Ford Motor Company has a powerful new Mustang Shelby GT350 coming up and the company now touts a customizable shift light indicator for the car.
The Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 will hit the showroom this fall, but the automaker already started teasing some exciting tech features that will be part of the 526-horsepower package.
Both the Mustang Shelby GT350 and the more powerful Shelby GT350R will boast a customizable shift light indicator, design to help drivers focus on the road rather than checking out the tachometer at crucial shift points.
This shift light indicator set to come with the Shelby GT350 is called the Performance Shift Light Indicator and will be part of the car's heads-up display, allowing users to control it via the driver information center in the gauge cluster. Drivers can choose between three different modes, set shift points and light intensity, or turn off the feature altogether if they so prefer.
As Ford itself points out, race car drivers have been using shift lights for decades, but most shift lights are either placed at a low level in the instrument cluster, thus requiring the driver to look down, or they obscure the forward field of view.
To eliminate such inconveniences, the new Performance Shift Light Indicator comes as a heads-up display placed the driver sees up-front so they don't have to take their eyes off the road.
The three pre-determined modes included in the Performance Shift Light Indicator allow users to select the sequence of the lights, setting them to Track, Tach or Drag.
The man behind the Performance Light Shift Indicator is Ford engineer Mike Makled, who initially built a prototype of the feature in his own Ford Taurus SHO vehicle. As Ford explains in its press release, Makled got the idea while driving his Taurus SHO and the car's collision warning with brake support system started flashing its red LED heads-up display when he came to a quick stop.
"The system bounces upward projected light against the reflective inner surface of the windshield so the driver can see it as a warning of impending danger. This got him thinking," states Ford.
Makled then worked with a supplier for the next three months to build a prototype, marking the beginning of the new Performance Light Shift Indicator.
