It makes a bit more sense for an electric car. It’s like how phones still make a ringing noise (often) despite the lack of a bell, or the presence of “folders” on my computer. They want the car to still be able to warn pedestrians that its coming, so making it sound like an engine-powered car makes sense. As time goes on, presumably, we’ll be able to choose from an array of sounds, including something more like a Tron lightcycle.
I’m a pretty big car guy, and while I get the backlash to this, I understand why it happens. Carmakers that do this, like Ford on the Mustang and BMW on the M3, are selling to performance-minded enthusiasts who like hearing engine noise. But car buyers today, especially on an expensive sports-luxury car like the M3, also demand a car with a lot of noise deadening – they don’t want to hear road noise and wind noise on a car that they dropped a ton of money on. The compromise is to build a very quiet, isolated cockpit and use a system that still allows the driver to hear the engine noise.
If people don’t KNOW that there’s a system piping engine noise into the cockpit, they think it’s a great car that sounds wonderful from behind the steering wheel. If you gave them one car to drive with the enhanced engine noise and one without, and didn’t tell them about how it worked, they’d almost surely choose the car with the enhanced engine noise…they’d just think it was a car that sounded better and gave them more of a high-performance feel when driving it.
Basically, I think most people are against the IDEA of “fake engine noise,” but if Car & Driver never told them that it was fake, they’d love it.
But it is known now as the 2015 Mustang is hitting the market, and it is going to be a major laughability factor that will, in my opinion, have a negative effect upon sales. It is no longer a muscle car or even a pony car.
The previous 8 cylinder versions of the Mustang had a good engine tone. 4 cylinder engines even turbo charged ones do not have the same throaty sound. If you are going to introduce an new model it should be able to stand on it’s own based on cost, power, handling and the other factors that drive people to own a pony or performance car.
If you buy one of these castrated new Mustangs you might as well put your lips together and go “bubbbbb, brrrr, bubbbb” like you did when you were a child pushing cars around on the living room carpet.
I predict that this “feature” will not be offered in the 2016 model of the Mustang.
You can buy a 700+ horse power Challenger, but if you want a Mustang you are going to get a 4 cylinder with enhanced engine noise?
This idea will be the second death of Mustang, the first being that horrible Mustang II thing.
You don’t HAVE to get a 4-cylinder, and you don’t HAVE to get enhanced engine noise. You can just get the V8 version. The 2015 Mustang can be had with the EcoBoost (turbocharged) 4-cylinder, the somewhat pedestrian, mostly-for-rental-car-fleet V6, or the 5.0 V8, which makes 435 horsepower, 15 hp more than the 2014 model.
The EcoBoost is the only one with the enhanced engine noise, as far as I’ve heard. Turbocharged cars are pretty quiet, because the turbo basically acts as a really efficient muffler. That, combined with the quiet cockpit buyers demand, means that to make the car sound “right” from behind the wheel, they chose to sweeten the sound.
But you don’t have to get the EcoBoost. You can just get the V8 and make real zoom zoom noises to your heart’s content. Turbocharged 4-cylinder cars make great performance cars (I have one – not a Mustang), but if you want a loud exhaust, it’s not your best bet…the 5.0-liter V8 is.
I’ve had 3 so far.
The first was a brand new 2003 GT 5 speed that I got when I was 19. I added 4.30 gears, a shifter, sub-frame connectors, and stiff lowering springs. It was a fun car to have in college.
I traded that one for a Grabber Orange 2007 GT. The new chassis was lightyears ahead of the old fox platform that my previous New Edge used. I put 4.30s, an aluminum driveshaft, and a tune in that car. That was probably the best daily driver I’ve ever had, not counting my current Escape.
A couple of years ago, I decided I needed another and started looking at the new 5.0 cars. They are nice, and fast, but I found a 98 Cobra that caught my eye. It had a Vortech S-Trim with 11 pounds of boost, Cobra clutch, Steeda shifter, sub-frame connectors, Koni coilovers with super stiff springs, lowering spindles in the front, a panhard bar in the rear, and an auto-x alignment. I never had it on a dyno, but Vortech’s website said it should have made around 475 horsepower at the flywheel, so a little north of 400 to the ground. It was fast. I added 4.10 gears, drag radials, and an aluminum driveshaft and made it even faster. Fun car.
I like the new one, but I’ve told myself my next “Mustang” is a Factory Five Roadster. If I can keep from buying another Miata instead…
What? They couldn’t put baseball cards in the spokes?
One word… Pathetic, wait, no, three words… Utterly, Hopelessly Pathetic
In college and during the first years in the work world, I drove a 1985 Mustang, 2.3 L Turbo. Manual transmission. I lucked into it when my dad decided that the ancient Olds was too large for me to drive and drove it himself. He’s a really nice dad.
I had a lot of fun in that car. Bonus: I minored in studio art, and the hatchback came in handy for large canvases.
I considered one of the new Mustangs when I was car-shopping this last time. But since I live up north and don’t feel like I drive well in snow well yet, and because a convertible isn’t a good idea until I live someplace with a garage, I bought an AWD SUV.
But…there may be a charcoal-grey manual transmission Mustang convertible in my future. A few years from now, but still.
My first car was a 1968 fastback, bought it in 1978 for $800. I still own it today. It now sports a stroked 428 cobra jet, a Tremec TKO 5 speed & a bunch of other goodies. 602 horsepower at the flywheel with no power adders; it’s a lot of fun to drive.
I had a 1971 coupe (looked a lot like this) that I bought in high school (1985 or so) and owned for about five years. It had a 302. I liked it a lot, but always wished it was a Mach 1. I think the fifth-generation Mustangs look absolutely fantastic; the sixth generation doesn’t do much for me (too low to the ground and lost most of the muscle car look that the fifth generation had).
If I were to get another one, and it’s a strong possibility, I’d go with a 1971-73 fastback or a fifth-generation model. Both are beautiful cars – the early '70s Mach 1 models just look mean.