 IMV FIlms Video made a documentary... |
 Joe is as nice as they come,...  Joe is as nice as they come, and he was recently awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honor for his work in medical imaging software. The award, which has been given to such people as Muhammad Ali and Joe DiMaggio, is presented by the National Ethnic Coalition of Organizations and given to 100 people annually. |
 This '05 Ford GT was outfitted...  This '05 Ford GT was outfitted with the McIntosh stereo upgrade along with the BBS wheel option. |
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 Joe installed the safety harness...  Joe installed the safety harness after getting airborne in the car at triple-digit speeds. Its lack of a rollcage has proven to be a problem at local dragstrips despite being certified by Ford Motor Company to 204 mph. |
 The GT's lines are awe-inspiring...  The GT's lines are awe-inspiring for sure. We'll take two, please. |
The system took four 22-hour days to fabricate," says Stage 6 proprietor Dwight Baldwin. The hot pipes are all TIG-welded 304 stainless steel, and the charge pipes were made from aluminum. "We chose to go with Precision Turbo's Garrett GT35R ball-bearing turbochargers based on HP Performance's horsepower require-ment," Dwight says. "The 35s are compact in size and easy to fit in tight spaces."
The GT's factory water-to-air intercooler was employed, and Dwight ported the lower intake manifold to match the new custom aluminum upper manifold that he constructed. Gone is the GT's oval throttle body, as it has been replaced with a Wilson Manifolds 95mm billet unit.
A Greddy Profec Type-S electronic boost controller signals the two Tial 44mm waste-gates to control boost pressure, while a Tial 50mm blow-off valve keeps the boost from slamming back into the compressor wheels. The increased performance of the twin turbo system necessitated the use of an SCT 2800 mass airflow sensor, still employed in a draw-through design.
Back on HP Performance's Dynojet, Tony tweaked the GT via laptop and SCT custom tuning software. The GT gave out horsepower as if it was free. On pump gas, the 5.4 mill churned out 856 rwhp and 735 lb-ft of torque at 18 psi of boost using a huge JLT Performance air filter. Getting greedy with the Greddy boost controller led to the GT pegging the Dynojet software at 1,000 rwhp with C16 race fuel and 22 psi of boost.
Tony called Dan Hourigan at Dynojet who immediately updated the software for 1,500 hp, and the car's follow-up dyno pull netted 1,012 rwhp and 892 lb-ft of torque. Once the driveability was dialed in to the computer tune, the GT was set loose on the streets of northeastern Florida and on dragstrips from Orlando to Valdosta. Salvitar Charudattan of IMV Films, who had been documenting the GT's buildup from the beginning of the turbo install, was on hand at South Georgia Motorsports Park, where Joe took the GT to see what the twin-turbo supercar could do in 1,320 feet of pavement.
Tony has been behind the wheel of many a fast Ford, including his own high-eight-second Fox Mustang, and he was at the helm when the GT made its dragstrip debut in Orlando with the gas on it. Joe once again appointed Tony as official test driver this time out, and it was going to be a ride to remember.
After heating up the Nitto drag radials, Tony tripped the Tree and rolled into the throttle. Just as the turbos started making power, the car broke loose and got out of the groove, sending the GT towards the opposite lane in a bad way. By the time it had stopped spinning, the GT had completed a 360-degree rotation across both lanes, and Tony managed to keep it from hitting either wall.
Joe says, "I turned around and looked away, and said, 'this one's done.' I looked back and saw the car still in one piece, and asked, 'what the hell just happened?'"
That was the last time the GT went to the dragstrip. The idea of mounting up some slicks was tossed around, but the extremely wide gear spacing of the Ricardo six-speed transaxle isn't exactly optimal for quarter-mile conquest.
Joe's most memorable experience with the twin-turbo GT occurred at the Ford GT reunion in Dearborn. In addition to giving rides to such GT luminaries as Camilo Pardo, Primo Goffi ,and numerous other members of the GT team, Joe was able to have SVT Development Engineer Gene Martindale drive the GT on a closed test track in Michigan.