Ford has never been one to stake claim to a new wrinkle on car safety so you should have expected that the Detroit-based automaker worked tirelessly so it could come out and introduce something along the lines of a ’world’s first’: inflatable seat belts.
To be honest, it’s a pretty novel and idea and something that a lot of people are kicking themselves for not thinking about it sooner. As Ford explains it, the inflatable seat belts are so much more effective than standard seatbelts because they can spread the force of an accident over the human body by as much as 5 times as its traditional counterparts.
By using inflatable seatbelts, the possibility of injuring your head, chest, or neck significantly decreases, which is what we’re all hoping for anyway.
Contrary to the heat-triggering airbags, the inflatable seatbelts are inflated by a cold, compressed gas and when the threat of a crash becomes alarmingly higher; the seatbelts trigger off and inflate before the crash occurs.
The whole idea seems like a home run on all fronts. After all, we can’t have enough safety features on our cars, unless of course, we’re the type who thinks that deathly joyrides should be done as often as possible.
The first car to be outfitted with these inflatable seatbelts will be the next-generation Ford Explorer SUV, which is set to start production sometime next year. As the years pass, Ford said that the new inflatable seatbelts will find their way in other Ford models as well.
The Ford GT is for sure one of the best Ford ever, so its no surprise that even if out of production for long time now, it still gets lots of attention from tuners. And the US specialist Geiger Cars have prepared the HP790 kit based on the Ford GT.
The Geiger HP790 is powered by a 5.4 liter V8 engine that delivers a total of 790 hp (an increase of 240 hp over the standard version) and a peak torque of 863Nm. As a result de GT sprints from 0 to to 100km/h (62mph) in just 3.6 seconds, breaks the 200km/h (124mph) mark 6 seconds later and reaches 300 km/h (186 mph) in only 22.8 seconds. Top speed is 223 mph.
The car has been lowered with 60-millimeter and sits on matte black alloy wheels outlined in the car color, mounted in 9x20 inches at the front and an impressive 11x21 at the rear.
Graham Goode Racing revealed details on the RS370FR package based on the Ford Focus RS sports hatchback. Thanks to a new carbon fiber Cold Air Induction System (CAIS), a larger capacity air to air intercooler with alloy air diverter plates, an upgraded ECU and a larger bore exhaust turbo front pipe and sports catalyst section the 2.5-litre, five cylinder turbocharged engine delivers 368bhp at 6383rpm and a peak torque of 339lb.ft at 4997rpm.
"It gives me great pleasure to launch this latest Focus RS upgrade, which builds upon the success and popularity of the 340 conversion, but raises performance to a new level. I am delighted with the outcome of the work undertaken by our technical team, because the RS370FR package is exceptionally fast, yet as usable and civilised as our numerous Focus RS customers expect."
The RS370FR package is available now, fully fitted at our Leicester premises for £3750.00 plus VAT.
The boys from Bonurant had to share the back lot of the Las Vegas Convention Center with the blue oval because as part of Ford’s Fiesta Movement, visitors to the 2009 SEMA Show had a chance to wait in line to take the all new premium compact for a spin. The Fiesta Movement is a grassroots marketing campaign set forth by the American automaker to promote their new product that will be unveiled a week from now in Los Angeles. The movement has generated millions of hits on youtube and registered 60,000 hand raisers while Ford lets its agents speak freely about the not even released vehicle; these are a few things that have certainly made the Fiesta’s Brand Manager Sam De La Garza awful proud. However the little ride and drive that Ford set up is sure to have converted a few more Americans into small car fans.
Speaking of tire smoking drift cars and Porsches, another familiar face at the 2009 SEMA Show was Falken with a pair of very different blue and green high performance machines to show off what Team Falken is all about. It is nice to see that one manufacturer can be so successful in two completely different disciplines of motor sport.
Representing the world of drifting where goal is to get sideways, light up the tires and hope for an outstanding crowd reaction in a matter of corners was Formula D driver and recent Japanese export Vaughn Gittin Jr.’s competition drift car, a 2010 Ford Mustang with enough supercharged Detroit iron under the hood to go through a set of Falkens in a matter of minutes. On the other hand, the Falken Porsche that races in the American Le Mans Series is about getting as much grip as possible from the sticky Falken slicks, keeping wheel spin to a minimum and hoping not to get the crowd on its feet until the end of the lengthy endurance race. If they got excited any sooner, it would probably signal the end of the car’s day. However as different as the setup on each of these cars is, they are both able to excel at their particular brand of motor sport.
Ford’s ’10 Unleashed campaign has given us some pretty good entertainment over the past couple of months. There was the touching story of a blind man getting his first taste of sitting behind the wheel of a 2010 Mustang, there was that owner who decided to turn his Mustang into a rally car, and of course, there was the four Need for Speed gamers who took their video game skills out on a real race track.
The latest instalment of the hit campaign sees the 2010 Mustang take on a group of professional skateboarders in a sort-of can-you-top-this competition.
Of course, we need to have a certain level of perspective as to how this challenge played out. After all, the 2010 Mustang had the decided advantage of computer-generated graphics on its side. So, in a nutshell, you can say that the competition wasn’t done on an even playing field – no pun intended.
Check out the videos after the jump to see who rocked whose wheels.
In what must have been some sort of twisted marketing ploy, the great American automaker Ford had an Ultimate Green Ford Focus RS sitting at the beginning of their display at the 2009 SEMA Show in Las Vegas. Honestly, as you turned the corner expecting to see more Mustangs than you can shake a stick at, there it was, a 300 HP turbocharged lime green Focus wearing a set of wide arches, 19 inch multi spoke rally inspired RS wheels, vents in the fenders and hood as well as a wide mouth front bumper.
At first the neon paint acted like a magnet drawing in your eyes. As anyone who has ever been behind the wheel at speed can tell you, you end up going where your eyes are looking, and we weren’t alone. We literally had to shove through the crowds and hold back attendees just to get a clean shot of Ford of Europe’s greatest creation. Hopefully Ford’s marketing team were hiding behind the curtain somewhere like the wizard of Oz just so that they can understand just how much of a demand there is for this machine right here in the U.S. however we might just settle for an RS Fiesta.
Ford will unveil the 2011 Mustang at the Los Angeles Motor Show, but of course details on the car couldn’t be kept secret until then. So, thanks to some very vigilant eyes we can tell you the first details on the future muscle car. Orders will begin in January 18, 2010 and first deliveries will be made starting March 15, 2010.
For the 2011 model year Ford will bring back the 402A Package which is the California Special (GT/CS) model and a Shelby Convertible powered by a 5.4-liter Supercharged 4V V8 engine.
There will also be a SVT Performance Package that includes: 19-inch wheels, RR spoiler with GF (not sure what GF stands for), Over The Top (OTT) stripe delete and 3.73 limited slip.
Ford will also offer a Brembo Brake Package, 6-speed automatic transmission option and three different 19-inch wheels.
Ford and M-Sport UK revealed today the long-waited Fiesta S2000 rally car. The car will be homologated in January 2010 and will compete in rally championships as IRC and S2000 World Cup.
The Fiesta S2000 has already completed nearly 3000kms of testing both in the UK and Europe and that extensive testing programme will continue into the start of the next year in readiness for the car’s competitive debut.
The Fiesta S2000 is the latest in a long line of rally cars produced as a result of the successful partnership between M-Sport and Ford, starting with the Escort Cosworth in the 1990s and moving on to the record breaking Ford Focus RS WRC and Ford Fiesta ST.
When Ford decided to enter a couple of rally cars at the 2009 X-games we were excited to see the new Fiesta wearing a set of bulging boxed fenders, a WRC style wing and some tarmac spec rollers. Perhaps even a showroom version. The blue oval should be happy that they chose to run an assortment of their Fiestas both new and old because the weekend’s broadcast television action sports etravaganza finale featured a 2010 Ford Fiesta going up against the golden boy Travis Pastrana and his fully built Subaru Impreza WRX STI. The boy and his Subaru had taken the gold the year before but after clipping a little too much off of his last apex, it was Indianapolis 500 winner Kenny Brack who was jumping up and down celebrating on the roof of a car that looked alot like this on
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