Tired of Magazine articles?

[Sleeper 362]

I just read Motor Trend and they put the Ford GT against the Dodge Viper. They keep talking about how close in performance these cars are. Then they talk about how the new V10 truck is better then all current lightenings. They keep looking past the fact that all the Fords mentioned are only a couple measally dollars from owning all. The Ford GT is making 500hp with I believe only 8#'s of boost. It is also a twinscrew blower from lysholm. What happens when they up the pressure a couple of pounds? Could 800 hp from a pulley swap be far away? All of the S/C vehicles have this ability. And the one thing that I've learned from hangin around dyno shops is that it costs another cars worth of money to modify any dodge 10cyl. Now if they put that V10 in a Dakota I would've given it a second look. I just wanna know if anyone else feels this way.

 

[ZorkStang]

Just a bunch of bench racers... and they when they "test" the cars, their favorite will always win. They write the articles, they can make them say whatever they want.

I look at it this way, if you are a Ford guy buy a Ford, if you are a Mopar guy buy a Mopar... either car is way faster than you need to go anyhow.

 

[DirtyD916]

motor trend and car and driver has the worst drivers. their times are just pitiful. go to a mustang magazine or top gear if you want good TRUE numbers.

 

[ZorkStang]

even MMaFF is lacky on its numbers... and when they do their "engine combos" its all bench racing, they even admitted they don't assemble the engines and test them.

Car and Driver has terrible drivers, they said the 03 Mach1 at best runs a 14.6 and I have seen them go 13.5 in person bone stock.

 

[Sleeper 362]

I agree. They always talk about things like they know. In 5.0 they talked about a turbo V6 with everything else stock running 13.teens. They also said in the same article that it was only making 230rwhp. I'm just tired of magazines looking past the obvious. It takes one hell of a Ford to do good in any magazine. Don't get me started on car and driver. They will put anything against a Ford to make it look bad." Here is a group of SUVs for testing. With it we put the 03 Cobra in the test as well, due to it being in the same price range. Well Casaba Sux gives it last place due to its lack of storage capacity." Oh well you can't win them all. The F-bods know as well as everyone else. The underdogs aren't always under.

 

[Chas. Smiley]

Think of all those years in the 70s and 80s when Mercedes made slow, ugly crap. Those clowns from the magazines nevertheless had their noses up Daimler’s ass at every turn. Fawning over every model they tested. Could it have been all that money they'd find under the floor mats? Huh, do ya think??

Now Chrysler is a mere extension of Mercedes. So what do you expect? IMHO

 

[Traveler]

Sometimes the mainstream mags luck up a give a good review. Car & Driver's 2001 Cobra immediately comes to mind, because as much as they have complained about the Mustang over the years, they admitted they couldn't find much fault with its performance nor its driving characteristics. Actually, Car & Driver got great numbers in their test...some of the best in any magazines.
That aside, numbers will vary. MT's latest test of the SRT Ram seems a bit slow in comparison to Sport Truck mag, which got 13.1. However, the mainstream mags usually state that they do not usually use aggressive launch techniques so certainly that effect the numbers in many cases. There are going to be variations, but I can't judge a car or truck by one test.
One thing I must say is how great it is that the Viper now has a very strong competitor in the GT and the Lightning in contrast has a new formidable foe in the SRT Ram. One thing I find interesting is how the SRT Ram is quite a bit more expensive than the Lightning, yet Ford's GT is much more expensive than the Viper.

 

[Snake03]

One thing I find interesting is how the SRT Ram is quite a bit more expensive than the Lightning, yet Ford's GT is much more expensive than the Viper.

Ford isn't aiming the GT at the Viper, but at the Ferrari 360 Modena.

They're even giving testers both cars to compare at one time.

 

[Stiffler Time]

I just read Motor Trend and they put the Ford GT against the Dodge Viper. They keep talking about how close in performance these cars are. Then they talk about how the new V10 truck is better then all current lightenings. They keep looking past the fact that all the Fords mentioned are only a couple measally dollars from owning all. The Ford GT is making 500hp with I believe only 8#'s of boost. It is also a twinscrew blower from lysholm. What happens when they up the pressure a couple of pounds? Could 800 hp from a pulley swap be far away? All of the S/C vehicles have this ability. And the one thing that I've learned from hangin around dyno shops is that it costs another cars worth of money to modify any dodge 10cyl. Now if they put that V10 in a Dakota I would've given it a second look. I just wanna know if anyone else feels this way.

No, I don't feel the same way you do. Yeah you can add pulley's and this and that to make the GT far superior in straight line speed when compared to the Viper. However, those magazines test stock vehicles. Apparently in stock trim, the GT and the Viper are close. Yes SC vehicles are cheaper to make go fast than modding a V10, but that's not the point. Do you think someone who can afford a GT will be worried about how much it costs to mod it? If they can afford a GT, they can afford the mods no matter what the cost.

