2019 Ford Mustang EcoBoost

Reading the result

This car was measured with the factory calibration untouched, on 87 octane, with a blow-off valve and a cat-back exhaust fitted. Two hundred and twenty-four horsepower and two hundred and fifty-four pound-feet at the hubs.

The window sticker on a 2019 EcoBoost Mustang says considerably more than that, and the gap is the single most common conversation in this building. Three things account for almost all of it. A manufacturer quotes power at the crankshaft on an engine dynamometer; we measure at the hubs, with the transmission, driveshaft and differential in between, and those cost power. Second, 87 octane gives a turbocharged engine the least knock margin it will ever have, and the factory calibration responds by pulling timing and boost — it is protecting the engine, correctly. Third, we publish what the equipment read.

Neither of the two modifications on this car makes power. A blow-off valve changes what happens to the air already compressed when the throttle closes; it does not change what happens when it is open. A cat-back exhaust is behind the catalyst on a turbocharged engine, which is the least sensitive position in the whole exhaust path. Both are worth having for how the car sounds and behaves. Neither is worth having for a number.

That is why this entry exists with no tuned figure next to it. The useful output of the session was knowing what the car actually does — which is what a baseline is for, and why we pull one before touching anything.