Anyone remember back before this website was in existence,
a little place called BON surfaced to talk about the 99 Cobra fiasco,
and had a nice little forum that I started on, and had great people that I met... like WildoSVT, Dan (moderator here), pretty sure brad was on there and I remember this site was a very small 1-2 page site.

Well back in 1999-2001, of course Ford was planning the all new 2003.5 S197 Mustang.
Yeah... it was late and pushed back to 05.

I was surfing through old paperwork I have, and came across these... lets lookback:

The article dates April 16, 2001

1) The Job1 was Feb, 03

2) Engine Info
V6:
3.0L 215HP/6250RPM 210FTLBS/4500 -- 7200RPM redline
4.0L 210HP/5250RPM 240FTLBS/3250 -- 7200RPM redline

GT:
4.6L SOHC2v 285HP/5250 310FTLBS/4000 6500 redline
4.9L SOHC2v 290HP/5250 320FTLBS/4000 6500 redline

Cobra:
5.0L DOHC4v 350+HP/6000 340+FTLBS/4750 7100 redline

Interesting back then they considered using engine options,
with very little power between them.
In the future I'd love to see them offer options again.
4.6L 3v 300hp base GT with a 5.4L or 5.8L 400hp option..I'd be sold

3) DEW98 Chassis was going to be used at one point. But was too expensive. DewLITE was considered, eventually we got the purpose built D2C chassic. Funny how a lot of magazines still quote the Dew98 and DewLite as what our cars are.

4) IRS was in the get go. Originally the Control Blade Suspension.
we also know that the D2C was designed first with the IRS in mind,
and changed after the fact for money reasons.

5) Standard Axles were 2.73 gears, with 3.55 options on the V6 and 3.27s on the GT/Cobra

6) Weight of the V6 was 3453lbs, the GT was 3688 and the Cobra 3817.
Kinda interesting, even back then.

7) Back then they were actually really concerned with the GT's numbers dwindling. So they wanted more quality materials etc in the GT.

Interesting to look back on. Even more interesting to see the design sketchs to see where it might have gone. And it wasn't retro...

Even after this... it was pushed back to the 04 S197 Mustang,
for the 40th, and I remember (but don't have any articles)
that the 4.0L was in the V6, the GT was a 5.0L SOHC and the Cobra was a 5.0L DOHC.

Obviously we know what happened

 

I doubt if there ever was going to be 2 different V6 and 2 different GT V8 engine choices. The multiple engines listed were what was up for consideration. That is the new V6 stang was going to get either the 3.0 or the 4.0 and the new GT was going to get either a 4.6L or a 4.9L V8 (but not both).

 

I recall the 3.9 V-8 that was in the Lincoln LS was going to be the V-8 of choice at one point.

 

Very cool. As a 'stang newb I find this enlightening.

BTW, is the factory redline/cut-off 6000rpm or 6500 rpm on the S197 V8?

 

I originally thought the same thing,
but someone on the inside mentioned options... 2 per car.
Also there was a mention that the engines could have made the debut in the SN95 cars a year prior to the 2003.5

Here is quote:

Quote:

The base Mustang's 3.8 will be killed off at the end of 2002 and will be replaced in 2003 by a standard 4.0L SOHC producing 210 horsepower @ 5250 RPM. An optional 3.0L 4V V6 will produce 215
horsepower @ 6250 RPM.

The GT will continue to use the 4.6 2V, but it will get a bump in power to 285 horses @ 5250 RPM.
An optional 4.9L GT 2V will be an all optional engine for 2003. The 4.9L will produce 290 horses @ 5250

Quote:

You shouldn't see any engine changes for the 2001 Mustang. The engine changes will start with the 2002 model and carry on through to 2003, when even more changes are planned.

I also had a contact at one point at the Essex engine plant in Windsor,
who had talked about them testing power output on the 3.8 and 4.0s to get them to min. 250hp
Moot point now, that the 3.5 is coming out, but back then...that was the goal

 

If I remember correctly, the redline is at 6000 and the rpm limiter kicks in at 6250 (not that I've tested it).
-Chip in SC

 

I remember that! I am the 788th BON member.

 

I remember when there was talk of using the focus chassis and converting it to RWD. I would love to know how the entire design and development took place.

I'm pretty sure they were considering the 3.9 V8 because the DEW chassis is too narrow to fit the 4.6. I am guessing that helped the demise of that platform.

 

Yup, good old BON.
Remember the infamous I.P.I.E.?

 

That's pretty interesting. As a n00b to the forums, all of them, I had no idea how much different everything started out as. Thank God we didn't get a RWD focus chassis.

I do have one question, the 99 Cobra fiasco... I've seen that mentioned elsewhere. What happened ?

The reason I ask is before I knew I was going to go for the '05+ 'Stang is that in 01-02 I was looking at Stangs and almost lauged at a dealer that wanted to charge almost 50K for a the blown Cobra, the terminator ??, the markup was terrible. It was then that I decided to not by a car and wait until I paid mine off... I know it's not 99 but still, curious minds...

 

1999 Cobra Fiasco:

The 320HP rated Cobra, only put out 300-310HP... causing a massive recall and changes. If I remember correctly, the exhaust was changed and something else... to bring it up to the correct 320hp.
Cars having the 'fix' were louder and actually had 320.

It was basically a BIG screw up and was all over the place.
Since then, Ford has start to underate things by a small margin, to make sure that wouldn't happen again. Like the 03 Cobra and Mach1s

Story goes, that because of the 99 fiasco.. no 00s were made. (with the exception being the 300 car run of Cobra R's)
Even further than that... there WERE some 00s... but they were converted to right hand drive, and sold in Austrailia. The 01s came around... and no 02s because of they were realeasing the 03, which actually was a late 02 and had an extended run, compared to the 04s.
There were apparently a handful of 02s, that were used internally for Ford brass...

And anyone from back in the day remembers IPIE
IPIE -> Ignore, Posted In Error
Mustang Marty was THE man
An errored topic turning into the biggest thread ever... with women

 

I saw those some of those 00 Cobras outside DAP in August of 2000. They had stickers on the drivers headlight that said Austrailia. All of those Cobras were left hand drive. They converted them after they arrived in country.

If Im not mistaken some of the 00's Cobras kept by Ford were used as test mules for the 03 Terminator

 

You can buy the v8 focus kit.

 

If I remember from the paperwork too, the car for sure was going to AAI back then (considering Dearborn was old and outdated) but it had to be after the cougar was run...

I can't even remember the informant...all I remember is his signature on BON "The info is out there, just bring a shovel"

As for the S197 ... I know from the start there were a lot of changes, and its a miracle we got the awsome car we did, with all the hard work of Team Mustang and everyone else involved.
Dubbed a kinda 'plagued' project near the beginning (I remember having doubts) they pulled off something special.
A lot of people may not like some of the things or decisions... but quite honestly..it could have been REALLY bad.

Now... lets hope that Ford knows what they have, and can keep it going Sounds like they do... i mean... I hope to god they do

 

Thanks for the info. Talk about SNAFU. I can understand the hesitation regarding the S197. I for one am extremely thankful it turned out as awesome as it did !!

 

I'm just enjoying the history lesson! I knew about the 1999 Cobra fiasco, but that's about it....