Your average road car has no need for hood pins. Sure, they look cool on sports cars and race cars, but your daily driver Honda Civic? It doesn’t need them. In fact, 99% of the cars on the road don’t need hood pins. One new car, however, does need them. The 2020 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 isn’t wearing them just because of a perceived cool factor. If you want your hood to stay put, those pins need to be there.
Speaking to MotorAuthority, Ford Performance’s Carl Widmann said the hood pins are necessary to “make sure the hood is stable at speed”. If someone were to remove the pins, the hood would lift at speed. Thats due to the massive vent found front and center on the hood.
Underneath that louvered section sits a rain tray. This is merely there to keep dirt and dust out of your engine bay. When it’s time to hit the track, however, Ford says it’s best to remove that tray. Not for cooling, mind you, but to reduce lift over the nose. That tray will supply unwanted lift, so you need to take it out. In general driving though? You’re fine.
So for those of you itching to take your 700+hp beast rocket to the race track, don’t forget to leave the tray in your pit space. And don’t have any funny notions of trying to shave down those hood pins or order the car without them. Ford won’t sell you a GT500 not equipped with hood pins.
This may be a high-water mark for the great Horsepower Wars. We’re at a point where a production car hasn’t affixed hood pins in an effort to be cool and appeal to aged, well-to-do muscle car lovers. Instead, the damn thing really needs them.
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