T-5 IRS from 64

65mistress · Dec 2, 2004

Hey all

Has anyone ever seen or heard of the T-5 IRS setup that was being developed by Ford in 64 for the Mustang?

Here is a link, I just wonder how true it is.

http://www.suspension.com/Must-IRS.htm

66P51GT · Dec 2, 2004

I didn't read the link, but yes... Ford did develop an IRS in the early 60s for the Mustang. There was a recent documentary on the History Channel surrounding Ford history and Lee Iacocca. They had a brief segment on the IRS.

rbohm · Dec 2, 2004

ford did prototype an irs system for the mustang, but the bean counters felt it was too expensive for the car, and shelby tested it and felt that the gt 350's didnt need the irs as he didnt see any real difference in performance.

burnout289 · Dec 2, 2004

rbohm said:
ford did prototype an irs system for the mustang, but the bean counters felt it was too expensive for the car, and shelby tested it and felt that the gt 350's didnt need the irs as he didnt see any real difference in performance.

Wasn't the T-5 that odd-looking two-seater prototype that was a sort of stepping-stone to the mustang? I remember reading that the reason they ditched the IRS was that by removing that a standard rear performed better due to a mix of the lighter rearend and the heavy rear window on the fastback.

65mistress · Dec 3, 2004

I think that the 2 seater was the Mustang I. I watched a thing on the Travel channel last night, they made a quick reference to it and then went on to the vette.

I find it really interesting that the article on the website states that the IRS was a bolt on setup. No major modifications needed to the rear of the vehicle. Any thoughts on how this setup would compare to the rest of what's out there?

reenmachine · Dec 3, 2004

The T-5 IRS is touted as a bolt-in system, and it was originally designed that way. On the one modern installation of it that I've seen, the builder (a mechanical engineer) wasn't very comfortable with it and welded in a bunch of reinforcement.

From the research I've done into the system, Ford was developing it in part for use in the '65 G.T. 350. Shelby tested it and concluded that there was no real performance advantage to using it in the Mustang platform and he could get better handling out of the solid axle in his race cars. It was also expensive, so it was shelved.

In my opinion, when you start a design with the huge constraint of making it bolt in to an existing package, you've got one arm tied behind your back from the get-go. You've got to make engineering compromises you normally wouldn't make. The SVT guys faced the same problem when designing the modern Mustang Cobra IRS.

T-5 IRS from 64

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T-5 IRS from 64

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