- The next-gen Mustang will be based on Ford's one of the five new platforms.
- A hybrid variant of the Pony car is also on the cards which will happen at the turn of the decade.
- Could use the all-wheel-drive underpinnings from the Explorer.
The reincarnated Ford Mustang has been the best-selling sports coupe in the U.S. since 2014. Now the American carmaker plans to suspend sale of its sedans in the North American market by 2020, with the new-gen Mustang being the only car in the portfolio of SUVs. So the development of the seventh-gen Mustang has been pushed by a year and it will arrive in 2021.
It will be based on an all-new platform which will be one of the five modular architecture that Ford will build all its new cars on. Which means, the Mustang will move to a platform which will also be shared with Explorer and Lincoln Aviator. This also means that the Mustang would finally adopt an all-wheel-drive powertrain which its direct rival Dodge Challenger has been offering since last year. However, moving to an SUV platform won’t affect the Mustang’s muscle car image, assured the members of the Mustang team in an official statement. Apart from that, a hybrid variant of the Pony is also expected to join the line-up at the turn of the decade.
Earlier this month, the Mustang achieved a production milestone of 10 million over 54 years. It sells more than its rivals – the Challenger and Camaro – and is sold across 140 countries including China, Germany and Australia. A special right-hand-drive version was developed for our car market where it sells around 5-10 units a month. In its new generation iteration, the Mustang will retain its classic design lines but it will have radical changes under the skin. Ford hasn’t hesitated to experiment with the Mustang. For instance, in the current generation, Ford was bold enough to put smaller engines in the Mustang, as small as a 2.3-litre EcoBoost unit. So we expect a completely modern Mustang when it arrives in 2021.
