2018 Ford Mustang GT V8 could rev to 7500rpm

Ford Motor Company hasn’t offered up the full details on the 2018 Mustang GT or the revised 5.0L V8 under the hood, but in addition to the promise of more power – it looks as though the 2018 Mustang GT will rev considerably higher than the current models.

When the 2018 Ford Mustang was introduced earlier this year, the Motor Company promised that the revised 5.0LM V8 under the hood of the newest pony car would pack more power and rev higher than any Mustang GT before it. To be specific, this is exactly what the first 2018 Mustang press release said about the Mustang GT:
“Ford’s legendary 5.0-liter V8 engine has been thoroughly reworked. It is more powerful and revs higher than any Mustang GT before. This power increase was achieved with the first application for Mustang of Ford’s new dual-fuel, high-pressure direct injection and low-pressure port fuel injection on a V8 engine – delivering robust low-end torque, high-rpm power, and improved fuel efficiency.”

Since then, the automaker hasn’t offered any clues as to how much power the 2018 Ford Mustang GT will offer, but an image floating around the internet seems to prove that the redline rev limit will be somewhere in the area of 7,500rpm.

2018 Mustang GT 7,500 Redline
I am not sure where the image originated, but there is a shot of the 2018 Ford Mustang GT tachometer and on that gauge, the redline range begins right around 7,500rpm. We don’t know the exact number, but there is no question that the redline range of the 2018 Mustang is further “up” the tachometer than the previous models.

The image above shows the tachometer of a 2016 Ford Mustang GT and as you can see, the redline range begins just past 6,500rpm and at 7,000rpm, the driver will hit the rev limiter. Figure that with the 2015-2017 Mustang GT making its peak horsepower at 6,500rpm, there is really no need to wind the motor much past that point, so the gap between 6,500 and the 7,000rpm rev limiter is there to allow the engine to rev slightly past the peak power range. Once you hit 7,000rpm, the rev limiter kicks in and the car effectively loses power.

In the images of the 2018 Ford Mustang GT tachometer, the “warning range” (which runs from 6,500 to 7,000 in the current Mustang GT) is smaller, seemingly beginning just before the 7,500 mark while the actual rev limit point is around 7,700rpm or so.

What does this mean?
Well, it obviously means that the 5.0L V8 in the 2018 Ford Mustang GT will rev higher than the engine in the 2015-2017 models, but Ford wouldn’t increase the redline rpm and the rev limit simply to do so. This increase in peak engine speed almost surely comes with an upwards shift in the powerband, so where the 2017 Mustang GT reaches its peak of 435hp at 6,500rpm, the 2018 Mustang GT might reach its peak output closer to 7,000rpm. With peak horsepower levels (rumored to be anywhere from 450-475hp) being reached at 7,000rpm, that 7,500rpm redline would allow that “extra space” between the top of the powerband and the rev limiter.

More importantly, the higher redline and presumably higher peak horsepower range will lead to a larger powerband, so from the point where peak torque is reached (4,250rpm in the current models), the new Mustang will pull harder for a longer period of time between each shift.

Unfortunately, Ford still won’t offer up any details on the 2018 Mustang GT V8 engine, but with the 2018 model year rapidly approaching – it shouldn’t be long before we learn all of the key details of the newest Mustang GT.