Detroit, Michigan – Impractical, silly, downright crazy? Welcome back Detroit, we’ve missed you.
While the North American International Auto Show has always been home to a few odd concept vehicles, it’s been short on the outright nuts cars for the past few years.
Not so much on Monday, the opening day of media previews of the cars automakers expect to build in upcoming years. Major producers showed off three ridiculous, ultra-powerful super cars at the show – vehicles that will cost upwards of six figures and go 0 to 60 faster than you can read this sentence.
Ford got the ball rolling with the GT, a follow up to the 2003 GT which as an update on the 1960s GT40 that Ford used to beat Ferrari in several races in the 1960s. Production is set to start some time next years
Like all supercars these days, the GT features a carbon fiber reinforced plastic body, copious use of lightweight materials throughout its design, and the low-slung, mean styling people have come to expect from exotic automobiles.
What it’s missing, compared to those glory cars from yesteryear, are a few cylinders and a lot of engine block. Ford says the new car will produce more than 600 horsepower using a 3.5L turbocharged V-6, the next generation of its very successful EcoBoost engine line.
Raj Nair, Ford group vice president, Global Product Development, says “GT includes innovations and technologies that can be applied broadly across Ford’s future product portfolio – another proof point that Ford continues raising the performance bar while ultimately improving vehicles for all of our customers.”
Thankfully, for those who go to auto shows to entertain their inner 8-year-olds, the GT wasn’t along in the parade of super power. Honda’s Acura division unveiled the production version of its NSX supercar Monday, a vehicle set to go into production in Ohio later this year.
Honda has been showing off concept versions of the hybrid supercar for the past three years, but show visitors got a look at the final version on Monday. Like Ford’s vehicle, it has a small engine (well, small compared to the behemoth power plants that propel competing cars from Lamborghini), boosted with twin turbos.
Where they differ is the addition of electric motors in the Acura. But don’t expect it to be a fuel sipper. Acura engineers say the motors are intended to boost power and to offer front-wheel drive as engine power goes to the rear wheels. By combining the two systems, the car effectively gains all-wheel drive without the mechanical linkages that traditionally sap power and efficiency in AWD systems.
Another supercar to debut Monday was Fiat Chrysler Automobiles’ Alfa Romeo 4C Spider, a roofless version of the car Fiat began selling in North America last year. Smaller than the other two supercars, the 4C is lighter and shaves even more size off of the engine. A tiny 1.75L, four-cylinder engine powers the car.
So, one day at the show, three cars with a combined horsepower north of 1,000 and only 16 cylinders between them.
Source: Ford, Honda, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles