2000 Ford Mustang Convertible

William Clay Ford Jr., scion of the house that Henry built, current Chairman and CEO of Ford Motor Company, has more than once said that if he could only have a car, it would be a 2000 Ford Mustang Convertible, especially a Mustang with a "throaty V-8." We close the Mustang would change the variety, the better to the sounds cervical make withdrawal from the V-8, the throat, as heard in two tubes and finally with the spores Ford's latest droptop pony car on test track and byway.

Do you have the idea of ​​a Fortune 500 CEO refuse to transport even in a mere Mustang when the company car park also includes Jaguar and Aston Martin? Hey, why not? Beyond the charm of the car itself, there is also a powerful element of the heritage. Ford counts each Jag and Aston ever built in its total production tally, but it is impossible for the home office in Dearborn to make a credible claim to the actual establishment of either subsidiary, while the Mustang is all-American and a private in the engine of Growing City. And as convincing footnote sold the first Mustang 41 years ago was a convertible, replete with a throaty V-8.

Billy Ford preferences notwithstanding, there are two questions to be answered here: How does the performance of the 2000 Ford Mustang Convertible stack up against those of the coupe? And what is the ruling on structural rigidity? Since the second question is the key for sorting the company out of the limp in convertibledom, first let us tackle that one. In our March preview drive, our man Winfield reported that Ford chassis-stiffening measures had all but a certain amount of subdued "vibration or movement through the steering wheel, with insignificant amounts of windshield frame trembling." He went on to note that the previous was "proof of good cowl rigidity and a very limited structure."

Winfield observations were rooted in a short day of riding on California highways. After a convertible on Michigan exercised streets, we find we have to change our preview-take, but not much. Structured on the sidewalk with frost heaves and potholes, does Chassis Mustang show occasional quiver and on really heavy shocks, the hood can be seen from and to wiggle. However, on this as cowl shake seems unfair because there shaker hood, look the Mustang, as it to make carved from billet.

Ford says the droptop Mustangs torsional torque at £ 6,500 feet per degree of rotation. The old convertible was 3000 also read bending stiffness-imagine a giant grabbed the two ends of the car and try to fold it like a piece of taffy-up is 25 percent, according to Ford. It is noteworthy, Chief Engineer Hau Thai-Tang and his troops ( there to line of Ford Advanced Product Creation and SVT programs applicable) achieved this with some of the same in the fundamentals of basic bone soon-to-be-discontinued thunderbird used, a cowl-shake posters car. In addition, they have it without achieving T-Bird United. The last Thunderbird we tested [C / D, August 2003] weighed in at 3800 pounds. Our GT Convertible tester scaled 3673 150 pounds heavier than the first '05 GT coupe we tested [C / D, December 2004] and only 98 pounds heavier than the one that prevailed Shooting against the latest Pontiac GTO in a head-to-head [ "Goat and Pony Showdown," C / D January 2005]. Why the difference? Various option packages. And what have the additional mass to do the acceleration?

We'll get to in a minute. First, we have this abstract chassis rigidity figures in real perspective. As already mentioned, the Mustang GT-body can be provoked in quivers, but there is nothing to remind you about the rubbery reactions a droptop like Toyota Camry, the boneless chicken convertibles. On the large scale of ragtop stiffness, we would behind railroad trestles as the Honda S2000, Corvette Convertible, and Porsche 911 Cabrio, but on a fairly equal basis with respectable entries as the BMW 3 Series, Audi A4 rank the Mustang GT a little and Mercedes CLK -and for far less dough.

The additional mass associated with convertiblization usually shows up as a debit in the acceleration column, but that was not the case here. Although our tester had droptop 300-plus miles on the odo when it came to the test distance by which we tested 5.0 seconds to 60 mph, it was faster than the two coupes, the 5.2 seconds and 5 , 1 run each. The convertible bond in the best quarter-mile time was 13.7 seconds also at 103 mph. This is only a 10-faster than the coupe and trap speeds were essentially the same, but it shows that the 4.6-liter SOHC 24-valve aluminum V-8 does not mind a little extra bulk ,