As it stands, the Chevrolet Camaro is the ticket for an American-made, high-performance pony car. The Shelby GT350 is the closest Ford gets to Chevrolet’s arsenal of hot Camaros in ZL1 and ZL1 1LE form. That will likely change soon, however.
A new leaked photo may show the upcoming Ford Shelby GT500’s aluminum supercharger housing. On it sits the unmistakable Cobra logo with the characters “5.2L” cast into it. Immediately, it seems likely the GT350’s flat-plane crank V8 is in for forced induction. However, Ford Authority reported that may not be the case.
A cross-plane crankshaft could find its way to the new GT500. Ford’s performance parts division already sells an Aluminator 5.2-liter crate engine, which makes 580 horsepower without a supercharger. The figure to top is 650 hp, which is what the 2018 Camaro ZL1’s 6.2-liter supercharged LT4 V8 engine produces.
An additional oil-chart document, which may or may not be official, also shows a list of every Ford engine for 2020 and its required oil. At the bottom resides “5.2L Supercharged Mustang GT500.” If the document is legitimate, the new GT500 may arrive towards the end of 2019.
By then, who knows what the Camaro team will have cooked up. Right now, the team is certainly riding high on the 2018 Camaro ZL1 1LE‘s launch, but we doubt they’re sitting idly by. We’ve yet to see much of a new Camaro Z/28, either …
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Bring it, to the Ring… ooh wait, Ford doesn’t!