Car Throttle

Ford's iconic Mustang musclecar got a significant revamp for 2010, and a pair of new engines for 2011. While the 2005+ Mustangs have always been pretty nice cars with a decent amount of punch, for a while they were playing for customers without any real competition.  With the introduction of the Chevrolet Camaro and Dodge Challenger, Ford needed to up the ante: the 315bhp GT just didn't have much to say against the 426-bhp Camaro SS. The battle-tested 4.6L "modular" V8, which powered Mustang GT's from 1996-2010 has finally been retired, and replaced by a thoroughly modern V8.  The return of those oh-so-familiar 5.0 badges to the flanks of the Mustangs mean a nearly 100-horsepower bump over last year's model, but don't be fooled into thinking

One thing the world has no shortage of is limited-edition Mustangs. I'm not sure they make numbers high enough to count how many "special" Mustangs there have been over the years, but it's somewhere between "A gazillion" and "X, where X=enough+1."  What's a shame is that most of them are nothing more than silly tape-and-stickers packages.  GT/California Special?  Vinyl decals and some nice wheels.  Shelby GT?  Loud exhaust, filter-on-a-stick, a $10,000 Shelby badge and some chrome hood pins.  Bullitt?  A Mustang GT with less of the tacky Mustang GT stuff stuck on it.  Just fabricated specialness that any gearhead can see through at first glance. So when rumors started circulating that Ford would be bringing back the "Boss" Mustang moniker, I didn't get my hopes up. 

Hey, do you remember that one special edition Mustang? You know, the one with the vinyl stripes and stickers and the loud exhaust that was really rare? ...yeah, that doesn't narrow it down.  I know, I know, they all look the same.  But ol' Carroll himself picked this year's Barrett-Jackson auction as the place to debut his latest tape-and-stickers-and-go-faster-goodies Mustang special, and it actually seems like it's gonna rock.  Called the GT350 (original!), it's a faster and harder version of the 2011 Mustang GT, retuned for a little more face-punching power and grip. Starting with the brand new 5.0L Ti-VCT 32v V8, Shelby decided that 412bhp wasn't enough, and the GT350 is fitted with a Ford Racing supercharger setup, with a claimed output of 500+bhp.  This is

Soon, you will once again be able to non-ironically blast Vanilla Ice from a Mustang. OK, perhaps not - but come 2011, the faux-rapper's words (in case you're confused, they're "'Rollin' in my 5.0, with my ragtop down so my hair can blow..."  now do you remember?) will once again ring true. That's right, as you've probably heard, the Five-Point-Oh will once again reside under the hood of the Mustang.  Only this time around, if you do the math properly, it actually is a 5.0!  The initial details of the new motor leaked out last week; the basic goods were a 5.0L V8 with 412bhp and 390lb-ft of torque.  Today, Ford released the full monty press release on the 5.0, and at least on paper it sounds