Ford and Pro Stock

[Chad Rhodes]

Originally Posted by BlueOval Ralph

From Pomona, Ford will no longer support Pro Stock! Just not important!
Stay tuned.

otherwise spelled as "we can't get competitive"

[jmcarter]

Sure leaves Morgan and others hung out to dry...I thought Morgan did a pretty good job on the motor program. Sorry to hear this for the blue oval faithful. Think about Mark Wolfe who just stepped up to the plate and now his investment is hurt badly.

[Arnold Greene]

Originally Posted by Chad Rhodes

otherwise spelled as "we can't get competitive"

Yeah, Chad, it's hard to be competitive with a level playing field, instead of with a blower and/or a bogus hp rating........I'll bet they lobbied nhra for a low horsepower rating. It must have been denied!

[Dinsdale]

Originally Posted by Chad Rhodes

otherwise spelled as "we can't get competitive"

I'd say qualified #5 is competitive. In fact, just qualifying in that class means you must be doing something right.

I don't think Ford did much for Morgan (or anyone else) in Pro Stock. Read someplace it was mostly engineering stuff but could be wrong. They didn't do much for Glidden in the old days either and that's why he got out of it. As for Mark Wolfe, he only had a couple race deal with Morgan's motor. I heard he will be running in Comp next year

[bigshow2966]

Morgan should have been competitive right out of the box. The Ford motor is just a Hemi99 with the spark plug moved around some.

I thought Ford wasn't really putting up money anyway, the money was mainly from Cunningham?

[Stephen & Horace Johnson]

Originally Posted by bigshow2966

Morgan should have been competitive right out of the box. The Ford motor is just a Hemi99 with the spark plug moved around some.

I thought Ford wasn't really putting up money anyway, the money was mainly from Cunningham?

the info I got..............was that FORD wasnt sponsoring him anyways, it was just cunningham footing the bill on R and D............so why is this a suprise.........I dont think FORD will ever be a "FORCE" in Pro Stock unless they sponsor somebody in that class... I hate that for morgan, cunningham, and the other ford guys..

[Jimi B]

The blocks and heads are already developed. Hopefuly they all can do r&d on their own. Mark Wolfe today said he is planning on running Pro Stock stll next year.

[Jeff Lee]

I think Ford gets more press, which is name recognition, which turns into sales with the CJ's than anything they could EVER get with a P/S team. Those CJ sales are turning some into GT500 sales and Boss 302 sales.
I'd LOVE to have a new Boss 302.
See the 2013 Mustang line released today? GT500 with standard 5.8L and 650 HP and 200 MPH top end speed? Can you say "bye, bye ZL-1"!
And Ford racers, the GT500 now comes with a carbon fiber driveshaft. Sounds like a superseded part in the making!

[Dan Bennett]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lee

...And Ford racers, the GT500 now comes with a carbon fiber driveshaft. Sounds like a superseded part in the making!

That's a great point which clicked on a light bulb in my brain.

In the early 50s, Zora Arkus Duntov wrote a letter to the big wigs at Chevrolet. He strongly made the case that the key to making the brand a performance icon (remember, at this time all they made were six cylinders) was to make inexpensive parts which would allow anyone to hop up their small block.

We got Duntov cams, big valve heads, intakes, and more. That was a stroke of genius, and the rest is history.

Why do we see so many Camaros in Stock and Super Stock? Because they follow Duntov's premise: fairly cheap (at least at one time), good performance, and easily available parts.

So here it is in 2011 and we have the same concept, of a manufacturer providing hard core racing parts to the masses. Except this time it's Ford.
They are the only OEM that cares about drag racing and it shows.

Keeping with the spirit of the thread, in my mind a carbon fiber driveshaft sold to anyone is much more significant than a hand-built Pro Stock car or two.

Unless one of the other manufacturers decides to compete, I would wager big money that the Mustangs will be the dominant cars 10 or 20 years from now and appear in the big numbers that Camaros do now.

[Pvt Parts]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lee

And Ford racers, the GT500 now comes with a carbon fiber driveshaft. Sounds like a superseded part in the making!

Gee I wonder what took em so long. As far as I know, I was the first drag racer to run a carbon fiber driveshaft. That was in 1990 !!!