 

[RydeOn]

No, I don't feel the same way you do. Yeah you can add pulley's and this and that to make the GT far superior in straight line speed when compared to the Viper. However, those magazines test stock vehicles. Apparently in stock trim, the GT and the Viper are close. Yes SC vehicles are cheaper to make go fast than modding a V10, but that's not the point. Do you think someone who can afford a GT will be worried about how much it costs to mod it? If they can afford a GT, they can afford the mods no matter what the cost.

I dont think cost is the point, so much as EASE of these modifications. Some guy could have a 800 HP Ford GT and the only difference would be a different pully and possibly a custom chip. No one besides the owner would even known the car had been modified. The car is still 99.9% stock. This is a big deal on a 100k+ collector car.

 

[Stiffler Time]

I dont think cost is the point, so much as EASE of these modifications. Some guy could have a 800 HP Ford GT and the only difference would be a different pully and possibly a custom chip. No one besides the owner would even known the car had been modified. The car is still 99.9% stock. This is a big deal on a 100k+ collector car.

I agree modifying the GT would be a big deal. Many of the GT's will unfortunately end up as dust collectors in garages. The original post is "Tired of magazine articles." Sleeper seems upset because the GT and the Viper are rated so closely together. The he goes on about modding the GT would be cheap to make it much faster. He's right but, magazines test stock vehicles. They are not going to add a pulley just because it's cheap to do. Being "tired" of magazine aritcles because they don't mod stock cars isn't valid complaint. I'm not saying that either one of you are wrong about modding a GT will be cheap and fairly easy. But after testing the Viper and the GT, the editor isn't going to say "they are too close in performance, let's mod the GT so it can clearly be the winner."

Eventually when the GT's are out on the street, someone will add a pulley and a chip and it will be very interesting to see what kind of hp/tq they come up with.

 

[Firme]

as usual, and same as the 03, most magazine's don't recognize "underated" if it bites them on the a$$.

There have plenty of reports comming in that the tuners that are on the Ford GT project are gettin well over 500 hp to wheels... I've even seen 620hp thrown around.

Another thing that made me raise an eibrow... is when Top Gear road tested the Ford GT (and all those who saw video posted know what I'm talking about), the made statement "but they (americans) have never, and I have checked this out with all the experts, they've have never, made a car that could go around corners properly...............until now (driving the ford GT)...
I have heard no such comment about the viper... and I hold Top Gear in much higher light than Motor Trend

 

[cobranator]

Car and Driver tested the Ford GT against a Ferrari Challenge Stradale and a Porsche 911 GT3 and it totally embarased the other two cars.

Here is a quote from the article. " It wasn't even a contest. The Ford GT so completely dusted off its two highly recognized competitors that if we wanted to make this a real challenge,we would have had to go way up the ..supercar.. price ladder. The $401,000 Saleen S7 is about as quick as the Ford GT, and we know of only one car that would surely outrun the For--the $659,000 Ferrari Enzo."

Here's some stats from the article for the Ford GT.

0-60 3.3 sec
0-150 16.9 sec
1/4mile 11.6 sec @128 mph

According to M/T the Viper runs the 1/4 mile in 11.76 @ 124 mph. I'm not sure what they got for 0-60 for the Viper but I doubt it is better than the Ford GT's.

Even though I will never be able to afford a Ford GT I'm absolutely ecstatic that it blows away it's competition. Yehaaawww.....Ford rules!!!!!!!!!!

 

[striped]

Did any of you guys see the 5.0 mag were they tested the mach,bullitt, and cobra....they pretty much destoyed the cobra in that article


chris

 

[Traveler]

Did any of you guys see the 5.0 mag were they tested the mach,bullitt, and cobra....they pretty much destoyed the cobra in that article


chris

Yeah, I saw it, but I can't see comparing this Cobra to the others as it wasn't tested with its original engine. I believe it was a remanufactured engine.

Another Motor Trend article that was flawed was the red 02 Camaro SS vs. the yellow 01 Cobra. Motor Trend tested the 01 Cobra with the WRONG tires. I caught this little UNMENTIONED error looking over the specs. It clearly states Goodyear ZR45s and the 01 Cobra was delivered with BF Goodrich, which is a stickier tire. You can verify this by looking at the burn out pic as clearly you can see the Gatorback tire tread pattern. The Cobra still edged out the SS in the handling, but was a bit behind in their testing in acceleration. Even though the SS would have still likely won the acceleration comparison, I have wondered how much closer the Cobra would have been with better tires and how much better the handling numbers would have been over the Camaros.