Max sustained speed of stock Terminator?

[bcwang]

I just came back from Germany last week and while there got a chance to drive on the Autobahn with my rental car. Frequently I had it running many minutes at a time full throttle which could eventually reach and sustain 122mph. I'm guessing most cars there are running full throttle all the time as they are small engines but they move fast.

So I began daydreaming about how it would be if I had my terminator on the Autobahn. Now we all already know top speed runs or WOT pulls to high speed are a no no on this car. So my questions are:

-On a stock cobra, what is a safe sustained (over 1 hr+ duration) speed the car can maintain without engine damage?
-What is the top speed you can maintain without going into any boost at all?
-And what gear should you be maintaining those speeds in?

I know there are a few people here who have Cobras in Germany but I think most of those are modded in some way. It would have been cool to see a Cobra zoom by while I was there but I saw almost only normal passenger cars.

 

[VtekII]

i dont really think as long as you ease into high speeds in 5th and 6th gear you would be just fine. its the long sustained WOT blasts that fry the engines. youll be able to accelerate just fine inthose gears without boost just not mind blowing acceleration.

this is just my theory though i dont have any actual facts to back it up

 

[91svtcoupe]

Why the WOT gear pulls Fry the engines?

Is it not a good idea to do a

4th gear pull on the road?

5th gear

6th gear

I have heard of some people running 160mph in there car....I don't understand?

First I am too chicken to do it....but I thought you could hammer every gear in this car to the max....

What am I missing?

by the way.....I usually like doing a third gear pull in the car and I chicken out before 4th is half way over.....Is that bad for the car? Do i need to stop?

 

[divided]

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[VincodeY]

^ do a search for it. WOT pulls are no good due to the insuff. coolant system doubled with the tight PTWC.

 

[VtekII]

Why the WOT gear pulls Fry the engines?

Is it not a good idea to do a

4th gear pull on the road?

5th gear

6th gear

I have heard of some people running 160mph in there car....I don't understand?

First I am too chicken to do it....but I thought you could hammer every gear in this car to the max....

What am I missing?

by the way.....I usually like doing a third gear pull in the car and I chicken out before 4th is half way over.....Is that bad for the car? Do i need to stop?

1-4 gear pulls are fine, but i guess once you get into the overdrive gears(5&6) it intensifies the load on an already incredibly warm engine and allows the pistons to expand quickly and touch the walls of the cylinders. i guess having the cooling mod will help a small amount but the cars shouldnt be boosted hard in OD.

 

[91svtcoupe]

1-4 gear pulls are fine, but i guess once you get into the overdrive gears(5&6) it intensifies the load on an already incredibly warm engine and allows the pistons to expand quickly and touch the walls of the cylinders. i guess having the cooling mod will help a small amount but the cars shouldnt be boosted hard in OD.

Sounds Good.....That makes sense..

 

[evn62719]

So a centri. supercharged Mach 1 with a built motor shouldnt have this problem because of the lack of heat soak from a PD blower, right?

 

[greengt88]

that's what i'm wondering, i kinda like the pull of a centrifugal. I bet a turbo could definitely get WOT in 5th and 6th.

 

[bmxer89]

I did wot once in 5th on the way back from the track, manly because I was running a supercharged challenger that wanted to keep going. I was very nervous

 

[Silver2003Cobra]

hmmm, not saying WHERE I've done it, but here's my accounts of high speed runs (that I can remember)

one I started about 30 mph in 6th gear (to see if it would do it) and took it to about 155 WOT all the way.. (ran out of road)

another time, drove about 13 miles, going from 140ish to the speed governor in 5th gear.. bouncing off the governor about 5 times WOT throttle when hitting the governor.. (went from 3/4 tank to 1/2 tank in that distance)..

20 miles averaging about 150ish in 6th gear, boost right about 10 psi with a 2.8" pulley..

I got the car with 166 miles on it, and now have almost 78K miles.. change the oil every 10K with mobil1 synthetic..

it runs as good now as the day after I got it (the day I got it, it ran like crap, because the dealer would start the cars and let them idle as they cleaned the snow off the parking lot, and moved them around a bit, also they let people test drive it since they already had 04's on the lot and it's a 2nd build 03)

 

[Digital]

The WOT 5-6 gear opinion is a widely shared opinion but there is little proof that it will happen.
It HAS happened to a select few but in the same right there are plenty of people who run 5-6 all the time and don't have a problem.
As a rule of thumb I would say don't do back to back 5-6 runs and if you're making a lot of boost and you are running a lower then stock compression don't do it either since this is where most of the damage has happened.

