Test drive Ford Mustang Shelby GT 640 screams Nissan GT-R: Fast Food
Content
When the earth plunges into darkness, the thirst for adventure awakens. To satisfy our appetite, we drive a Ford Mustang Shelby GT 640 and a Nissan GT-R and we drive off to experience an amazing Fast Food feast. Enjoy your meal!
The difference between American and all other sports cars remains stark: while some behave like perfectly played racing stallions, others remain rabid bulls that you need to tame if you want to survive. While squeezing ...
The beast with a terribly long name meets Godzilla
In the dark of the night we are confronted by a beast with a terribly long name - this is the Mustang Shelby GT 640 Golden Snake. Why at night? After all, in the afternoon you won’t go far in this car without being discussed, juicy and photographed - all these are platitudes that you are unlikely to need. Anyone who was once fascinated by the Ford V8 coupe will be left in awe of the sinister figure of the matte gold four-wheeled evil. The car looks just as menacing as the first 1965 Mustang that Carol Shelby turned into a Musclecar. What would Mr. Shelby say about the Nissan GT-R?
We invited Godzilla to the party tonight because it's the epitome of the modern supercar, the exact opposite of the Mustang: it's damn fast on the Nurburgring, accurate to drive, and even squeaks friendly when reversing. However, despite the specific charisma of parallel computer reality, after a partial redesign, the Nissan GT-R now boasts some mechanical "feel". For example, when driving in third gear in a city, the rear axle gears make sounds as if someone decided to insert the wheel bolts into the grinder. In fact, Mr. Shelby will probably like the Japanese car, but only until he opens the hood: “No !!! It's just V6! "
Cold sweat
For enthusiasts like Carol Shelby, we race the Mustang and GT-R in the moonlight to find the answer to the only question: Which of these two beasts is more fun? Methods for evaluating comparative tests remain deeply hidden in the closet (or maybe someone still doubts that Ford will lose on points on objective criteria?!). It's time to release the film ...
It is enough to turn on the light and we are already starting to sweat. Tup-tup, tup-tup, tup-tup - the heart is not just beating, it is beating at breakneck speed. Just like the eight giant pistons of the Golden Serpent, whose roar breaks the night. Darkness is like a car body screen that is hard to see from the driver's seat and hides the gloomy interior. During the day, large gaps, cheap plastic and soft seats would be shocking, but not really - this is a typical Yankee.
At night, the eye is delighted by the two-tone illumination of the controls and the seductive white ball on the gear lever. Despite the presence of 800 Nm of torque, the transmission gears are sorted manually. If one is a fan of Audi and BMW styling, it would be best to literally rip out the Mustang's cabin and leave your car in the hands of a good auto interior specialist to create something of value. However, tonight we will not deal with such problems and will focus on the red dot that stands in front of the closed mesh of the gaping mouth of the Golden Snake.
Against each other
It's a GT-R that cuts through the air with lightning speed and strives to be the first to reach our final destination - a typical American fast food restaurant. Despite its heavy aura (first impressions are true - the car is actually heavier than the larger Mustang), the Japanese fighter feels like a fish out of water on the track. Driving emotions are subdued in comfortable sports seat shells. If you do not follow the speedometer and relax your right leg, it is almost like in a "normal" car.
Mustang does not like soft nonsense - he attacks ruthlessly with a deafening roar. The driver simply looks in the rear-view mirrors and sees the flames, which should come from the exhaust pipes. Doesn't this machine spew fire and brimstone? An open exhaust system is a test for all neighbors - it seems not to drown out the noise, but only to simulate it. This exhaust system is part of a large Geiger-Cars tuning package that turns a stock Mustang GT 500 into a poisonous GT 640 Golden Snake.
Interested clients will have to seriously train their right leg. Just too much gas pressure and jump! - The butt is already turned. The stock traction control system should be active, but it seems to be as motivated to work as a traffic police officer in charge of installing license plates. Would anyone notice 640 Golden Snake horses in such a service? It is unlikely - today's car coupons look so opaque ... And in general, what papers are we sitting here to talk about?
Heat
It should smell like tires today. With 285mm tires, Nissan has one decisive advantage over its rival: the dual powertrain. Regardless of how lightly or roughly you control the throttle, the 530 horsepower of the V6 bi-turbo engine is distributed to the four wheels. This explains the incredible acceleration from 100 to 3,4 km / h that the GT-R achieves in an astounding 2009 seconds. In 0, this achievement brought the car a place in the Guinness Book of Records: no other production four-seater car accelerates faster than from 100 to XNUMX km / h. But in such an exercise, the bastard is especially good to be careful not to damage the cervical vertebrae ...
In the Mustang, the picture is completely different - in second gear, the impressive Ford-V8 still makes the rollers on the 285-wide rear axle shroud in thick smoke. After a successful duel for a quarter mile, we decided to measure the black lines that the GT 640 Golden Snake leaves on the pavement: 90 meters! Nissan leaves no trace of its tires, but leads Ford in the 400-meter sprint by almost a full second - with significantly less power.
The darkness of the night can't hide the GT-R's huge handling advantage. While the Godzilla behaves like a sort of big jet-powered kart around the corner, and pointing it in the right direction is a relatively easy task, the Mustang pours tons of sweat while struggling with the stubborn behavior of the rigid rear axle. Worst of all, the driver has no chance against a recalcitrant car - the rougher the road, the worse it gets. We have to repeat it again - the difference in steering precision between a car with a rigid rear axle and a car with independent suspension is like comparing a game of ball with a dart.
Like after orgasm
The fast food restaurant is already very close, we can even see its signs. Nissan starts to behave more casually - this is already a winner. Why, then, be stressed in the final meters? The dual-clutch transmission upshifts, the tachometer settles down to 2000, and the car drives smoothly and confidently.
Such harmony is alien to Ford. After a few meters of driving at a slow pace, the electronics can no longer convince the fuel injection system that it should supply the cylinders with a very modest amount of gasoline. As a result, the engine almost suffocates and goes into emergency mode. This car is really crazy! The only way to help him in this situation is to downshift and rev up his aluminum flair again. Then the 2,3-liter compressor creates thrust that after 3000 rpm is so terrible that your skin will continue to itch even after you get out of the car.
For GT-R owners, this type of emotion may not be entirely clear. A true super sports car must be, of course, fast and controlled with surgical precision. The real value is the perfection of the whole machine, not just its individual components.
Even if the Mustang is your dream car, you can't argue with the second argument. And yet you will choose the Golden Snake again - because these are imperfect cars that we remember for a lifetime.
text: Dani Heine
a photo: Hans-Dieter Zeufert
technical details
| Ford Mustang Shelby GT 640 Gold Snake | Nissan GT-R Black Edition | |
|---|---|---|
| Working volume | - | - |
| Power | 640 k.s. at 6450 rpm | 530 k.s. at 6400 rpm |
| Maximum torque | - | - |
| Acceleration 0-100 km / h | 4,3 with | 3,4 with |
| Braking distances at a speed of 100 km / h | 35 m | 34 m |
| full speed | 304 km / h | 312 km / h |
| Average consumption fuel in the test | 16,5 l | 17,1 l |
| Base Price | 89 140 euro | 92 000 euro |
