesting from a technical and engineering viewpoint but it’s bound to be the shape that people talk about first. Quite simply, the 308/328 was probably the prettiest production car Ferrari has ever built. You can look at the 348 and decide it looks quite nice when approached carefully from the right direction, but you wouldn’t say it’s pretty unless you’d had a couple drinks—and that’s no way to approach any car, especially a Ferrari.”

Nice caboose

“The most flattering angle for the 348 is from slightly above the rear three-quarters. The line of the rear side windows is neat, with the rear window more reminiscent of the 246 Dino than the 328. But even from there, the sensuality is gone. Least flattering is the full frontal view, and that dummy grille is a copout: If you don’t need a grille, why have one? An innovative aerodynamic approach would have made more sense. In the press handout (referring to the Testarossa-style side strakes) is the following remark: ‘On a Ferrari a technical requirement becomes a stylistic theme and nothing is simply there for decoration.’ Oh, really?”

Better Beneath the Skin

The “T” in 348 TB and later TS stood for Transversale, referring to the transmission’s orientation, not the engine’s. This represented a swap from the 308/328’s transverse engine/longitudinal transaxle design, as author Peter Dron explained. “The main reason for this was not any philosophical dislike of transverse engines, but simply a search for better cornering behavior. Like the Testarossa, the 328 had too high a center of gravity for ideal handling, and the rearrangement has permitted Ferrari to lower the engine by more than 5 in.” This engine orientation also made it possible to move the cooling from the front to the rear side openings, improving the car’s polar moment of inertia.

Shorter, Taller, Wider, Heavier?

Perhaps some of the 348’s design challenges were dimensional. “The dimensional changes are in line with the current move toward extra width and height. Almost 2 in. shorter than the 328 (but with 4 in. extra in the wheelbase), the 348 is 8.5 in. wider and 1.7 in. taller. It weighs 2,740 lb, an increase of more than 200 lb, due mainly to extra equipment but also because of the more rigid chassis.”

Sounds “Efficient”

Engine sound has long been a hallmark pleasure of any Ferrari, although the turbocharged 488 has taken some flak on this score. The 348 didn’t impress us much on this count, either: “It doesn’t sound like a V-8; in fact, the noise it makes is more like a high-pitched turbine than anything else, the characteristic whine of the flat-plane crank. It doesn’t have the hard edge of Lamborghini’s V-8 (similar to the old Cosworth DFV) or the deep, throaty rumble of the high-performance domestic engines. It isn’t an unpleasant noise, but it won’t make the hairs on the back of your neck stand on edge. It’s simply an efficient device, to be used to the fullest.”

Sub-Supercar Performance

“For some manufacturers, it might be hard to go to market when competitors are offering cars with demonstrably better performance for tens of thousands of dollars less. Ferrari, however, seems blessed with such cache that the numbers gleaned from mere fifth wheels don’t seem to make much of a difference. Take the Ferrari 348, for example. Its 0-60-mph time of about 6 seconds can be bested by such lesser-priced machinery as an L98 Corvette. Its slalom speed of a little over 63 mph is flat blown away by the humbly priced Nissan 300ZX Turbo. Even with anti-lock brakes, its stopping performance from 60 mph is bested by any number of ABS-equipped cars.”

Almost Testarossa-Quick/Fast

When it first arrived on the market, the 348 nipped at the heels of the range-topping, Miami Vice/Sonny Crockett–popularized Testarossa. “It certainly does take off, too, with 0-60 mph in under 5.5 sec and a top speed of more than 275 kph (171 mph). This calls into question the purpose of a Testarossa, which is no more practical, doesn’t handle as well, and is no longer significantly faster. It’ll be interesting to see what Ferrari does with the ‘face-lifted’ Testarossa (an engineering as well as a cosmetic job), which is due out in the next couple years.”

Underselling the Flagship

Indeed that flagship replacement, the flat-12-cylinder 512 BB, quickly eclipsed the $100,000 cheaper 348 in terms of performance and sales, as we reported in our April, 1993 issue. This situation called for drastic action: “… radical surgery to increase the latter’s appeal to Americans. The operations included a roofectomy along with some minor bodywork nips and tucks. The result is the new 348 Spider, Ferrari’s first two-seat convertible since the 365 GTB4 Daytona. Along with its manual soft top, the Spider gets body-color lower cladding and engine cover, plus oversize prancing-horse badges front and rear. The open-air 348 gains added stability thanks to a 50-millimeter increase in rear track. And Ferrari claims a modest horsepower bump-from 300 to 312. Coupled with a new transverse gearbox and slightly lower differential gear ratio this should help the Spider scamper 0-60 mph in under 5.5 seconds. The price for all this al fresco excitement is expected to start around $120,000.”

Room With a View

“All-around visibility in the 348 is much better than in most mid-engine cars, and the large door-mounted mirrors are ideal. At first, it’s hard to spot the changes to the interior, and the character of the 308/328 has been carried forward into the 348. But there are significant improvements, not the least of them being an important increase in leg and head room and a better driver’s seat. For the first time with a Ferrari V-8 behind my shoulders, I was truly comfortable and didn’t feel cramped. At last, the factory has recognized that some of us—and quite a few Italians these days—are over 6 ft tall.”

Parting Shot

After damning some ergonomic and build quality aspects with faint praise (“Heating and ventilation systems in Italian cars have moved from effectively non-existent through fairly feeble to a point where they are now almost as good as anything from anywhere else;” and “The interior was well put together, except the two outer vents were not perfectly aligned in the fascia”), Dron closed with this zinger: “There’s no doubt that the 348, from a dynamic point of view, is a serious and important step forward from the 328. It’s just as well, because it’s a bit like the plain sister who got all the brains.”

Read more Feature Flashback stories here:

Was Luxury Worth It In 1968?

1971 Chevy K5 Blazer, Ford Bronco and AMC Jeepster Commando

1986 Volkswagen Vanagon

1976 Honda Accord

The post Feature Flashback: Remembering the Malaise Ferrari appeared first on Motor Trend.

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