Family Life

12.01.09 | FL News Team

It looks like Ford and Chevy are preparing to turn their clocks back to the '60s, when performance wars raged between the automakers. This time, though, the Ford Mustang versus Chevy Camaro dual involves performance plus fuel mileage. Ford, in one corner, is bragging the original pony car will get 30-miles-per-gallon from a 305-horsepower V-6 in 2011. Chevrolet, which recently began producing the Camaro again, is bragging of a V-6 engine that gets 29-miles-per-gallon and sports 304-horsepower.

 The Mustang has been around in its current form for several years, but industry analysts say Ford was caught off guard by the new competition. Aaron Bragman with Global Insight says "Camaro took them by surprise in terms of the power and fuel efficiency of their V-6." He says at the moment, "the Camaro is eating their lunch in terms of sales." Through October 2009, Mustang sales totaled 56-thousand vehicles in the U.S. Camaro sales totaled just more than 47-thousand, but the car didn't go on sale until April. While the two cars are generally marketed as performance vehicles, Ford says half of all Mustang sales have a V-6 under the hood and not the more powerful V-8.