2016 GT Release Date/Question

[Tamadrummer88]

Does anyone see parts / engine changes in 2016 or 2017??
When do you think Ford will do a refresh?
Just a little off topic here

2016, probably not. But 2017 may see a slight bump in HP and the addition of more performance parts.

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[Twin Turbo]

My thoughts?

'17MY
New 10-speed auto
DI Coyote with 460hp
Possible bump in power for Ecoboost (perhaps the RS Focus will be a pointer)
2.7 Ecoboost (wildcard here, but I'm hoping)

'18MY
Refreshed sheet metal

Or they may choose to roll this into a single model year. In that case, I'd expect it for '18MY.

 

[JoeDogInKC]

2 thoughts.

1) I'm here because I like mustangs, not as a Ford rep. If you want to complain bring it up to someone that's actually paid to represent the company.

2) I'm going to assume you're not an electrical engineer or computer scientist, so I'll give you a pass on not understanding the difficulty making these things happen on automobile. But long story short, SYNC updates are constantly made available, but unless if you get a vehicle with an embedded modem, it's on you to either go to the dealer or upload it via microSD.

Sorry, I was being a bit sarcastic to the fact that I'm sure many people have complained and that Ford hasn't listened over many years. I wasn't really putting you on the spot to be a Rep, but at the same time, someone with access to get the right people to listen is sometimes useful.

I am a Network Engineer and overall "computer guy" and have been for almost 20 years. I'm quite aware of how to check for updates and install them. The problem is, updates are extremely rare.

When I said that it wasn't hard, I meant it wasn't hard to provide an option for the upgrade path, i.e. getting the necessary parts available to dealerships, instructions on how to remove the old parts and install the new ones, etc. The head unit is essentially a computer (Running Windows CE, currently). If the system is not capable of running a *nix OS with minimal graphics and overhead, or being upgraded to such, it wasn't really designed all that well IMO. That said, I see no reason why the hardware *couldn't* or *shouldn't* be able to be physically upgraded so that Gen 3 could be swapped in at a dealership, if that were the case.

I'm admittedly a Ford fanboy, but this is one area where I think they hang their customers out to dry a little bit. I can't be the only one to think so. My 2011 GT never had a SYNC update come out for it, and I checked pretty darn often, even asking at the dealership if they had some updates that would never show on the syncmyride.com website. IIRC, newer models had SYNC AppLink and 2011 owners were not able to get it. I'm sure that even if the system wasn't capable of supporting AppLink for some reason, there were probably bugs caught and resolved in versions for following model years that 2011 users didn't get (or, maybe they did at some point. I ended up with a 2013 because I needed an A/T at the time). The bottom line for me is that Ford is basically saying: "Nope, sorry, you'll have to buy a brand new car if you want that."

It's not the same as the change from the 2010 4.6L to the 2011 5.0L, where to upgrade you needed a whole new motor. We're talking about relatively simple hardware and software. I didn't mean to imply that it'd be easy to get everything set up to where it's possible to do the upgrade, just that it is possible and doesn't appear that it'd be all that difficult compared to a motor swap. And, if it is, it's my opinion that it just wasn't really designed that well to begin with.

BTW, this wasn't all directed at you, my man. Just a general rant with some quantification on my position. If I were designing something like this, where components are software upgradeable by some means (Direct Internet, SD card, USB, RS-232, etc.), I'd want to future proof the hardware to some degree (2 - 3 years at minimum). Then, I'd want to make sure there was a software upgrade path for new features/bug fixes, or possibly even a new OS. If constraints made it absolutely impossible to upgrade an existing unit to provide the aforementioned, I'd want a physical hardware upgrade path as well. However, there'd be a fair amount of flexibility built-in so that you may be able to upgrade to the new OS, but not get all of the new features. Apple does this with Mac OS, for instance. You can upgrade the OS on a 4 - 5 year old machine, but you can't use AirDrop on those machines because they didn't come with Bluetooth chips that support 4.0/LE.

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