In 1981, Ford formed the Special Vehicle Operations (SVO) group to design and develop performance parts and accessories related to the company's racing programs.
The group also built a special model to showcase these parts, the Ford Mustang SVO. The SVO Mustang was designed to compete directly with European sports sedans like BMW's 3 Series. To reduce costs, they used the existing 2.3 L turbocharged 4-cylinder engine and Borg-Warner T-5 5-speed manual transmission from the Ford Thunderbird Turbo Coupe. The car had a different computer and air meter and added an intercooler, a Hurst shifter, KONI shock absorbers, and 16 inch wheels, a novelty at the time. The car produced 175 hp (130 kW) for the 1984 model year (MY) and the first part of the 1985 MY, 205 hp (152 kW) after mid-1985 MY, and 200 hp (149 kW) for the 1986 MY. In total, 9,844 were built.
SVO/Ford Motorsports was later renamed Ford Racing Technology (FRT).
Read more about Special Vehicle Operations: SVO Australia
Famous quotes containing the words special, vehicle and/or operations:
“The books may say that nine-month-olds crawl, say their first words, and are afraid of strangers. Your exuberantly concrete and special nine-month-old hasn’t read them. She may be walking already, not saying a word and smiling gleefully at every stranger she sees. . . . You can support her best by helping her learn what she’s trying to learn, not what the books say a typical child ought to be learning.”
—Amy Laura Dombro (20th century)
“The woman may serve as a vehicle for the rapist expressing his rage against a world that gives him pain—because he is poor, or oppressed, or mad, or simply human. Then what of her? We have waded in the swamp of compassion for him long enough.”
—Robin Morgan (b. 1941)
“It may seem strange that any road through such a wilderness should be passable, even in winter, when the snow is three or four feet deep, but at that season, wherever lumbering operations are actively carried on, teams are continually passing on the single track, and it becomes as smooth almost as a railway.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)