S650 Mustang Prototypes Spied High Altitude Testing

[Skye]

Wonder what short of hi altitude they are testing. Pardon the ignorance on the topic are or is this a normal thing and what are they prototyping, new body for the car new engines or next gen variants. Just curious on the overall topic not specifics as the camo suggests secret squirrel.

It's part of the overall rigor with testing any vehicle. A real-world way to confirm the limits designed and tested in the labs and on computers correlate with the real world. Most of the time, things work as expected. Sometimes, they don't. Or they do, but the customer experience doesn't meet expectations.

Race teams are same. They'll spent countless hours prototyping things in CFD, then testing in the tunnel, only to receive feedback on the track that, "This change sucks!" LOL. Or, the time, money and effort spent on the bits resulted in virtually no change at all.

Things are often camo'd, to protect Intellectual Property, leave people guessing, heighten the anticipation and to keep competitors in the dark.

Edit,

Ford spends about $8B in vehicle R&D, about 4.5% of sales, close to 50% of their gross profit.

Sponsored