Aside from GM, the other big news at this year's Auto Show was Ford. Sadly, they, too, suffered a shortage of new cars. In fact, most of the cars on display I had either seen, or were not interested in, to be polite. The first new offering on Ford's plate is the refreshed Shelby GT500. While new, and improved, producing 40 more horsepower, and bigger wheels than last year, I still took it with a grain of salt. Not that I don't care about the Mustang, but this seemed kind of meh. In fact, the whole Mustang thing in general doesn't excite me like it once did. Maybe I'm getting older, or maybe my interest in cars has shifted more to the European side, but seeing a hot Mustang doesn't excite me like it used it. At least not in this cliche red with white stripes combo. If it was blue and orange, or the classic blue and white, however, things would be different. A lot different.
The next big announcement from the Ford side of things were their new EcoBoost engine. Contrary its its green-seeming name, there is nothing green about EcoBoost. Averaging 18 MPG mixed driving cerntainly isn't green, but that's not the fault of the engine itself. While 365 horses and 350 ft/lb of torque, made possible by twin Garrett 15mm turbos, certainly get these new Fords up and running pretty quickly, it can't makeup for the weight of the cars this engine is thrown into. The Taurus SHO and Lincoln MKS weigh in at just over 4300 lbs dry, with the Flex and its MKT twin tacking on another 200 lbs. Quite scary, really. I'd love to see the EcoBoost thrown into a much lighter vehicle, say the Fusion/MKZ. Even an Edge or MKX would be cool with an EcoBoost.
Making up for the absence of the Super Duty, Ford presented the SVT Raptor. It looks awesomely menacing in the orange hue seen here, but it looks equally intimidating in the blue its offered in too, as well as the obligitory black. With its monstrous exhaust, and 6.2 "Hurricane" V8, this thing sounds like the beast it is. Unfortunately, in a haste to go, I didn't snap the logo.
The new Fiesta is finally here! Too bad Ford chose to display the ungainly, ill-porportioned sedan version. I almost didn't even look for it, but unfortunately, I had to take notice. Blargh. I'll wait for the hatchback version, thanks.
Ford's ex-subsidaries both had, in my opinion, rather lame displays at this years auto show. Jaguar, unlike last year, had nothing new that was noteworthy this year. They did present the XJ, though. Sadly, the XF's design theme penned by Ian Callum does not work on the XJ as it does on its smaller sibling. Whereas the XF flows rather nicely, the XJ look great until you see the rear end. Then it's a whole slap of "what the hell were they thinking?" Honestly. Blacked out C-Pillars, tapered, round, taillights, and a big "cat" logo? Really? The back of the XJ looks like a Hyundai attempt at luxury circa 1999. Ew.
Like Jaguar, Volvo, too, had a rather mundane display. Quite contrary to arch-nemisis Saab, Volvo had nothing of extreme significance. The all-new S60 that made its world debut at Geneva was not present this year, for good reason. It isn't on sale yet. However, they did show off the new facelifted C30/C70 twins. Forgive me for saying this, but I honestly think the new front end sucks. The first generation was so much nicer looking. Whereas the old front was slim and tied in with the overall design theme of the car, this looks like the grafted an XC60 front end on the damn thing. Oh wait.
Like I said in regards to the GM display, I hope next year will be better. Ford better have some nice cars on display to make up for this year's disaster. I honestly can't wait to see the new Edge or Super Duty in person. Same story for the real Fiesta! Gimme a Lime Squeeze Fiesta hatch with the proper wheels, and I'm good. Make it a stick, too, please.
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