The Ford GT began as a concept car designed in anticipation of Ford's centennial year and as part of its drive to showcase and revive its "heritage" names such as Mustang and Thunderbird. Camilo Pardo, the head of Ford's "Living Legends" studio, is credited as the chief designer of the GT and worked under the guidance of J Mays. The designers drew inspiration from Ford's classic GT40 race cars of the 1960s and the GT is sometimes mistaken for its 1960s counterpart.
Positive response on the auto show circuit in 2002 helped persuade the company to produce the car in limited quantities, and the first production versions appeared in 2003. It is a very high-performance, two-seater vehicle with a strong styling resemblance to its racing ancestor and performance to match. The powerplant is a mid-mounted supercharged 5.4 liter V8, producing 550 horsepower and 500 foot-pounds of torque. Top speed is 205 mph.
The Ford GT features many new and unique technologies, including super-plastic-formed aluminum body panels, roll-bonded floor panels, a friction-stir welded center tunnel, a “ship-in-a-bottle” gas tank, a capless fuel filler system, one-piece door panels and an aluminum engine cover with a one-piece carbon-fiber inner panel.
Brakes are four-piston aluminum Brembo calipers with cross-drilled and vented rotors at all four corners. When the rear canopy is opened, the rear suspension components and engine are visible.
The 5.4L V8 powerplant is all-aluminum and fed by a Lysholm screw-type supercharger. It features unique 4-valve DOHC cylinder heads and a forged rotating assembly. It uses a unique aluminum block designed specifically for the GT program with an emphasis on block rigidity. A dry sump oiling system is employed, allowing the engine to sit very low in the frame. The DOHC heads are a revision of the Cobra R cylinder heads (with slightly increased wall casting thickness in the exhaust port) and the design is essentially shared with the GT500. Power output is 550 horsepower and 600 foot-pounds of torque. A Ricardo six-speed manual transmission is fitted featuring a helical limited-slip differential.
Performance (mph):(Source: Ford Motor Company)0-60 mph (0-96 km/h): 3.3 seconds
0-100 mph (0-160 km/h): 7.8 seconds
Top speed: 205 mph