Black 1990 Ford Bronco 2WD from front angle, showing aftermarket…

PHDYOGRAPl iv toou KAHU A Factory 2WD Bronco Wilh cl .lolI of llglnmg Performance By Todd Kuho ant a Lightning 11150 hut nding it difcult to justity a sport truck with only two seats? Me too. The Lightning is light at the top of my "gotta have" wish list, but reali ty sets in every time a tcst llnit must sttiy in the garage bccause lnectt room for the entire itlmily. If only they built 21 Lightning Blonco. A big, 2WD utility fil- tcd with a Lightning pttwertraiii and chassis components Your wish has Come true- we, sort of, One such vehicle exists, a Ford engineering test mule thiit Sport Truck recently put to the test. Apparently a group of cngmccl's at Ford (who are regular people. too) recognized the potential for a Lightning dcvtatlon that could carry ve and haul the freight, The obvious answer was to bolt Lightning performance hardware onto a Bronco. To test production feasibility. the engineering team decided lo put the Lightning Bronco together right on the iegulai pl'OV duction assembly line. 'l'ht: Bronco and Frscrics are from the same platform. so it stands to reason thztt most of the compo- nents would bolt right up. As it turned out, the Lightning Bronco wcnt together ens l than anyone imagined. All the Lightning powertrain tiiid chase sis goodies wcre a perfect lit with one minor exception The 132 SPDMWIKK Dmmlm 1993 Broncos shorter whc base required a unique tailpipe routing and differ ciit mufflers, but everything from the catalysts torward are regular produc- tion parts, Ford will be offering a Sport trim package on the Bronco latcr in the 94 model year that essen tially duplicates the monochromatic Lightning exterior treatment, so thc cosmetics are no problem clther. Like the Lightning, the Bronco is powered by a hi-po version of Ford's stout 351 Windsor V8, The Lightning engine is titted With free-breathing SVO GTr40 cylinder heads, which are fed by a [warpiece lubulal intake manifold Valvctrain action Is one trolled by a marincrgrind cam and high-silicone pistons are utilized in the freerevving engine. On the we haust side, the Lightning employs tubular headers which dump into a true dualexhuust system with twm catalytic con. vertcrs. The factory Calibration de livers a conserr v at i v e 2 4 D horsepower at 4200 rpm and 340 lb-[t of torque at 3200 rpm. Fords {er s p o n s i v c E4OD four- speed automate ic overdrive transmission is standard along with a 4 10:1 limited slip rsarcnd. All these parts are right at home beneath the B ro n c o a n (1 yield very im- pressive pcrtorr niance. We didnt have a chance to run accelera- tion tests on _ the hot Bronco, M ' but it felt at- most as strong as a regular p re d u c t i o n Lightning, The B ro n c o i 5 about 500 pounds llcavlcr than a production Lightning, so we expect I) to 60 and quarter-inilc times to be a bit off the Light- nings pace. But out on the road. it's difficult to detect much differcncc, As mentioned, we flogged the Lightning Bronco on a harl- zai rutl racking up 1200 miles in one short weekend, Our miSr sion was to lun chase and support for the Livernols Engineer- ing/Rampage Racing Class 3 Bronco and driver Chad Schluetel as the team attempted to run three separate offrroad him. The secret to this Broncos klck IS a pro duction version of the Lightning GT-4D 351W neslled beneath the hood. With 240 hp and 340 um of torque on tap, the Bron- co is a real performer. During our 1200-mile trek, we agged the Lightning Bronco under a wide variely 0' demanding conditions, From country back roads and ralnrsoaked twisty two lanes [0 extended hlgh-Speed freeway blasts, it per- formed flawlessly.