Acceleration
The heart of a comparison such as this is how each engine moves its car. Always a good sign, opinions among us were varied in the beginning as to who was quickest, and it was an amazingly close race all the way. Regular test driver Chris Walton did the honors, with the following results.
________0-30 Mph____0-60 Mph_____1/4- Mile
Cobra____ 2.109_____ 5.25_____ 13.62 @ 105.2
Bullitt____ 1.767_____ 5.15 _____13.59 @ 102.4
Mach 1___ 1.767_____ 4.70 _____13.19 @ 106.7
How's that for surprises? Who'd have thought a Cobra was slower than a Bullitt? And dig how the Mach 1 is more than a half second quicker to 60 mph than the Cobra--no wonder SVT put a blower on the '03 snake.
Some considerations need to be made, however. For starters, Cobra acceleration didn't benefit from the slightly shorter, stiffer BBK springs. These inhibit weight transfer, making the already relatively high-strung Cobra a tougher customer off the line. Chris spent a little extra time finding what this Cobra wanted, saying, "It turns out this Cobra likes a little wheelspin and doesn't produce any axlehop. About 3,200 rpm was all it needed to break the tires loose, but unlike the stock tires, these didn't spool up uncontrollably--they were tractable and responded to 'pedaling' the throttle. Short-shifting one-two and [the] two-three [shifts] (at 6,000 rpm) made the best numbers. I let it rev in Third to make the quarter-mile."
The overachiever of the bunch is clearly the Bullitt. Its Two-Valve engine is obviously biased to produce more low-end thrust than the Cobra--and maybe equal the Mach--and it shows in the 60-mph time. The relative lack of top-end charge is also indicated by its 3-mph-slower trap speed, even if this was a stellar set of Bullitt acceleration numbers. Chris' take on it was, "I had one magical launch that made this the quickest and fastest Bullitt we've seen yet. A 1.767 0-to-30 time exactly matched the Mach 1, but then the Mach 1 pulled away. Still, Miles owes me a lunch for getting his car deep into the 13s!"
And then there is the Mach. Clearly Ford has been running Four-Valves on the dyno--you simply can't make good quarter-mile times or especially mph without horsepower. But the Mach 1 is also the most softly sprung of the three cars here, with good weight transfer to plant the rear tires and no danger of wheelspin from the live rear axle. As Chris put it, "This was the fastest of the three to launch. I could dial in as much or as little wheelspin as I wished with my big toe. The shifter felt better--more precise than I expected--and I like the metal [shift] knob. It was also a surprise to find some useable power in the upper end revs--she just pulls and pulls. However, the best run was with a softish launch and short shifting at 6,000 rpm."