(Photos by Dave Nutting) This is the kind of car that can get you both into and out of trouble very quickly. With sedate styling that blends seamlessly with its surroundings and power enough to run deep into the 13-second bracket at the strip, the 2013 Ford Taurus is America’s best sleeper. Over the span of the four days I had this car I managed to put several hundred miles on it in mixed driving from the highway to some closed roads with incredible turns, elevation changes, and transitions. The 4,400lb sedan never lets you know it weighs that much, the 3.5L twin turbo EcoBoost V6 thinks it is a V8 with a voice changing device, and the interior has to be talked into admitting that it was actually installed at a Ford plant. It is a car to suck up highway miles and one that can legitimately be driven in a road course environment and not embarrass itself as a modern car with little more than big wheels and tires. The 2013 Ford Taurus SHO is a packaged piece of performance hardware and I thoroughly enjoyed my days with the car. Sadly, we had it a week before the drag strip opened, so “scientific” testing data is limited to our butt dyno!
The ruby red tester was loaded with almost every available option. It had a heated steering wheel, seats with heat and AC (both front and rear), it was even optioned with the optional SHO performance package which kicks an SHO up even another level and essentially turns the SHO into the well dressed brother of the Ford Taurus Police Interceptor that you now see prowling the highways and byways of the county. I’ll go into more specifics later, but a steeper axle ratio, more high performance brake pads, large 20-inch wheels, beefed engine cooling, beefed trans, differential, and axle cooling, less boosted electric steering, a “true off” mode for the traction control, and more. To drive the car I had out the door at list price would run you about $42,000. Not chump change by any stretch, but this is a whole bunch of car that is engaging and fun to drive, plus it will wipe the floor with virtually anything your pals are driving in the sedan class and they’ll never see it coming.
Lots of people write about cars as being “composed” and I think I have even used that line in the past. Sorry if I did, because I think it is an awful cop out. A steam locomotive looks “composed” seconds before it heaves off the tracks and causes an epic disaster. You can’t buy a modern car that isn’t “composed”. Maybe a Viper is the exception to that but it isn’t like companies are selling straight axle gassers with high performance rubber on them to people under the guise of them being capable handlers. The best compliment I can give to the Taurus is that the car is capable of out-cornering its seats…and they are damned fine seats. The grip is predictable and being an all wheel drive car, some push is expected on turn in and some over steer is expected under full throttle corner exits. I don’t know the specific torque split of the Taurus SHO, but from my experience driving the car, I would say that it favors the rear. Only under full throttle hard cornering did we experience any signs of front end wheel slippage. Even then, the only indication we got was the sound of the front end working and the feeling in the steering wheel.
The mind blowing thing is that at 4,400lbs the SHO acts like a far lighter car. Think about what a 4,000lb car was for decades. It was a highway bruiser that leaned like the Andrea Doria in any sort of turning situation. Cars in this weight class were reserved for guys who were retired, collected pension checks, wanted something to cover interstate miles, and smoked cheap cigars. The Taurus SHO is the complete opposite of that, despite being a member of the “two ton club”. If you are someone who commutes any distance both photographer Dave Nutting and I thought that the car would be a riotous choice. We averaged over 20mpg in four days of hard driving. Using the car like a normal human being would yield significantly better results than we got. It was actually shocking to check the mileage computer in the dash and see that 20mpg umber come up. Thank you EcoBoost. While the suspension of the car is great and capable and inspires confidence at every turn, the real sinister heart of this sleeper is the engine and it is the mill that Ford in some respects bet the farm on years ago, the venerable 3.5L twin turbo EcoBoost V6.
WE’RE GOING TO TELL YOU THE THE REST OF THE STORY THROUGH FANTASTIC PHOTOS AND PRETTY DECENT CAPTIONS –
The twin turbo V6 is a great engine. I have driven it in an F150 but this was my first time laying the lumber to it in a car. It makes 360hp and 365 lb/ft of torque. The engine’s power comes on in an awesomely linear way. Anyone who has driven an older turbocharged car will talk about turbo lag and in that scenario, it is a dogged naturally aspirated engine that roars to life when the turbo spools. In the 3.5L EcoBoost V6, the engine is capable enough on its own down low to get the part started and then the turbos spool and giggles begin. This thing is fast.
Here’s the engine “dressed up” with the engine cover on. Tidy but we like stuff naked and hanging out in the breeze. Without so much as touching the engine cover, guys have run these SHOs into the 12 second zone at the strip with computer tuning.
