He could use the Ford 4.6 / 5.0 / 5.4 / 5.8 Engine. I think using GM Drivetrain was not the best idea. It is a great looking Car and I believe that if it had a Ford Drivetrain, it would have been a huge seller. Also, who gets to Register the Series 1 Cars? David.
"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." I think there are considerable legal obstacles for Shelby to revisit that "venture." There was an aborted attempt a while ago, if I remember, to try a Series 2... but that never got off the pad.
I would disagree that the GM powerplant was a bad idea. The Aurora V-8 was a great engine. However, Oldsmobile was being phased out at the time of the Series 1. The Cadillac Northstar would have been a better powerplant choice. robin
Well, if it had to have a GM Drive Train then, the LS series V8's would have been better...... More Power Adder options. David.
He used the Olds Aurora V8 because it had a serious racing tie-in at the time. The Indy cars used the Aurora motor for their powerplant for a few years, and Carroll liked the fact that it was the most high tech power plant in his eyes. Now it didn't hurt that GM was willing to allow Shelby's designers to dip into the parts bins for stuff like windshields, radios gauges, A/C controls.
Eric Davison's book tells the whole story The book is called Snake Bit In the book Davison tells how one part of GM helped Shelby but then other parts of GM would freeze him out, not letting him use the parts he wanted, like Corvette suspension arms. GM was always worried Shelby would worm his way in and topple the Corvette, going back to '58 when Shelby had three Corvettes re-bodied in Italy. Still I've heard it would be more desirable to traditional Shelbyisti with a Ford engine. I wonder which Ford engine would fit--it might have to be at least a liter larger to make up for the unanticipated weight gain the car got between its first incarnation and the production version...
