New GT Ford’s Most Expensive Car Ever: $400K

We’ve known for two months that it was coming and for a few weeks where it would be built and for a few days how many would be built and now we know how big a check a prospective owner of the new Ford GT super car will have to write: $400,000.

By comparison, a Lamborghini Aventador comes in at about $380,000, which is the vehicle that Ford Performance Vehicles Chief Dave Pericak most often compares with the new GT.

Earlier this week, Ford officials confirmed they would produce just 250 of the supercars annually, although they haven’t committed to how many years they will build it. The price of the new GT is significantly higher than the $150,000 iteration built about a decade ago. Ford built about 4,000 units before discontinuing it in 2005.

The new version is powered by a 3.5-liter twin-turbocharged V6 developing at least 600 horsepower. The new model will hit the road in 2016, just in time to mark the original Ford GT40 race car’s big victory at Le Mans a half century earlier.

There have been ongoing rumors and reports suggesting Ford will have a track version of the GT ready to take back to Le Mans, something the maker has denied. Not that it is ruling out the possibility. Officials just insist they have not yet made the business case for that costly project.

(Ford offers up more, but not everything on new GT super car. For more, Click Here.)

The GT was on display this week at the Geneva Motor Show along with the new Ford Focus RS. The new hot hatch is powered by a 2.3-liter twin-turbo EcoBoost engine that will make “320-plus” horsepower when it begins to roll out of its Saar-Louis assembly plant later this year. That French factory will supply all global markets including, for the first time, the United States.

(Click Here for details about Ford bringing the Focus RS to the U.S. for the first time.)

Even though the new RS uses fewer horses than the previous model – although there’s a thought that the 320 will increase – it’s going to be significantly lighter than its predecessor, translating into a significantly better power-to-weight ratio.

(To see the top 10 debuts at the Geneva Motor Show, Click Here.)

Meanwhile, all that power will be put to the pavement through a newly designed all-wheel-drive system. Technically, the new RS is still a front-driver by design, but the new all-wheel-drive system will put as much as 70% of torque to the back wheels when needed. Meanwhile, its limited-slip system will be able to direct as much as 100% of the torque that goes to the back axle to one wheel or another. A brake intervention system will do much the same up front.

This torque vectoring system will more than overcome the traditional drawback of all-wheel-drive, which is to understeer in corners, stressed Ford’s global product development chief Raj Nair.