With that much oxygen and fuel invited to the party, the V-8 easily thumped out 355 horsepower at 5500 rpm and- miracle of miracles!-had also divested itself of its detonatin' proclivities, at least as long as the fuel tank was awash in 94-octane unleaded. We further installed 30-pound-per-hour injectors, a 10-millimeter-larger mass-air sensor, a 190-liter-per-hour fuel pump, and an air-intake tube (inelegantly dubbed the "snorkus") the size of the Chunnel. We then bolted on a pair of SVO cylinder heads with slightly altered combustion chambers and ports polished to a Bulgari-quality luster. We returned to stock pistons (now attached to manly Manley connecting rods) and dialed in eight pounds of boost. 3, fortunately for the budget, was a champ. Then the Ford Panther platform engineers-these are the guys in charge of the Vic, her pudgy sibling the Marquis, and the Town Car (and who are ultra-blasé about mechanical mayhem that accrues during testing)-calmly said, "Oh, you want a new engine? 'Cause, we can, like, ship you one."Įngine configuration No. I began to siphon funds from the Csaba Csere birthday fund. Brown trailered the whole leaky mess home.
One editor asked if he could obtain closure. We next installed a set of lower-compression pistons that allowed us to double the boost, a combination good for a total of 370 horsepower and, unfortunately, more detonation than Navy SEALs encounter in a whole career-enough, in fact, that on a 95-degree day, as we were noodling out engine-computer calibrations at Ford's test track, a connecting rod tunneled its way through the iron block and, last time we saw it, was touring downtown Dearborn. We started by installing an SVO/Eaton supercharger and intake manifold, with the blower set at five pounds of wheeze. Our goal was to obtain a minimum of 300 horsepower from the Crown Vic's 4.6-liter SOHC V-8. He assured us the outcome would humiliate an Impala SS, though perhaps not in price. Brown, who is the right age to understand why persons in the Sixties purchased 390-cubic-inch tri-carb Ford Galaxies, accepted the assignment as if it had come from the pope's mechanic. Burgor gave us a discount that amounted to $2728.Īs truckers slammed on brakes in front of us, we drove to see 50-year-old Kenny Brown, whose 18,500-square-foot shop in Indianapolis is famous for unloosing big-horsepower Mustangs (most recently, the 450-hp 289RS Cobra). When our backs were turned, he also installed a Uniden BearTracker 800 BCT7 police scanner, a Cobra SoundTracker CB radio, a pair of PIAA driving lights capable of illuminating previously unmapped sections of the moon, headlight flashers, tinted windows, and a $935 Sound Off strobe-light system that causes our Crown Vic to resemble Caesars Palace at night and is probably illegal in 48 states. "You need more than that," deadpanned Burgor, who outfits cop cars for a living.
LOUNGE LIZARD REPTILE SUPPLIES PLUS
All we originally required was a pair of utility spotlights ($175) mounted on the A-pillars, plus a Holbrecht grille guard ($175) with which we could bull our way through ugly domestic disturbances and ticket riots at Yanni concerts. So we immediately drove it to Dennis Burgor's Custom Ordered Police Supplies (acronym COPS, naturally) in Taylor, Michigan. It looked like what Tony Orlando was probably driving when Dawn quit. When we picked it up, our Vic didn’t look like much. It arrived with the handling-and-performance package ($615) and ABS with traction control ($775). We started with an inky-black Crown Vic-black being the hue befitting full-figured personalities such as Marlon Brando and the queen herself, It was the civilian version that anyone can buy, rather than the restricted cop-car flavor. Our goal was a sedan that, in all pertinent performance measurements, would surpass the Impala SS we tested in June 1994. But if Ford wouldn’t create a Dearborn version of the Impala SS, we would. Sure, it's a lounge lizard of a car, an A&W street racer, a hot rod for Thumper's Third Base Saloon (motto: "Last stop before home").
And as Chevrolet accidentally demonstrated with its ballsy Impala SS, the market for big brooding, brutish boulevardiers remains, well, rabid. For one thing, it is the last of the affordable full-size, V-8–powered, rear-drive American sedans. Still, there's something about the Crown Vic that might amuse.
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