Comparison: 2011 Chevrolet Camaro SS Convertible vs. 2011 Ford Mustang GT Convertible
Dancing Naked in the Rain
January 26, 2011
/ By Jonny Lieberman
/ Photography by Evan Klein
From
http://www.motortrend.com/roadtests/...son/index.html
What we have here is some Alanis Morissette-style irony. No, not ra-ay-ain on your wedding day. Rather, it's the one week when you have a pair of RWD, manny-trannied, V-8 powered, 400-plus horsepower convertible ponycars and Southern California decides to experience the "Storm of the Decade." Did I mention both cars had summer tires? Unlike Alanis's song, ironic isn't the word we'd use, and we can't print the one we would. But like Hunter S. Thompson alluded to, we're here to cover the story. Reviewing convertibles with the sun shining (so to speak) is sine qua non. Knowing that we simply had to remove the roofs despite the inclement weather, we donned full rain gear, dropped them tops and drove the new Camaro SS Convertible and Mustang GT Convertible in the pouring rain. The whole ordeal is a great lesson in making lemonade out of flash floods and mudslides. Besides, can you think of anything more fun than flinging these two mamma-jammas around in the wet while dressed up like the Gorton's Fisherman? Neither could we.
We lived with these two ragtops for a week in bizarre-for-Southern California torrential rain, and are shocked to report that both are livable, real-world propositions -- even with cats and dogs falling all around you. Put another way, these are not your father's ponycars. They did not hydroplane off the road at the first hint of a powerful right foot, an especially impressive feat considering just how much water came down (the Los Angeles Times tells us about an inch per hour during the worst of it). Let's not forget how powerful these headless beasts are. The 5.0 'Stang's 412 hard-revving horses combined with 390 angry pound-feet of torque are slightly bested by 426 macadam-thumping ponies and 420 lb-ft of smoky torque in the 6.2-liter Chevy. Back in the heavily fetishized days of yore, that much mechanical motivation coupled to poor brakes, flexible bodies, and primitive horse and buggy-style suspensions spelled disaster. Not so these days.
So not so, that associate online editor Scott Evans and I headed up to the snaking back roads of Malibu to put these anachronisms through their proper paces. Sadly, if not predictably, the hills above Malibu -- home to some of this country's best driving loops -- had already received 12 inches of rain. And unbeknownst to us, CalTrans was in the process of repaving Malibu Canyon Road and had removed the top layer of asphalt. As the years roll by you learn that certain stereotypes are true. Like the one about Californians not being able to drive in rain. That axiom, and the fact that the road surface was essentially a bunch of slick pebbles, kept our speeds down to around 30 mph for the first 15 miles. Not exactly the best way to conduct a convertible sports car comparison test. However, the second we turned left onto Mulholland, well, our fortunes dramatically improved.
Suddenly, and even in the slippery stuff, Evans and I found ourselves on an ideal road with two excellent automobiles. Both cars are fast (obviously), but each was able to handle the slick twists and turns. We here at Motor Trend have long been trumpeting the fact that the new Mustang GT is just as good as the best from Europe (see America's M3? October 2010). As such, we weren't surprised in the slightest that the soft-top version proved to be a proper back-road burner of a sports car. Does its nose still dive like the hardtop when you slam on the brakes? Oh yes, even more so. But hey, convertibles are for cruising, right? We were quite surprised by the headless Camaro's agility and prowess in the canyons. With that big bastard of an LS3 V-8, straight-line performance has never been an issue, but the left and right stuff continually left us wanting. Why? Near catastrophic understeer. Listen, the convertible still sports plenty of understeer (especially when compared to the Mustang), but it's somehow more manageable than the coupe.
Continued at Motor Trend -
http://www.motortrend.com/roadtests/...son/index.html