It is never good to run a engine "flat" out for long periods of time.
I would say what ever half or 5/8s your max rpm is in your highest gear should be about as fast as you would want to go for anything over 15 minutes.
If I remember correctly 3500rpm in a cobra is about 120mph in 6th gear.
Though with stock gears, tires, etc they will go to ~170mph in 5th at ~6500 rpm.

I get asked by people (who obviously know nothing about cars) how fast will it go?
I have lightened my car substantially and have 3.27s so I usually just tell them 200mph.
Which is probably not far from the truth, not that I can really verify that, nor would I want to.
If ford would have given us another 1500 or so rpm this car would go much faster (think ferrari)

 

[Black Sex]

If ford would have given us another 1500 or so rpm this car would go much faster (think ferrari)

Or if they would've gave us a reasonable overdrive gears in the tranny like the .80 5th and .50 6th that would help alot too. My buddys 01 z28 with a
T56 with 3.89 gears and a 26" tire turns 1800 rpm at about 75mph. My car with 3.73's turns 2K rpm at 70mph. His tranny has the .50 6th gear

 

[bcwang]

It is never good to run a engine "flat" out for long periods of time.
I would say what ever half or 5/8s your max rpm is in your highest gear should be about as fast as you would want to go for anything over 15 minutes.
If I remember correctly 3500rpm in a cobra is about 120mph in 6th gear.

Hmm, 120mph sounds low for a safe "cruising" speed for such a high powered car. Do you think the cobra motor can't stay at 5000-6000rpm safely for sustained time if it was not in boost?

I say this because I noticed the mercedes B200 I was driving in Germany would stay about 5000 rpm (6k redline) most of the time even at lower speeds and even just trying to lightly accelerate at even lower speeds. So I was driving for hours at above 5000 rpm.

Has anyone seen what speed can be maintained while staying out of boost?

I wonder if there is any safe amount of boost that would not eventually cause an overheat condition if kept at that level for long periods of time.

 

[Fat-cat]

i went WOT in 5th once to spank a Bently GT .. started 3 car behind him and put about 6 on him by the time we shut down. No problems here that one time.. its seen some minor 5th pulls but thats it. This was back when i was on my eaton.

 

[Digital]

Hmm, 120mph sounds low for a safe "cruising" speed for such a high powered car. Do you think the cobra motor can't stay at 5000-6000rpm safely for sustained time if it was not in boost?

I say this because I noticed the mercedes B200 I was driving in Germany would stay about 5000 rpm (6k redline) most of the time even at lower speeds and even just trying to lightly accelerate at even lower speeds. So I was driving for hours at above 5000 rpm.

Has anyone seen what speed can be maintained while staying out of boost?

I wonder if there is any safe amount of boost that would not eventually cause an overheat condition if kept at that level for long periods of time.

You can do what ever you want to your car, but when you have engine problems at early miles don't be surprised.
Most people don't take their luxury cars to triple digit milage, it is after all "just a mustang."
The SN95 platform is not stable at speed that you want to drive at either.
No one will be able to tell you that its ok to drive at redline for hours, because no one has ever done it. Your question sadly cannot be answered.
You are more then welcome to bank roll your own R&D facility and let us all know.

 

[mu22stang]

First, don't compare apples to oranges. A B200 is not a Cobra.

Second, heat is THE enemy of this engine. THE enemy. The piston-to-wall clearance is tight on the stock long block.

Positive displacement supercharged engine...heat
Increased engine load through overdrive gears...more heat
Increased engine load through higher air resistance...more heat
Boost increase [pulley(s)]...more heat
Typical dyno queen tune...more heat
Insufficient engine bay heat evacuation...more heat
Wrong cooling mods...not really more heat, but definately not less
etc., etc.

 

[RAPTOR5V]

Just curious and maybe stupid question but where do you guys get tight piston to wall clearance from exactly? my tuner had said to me these cars came with more clearance because they are boosted engines. than say a GT

 

[steves04cobra]

well I can tell you that im stationed in Bamberg Germany and ive had my car on the ban several times. I've had it up to 165mph a couple times. I normally cruse it at about 100mph for an hour at a time and have had no problems yet

 

[firemanmike]

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