Ford GT Officially Packs 647hp, Hits 216mph

The Ford GT was formally introduced at the 2016 Detroit Auto Show and while the company has offered up lots of information over the past year, there had been very few key specifications on the new supercar – until now.

Ford has finally dished the details on power numbers, a vague weight number and a few real world performance numbers, including track times from a Canadian road course which shows that the GT will outperform the McLaren 675LT and the Ferrari 458 Speciale.

“The Ford GT is all about performance,” said Raj Nair, Ford executive vice president, global product development and chief technical officer. “We achieved considerable weight savings with the carbon fiber architecture. We then reinvested some of that savings into where it counts most – performance, specifically, the active dynamics. The result is an even faster car.”

Ford GT Power
First up, the numbers that we have all been waiting for. The Ford GT will derive 647 horsepower and 550lb-ft of torque from the twin turbocharged 3.5L EcoBoost V6. This makes the GT engine the most powerful road-going application of EcoBoost technology thus far – although it is not Ford’s most powerful production car ever. That claim still belongs to the 662hp 2014 Mustang GT500, but in this carbon fiber-heavy supercar, this twin turbo V6 makes this the quickest and fastest production road car ever sold by Ford Motor Company.

“Our expectation has always been that the EcoBoost V6 would perform exceptionally well in the Ford GT – both in terms of power as well as aerodynamic efficiency,” said Dave Pericak, global director, Ford Performance. “We tested and developed this powertrain through the Daytona Prototype race car that ran in IMSA for two seasons, last season racing with Ford GT. We are extremely pleased with how it performs, both on the track and on the road.”

Performance Figures
Ford has also announced some performance figures, explaining that the new GT uses that power to reach a blistering top speed of 216 miles per hour, putting it among the fastest supercars on sale today. Also, Ford spent some time on the road course of Calabogie Motorsports Park in Ontario, Canada, which happens to be near the Multimatic production facility where every Ford GT is built.

The new Ford GT was able to turn a best lap of 2:09.8 at Calabogie Motorsports Park and, according to the Motor Company, both the McLaren 675LT and the Ferrari 458 Speciale were slower around that 3.1 mile road course. The McLaren ran a 2:10.8 and the Ferrari ran a 2:12.9 – making the Ford GT quicker around the track than the McLaren by a second while being more than 3 seconds quicker than the Ferrari.

Vague Weight Figure
Finally, Ford has announced the weight of the new GT supercar as being just over 3,000 pounds and when the company includes the power to weight ratio of 4.72 pounds per horsepower, we get an actual figure of 3,054 pounds. The problem is that Ford is using the dry weight, which doesn’t include any of the fluids, so when you add in the coolant, the various lubricants and gasoline, the Ford GT is likely a touch over 3,200lbs when filled with gas and all essential fluids. That makes the GT a bit heavier than we had expected, but with that solid comparative track time at Calabogie, the new Ford supercar appears to be prepared to take on the world’s best supercars.