The bad thing about taking photos of a modern car designed with handling in mind is that there isn’t much “action” happening. This corner was being made at highway speeds (on a closed road!) and you can see how flat the car is through it. The tires provided great amounts of grip and we never once got the car to push past the adhesion levels of the rubber (and we did try).
The test car was outfitted with the SHO Performance Package upgrade and that included these good looking 20″ wheels shod in 245/45/20 Michelin rubber. The wheels make a pronounced statement on this car and we liked it. 20″ wheels tend to blend on some new cars but these definitely have a strong presence and announce that they’re here. The brakes on the car are the same as you’ll find on the cop spec Taurus and feature rotors the size of pizza plates, a larger master cylinder, calipers and increased braking action as a result. You could windshield launch a bad guy who wasn’t buckled in pretty easily.
Complaints? Sure we have a few. More instrumentation would be nice. Gauges include a speedo, tach, temp, and fuel…that’s it. With all of the additional coolers and stuff added to this car some monitoring of differential temps or even a built in G-meter for fun would be attractive to us. The majority of buyers are probably satisfied with the basics, but we’re not the majority…clearly!
The center stack, HAVC controls, and large touch screen are cool and certainly add to the sport/luxury tone of this car. The shifter is one of the true keys to the fun of the SHO. Putting it in drive gives you a nice experience, but yanking ‘er down into S (for sport) changes the whole feel of the car by changing the shift points and recalibrating some of the car’s functions. The gas pedal is one of those things. While driving down the road with light pedal pressure, we shifted into S and the car immediately began to accelerate at a faster clip. The more aggressive throttle opening makes the car “feel” lots faster.
This shot gives you an idea of just how thick that center console is and the “cockpit” feeling it translates to is neat in our book. Thinner or lower consoles don’t really seem to isolate the driver from the passenger but this setup makes both feel completely independent and that is an important thing in a car that begs to be driven hard.
The SHO seats offer good support and are adjustable in ever way possible. Literally…every way possible. They are very comfortable and offer heating and air conditioning to whichever keister is occupying them. All passengers had heated and AC seats in the test car.
The technology packed into this car for a $40,000 price tag was damned impressive. The SHO had adaptive cruise control, backup camera, cross traffic warnings, blind spot warnings, collision warning, and the best one, auto parking assist. Auto parking assist was the hit of the family Easter party where everyone took a ride in the car as it magically parallel parked itself between two other vehicles on the street with the driver providing no steering input and only controlling the gas an brake. We’re a decade away from a world where no one can actually drive anymore.
Other than the big 20″ wheels and some subtle SHO badging, the major exterior styling enhancements are a set of honeycomb, black-out grills up front. That’s the beauty of this car. The fact that it isn’t trying to grab a bunch of attention or doesn’t wear wild paint, graphics and the like endears the Taurus SHO to me. The car is really the greatest American sleeper of our day. Older iterations of the SHO were nice and sporty and backed up the title, but they’d all be cannon fodder for this thing. It was swallow them all whole like it will still do to unsuspecting V6 pony car drivers and maybe a few truly napping V8 drivers.
I see a lot of Ford’s 2007 Interceptor concept car in the Taurus SHO. The big slab sides, the high belt line, and the comparatively low roof line were all hallmarks of that car. Functionally, I’m going to complain about that high belt line/low roof line thing. The problem is that you sit low in this car, so using an ATM or any other sort of arm level drive-up situation is cantankerous. I smashed my head on the roof a couple times trying to reach something out the front window. I don’t think a stretching rack is a good option for fixing this fitment problem for me.
Overall, I give the 2013 Ford Taurus SHO very high marks all around. It would be a car I’d cruise unashamedly, drag race occasionally, hit the autocross with when possible, and absolutely take to an open track road course day. I laughed with Dave Nutting about why anyone would want to take one of these to a road course until I got to our closed photo location and started putting the car through its paces. My laughter turned to an admission to Dave that I was absolutely wrong about thinking the track capability of this car was all Ford bluster. It isn’t. You could have some serious fun here.
If you are in the market for a sedan that needs to haul your family around and a sedan that needs to haul some ass and make you smile do consider the Taurus SHO. Handing the keys back to the nice people from Ford was a painful experience. This thing is the real deal and 100% BangShift approved!
I’d still rather have a turbocharged Coyote V8 . . . . and about a thousand pounds less mass.
You had me at hello, and lost me when I saw the auto stick on the center console.
The old lady saw me looking at the taurus and said whats with the faggy bling bling wheels ? they couldnt come up with anything better ? they look like flowers yuck .
ford American power