« GM Sales Performance - March 2005 |
Main
| Chevy's Freedom Over Texas Sizzles With Clint Black and LeAnn Rimes »
April 22, 2005
Ford's Hau Thai-Tang Brought a Team of Mustang Convertibles to Washington, D.C.
It's well established that in 2005, the Ford Mustang is the star in the car industry firmament. The fifth generation pony is number eight on the best selling car list, is on track to sell over 160,000 units, Ford has upped production by over 70% and everyone is paying their props.
At the same time, Hau Thai-Tang, who served as chief nameplate engineer for the Mustang redesign, is becoming a bona fide name in his own right - perhaps more respected by car people than executives, because he's the guy who started "with a blank sheet of paper."
Along with over 300 other Ford employees, of course, Thai-Tang succeeded in doing the impossible -- creating a 21st century Mustang that harkened to the past while pointed, aggressively, into the future.
It's not Thai-Tang's first succcess with Ford -- his work on the 2000 Lincoln LS won industry honors and he also led the development of the 2001 Mustang GT, V-6, Cobra and Bullitt GT models.
His bosses obviously expects more from the guy who joined the company in 1988 as a Ford College Graduate trainee. In December, Thai-Tang was named Director of Advanced Product Creation and SVT, the Special Vehicle Team.
In May, he will receive an honor from outside the car industry -- Thai-Tang is one of six Vietnamese Americans slated to receive the "Golden Torch" award at the Vietnamese American National Gala in Washington, D.C.
Despite avowing that English is not his first language, Thai-Tang entertained a group of about 100 auto journalists and Mustang fans at a lunch this Wednesday, with his story about how the Ford team approached their task.
Calling the project akin to "writing the novel to Star Wars," Thai-Tang said the obvious problem was balancing an ever present pair of opposites -- honoring the past while creating a modern car, and delivering performance while keeping price in mind.
The latter dynamic brought up audience questions regarding why neither a six-speed manual transmission nor independent rear suspension appear in the final car.
Rather than give a political answer, Thai-Tang was direct on both counts, saying they had to make a choice between incremental performance improvements versus how much the equipment would add to the MSRP. And while the solid rear axle remains a bone of contention for hard core fans, Thai-Tang said he was convinced the majority of Mustang buyers were not among those calling for an independent rear.
In terms of the former dynamic -- honoring the Mustang tradition -- Thai-Tang said the team "showed a lot of reverence for the Mustang" and made a conscious decision to "go back and embrace our heritage."
Perhaps the best illustration of this bias is his story of the Steve McQueen poster hanging in the design shop. The picture of McQueen from the movie, Bullitt, showed him with a "menacing scowl," Thai-Tang said, that telegraphed a "quintessential American toughness," they wanted the car to represent.
The image they were striving for? When you see the Mustang in your rear view mirror, Thai-Tang said they wanted people to think, "I need to get out of the way."
We were given the chance to test that proposition. Ford brought a handful of GT convertibles for a short ride & drive. I am sorry to report that I have no idea what the stereo sounds like -- given only 4.9 miles before I had to turn the convertible around, checking out the controls was not on my to-do list.
I suspect you would do with the Mustang exactly as I did. Rev the motor and enjoy the the menacing rumble.
[By the way, Thai-Tang relayed how delivering an authentic muscle car sound was a challenge since they had moved the muffler behind the rear axle. Comparing the muffler to a wind instument -- hence dependent on length and diameter to produce a quintessentially American roar, he told us they compensated by pushing the tailpipe further into the muffler body.]
Given the tight parkway traffic, you'd probably also slow the Mustang down to open some distance -- and then give it the gun to experience the pure indulgence of 300-horsepower acceleration.
I don't know what people were thinking when the Mustang came roaring from behind [always maintaining the driver-ed mandated three-car length of course].
I do know that I've still got that delirious smile on my face from driving the Mustang. And I can still remember the jaw-dropping looks and similar wide-open smiles on the drivers I passed. I'm pretty sure they were admiring the Mustang, but maybe it wasn't just the car.
After all, as Thai-Tang said, "everyone looks good in a Mustang."
Posted by Frank at April 22, 2005 11:34 AM | Filed under Auto News
| Ford