fabulous ford forever one pic

[teamSVTour]

That's a Contour, as explained elsewhere.

that was a joke bud....not to be taken seriously

 

[svt4stv]

ive been to the saleen show twice before. there was even a Saleen Expedition on display, that obviously never went into production. somebody must have owned it though because it was outside of the building with all the other owners' cars (not in front like the ones pictured in the OP). also inside was the only Saleen Thunderbird which looked DAMN sexy imo!

ive personally NEVER seen an S7 driving down ANY road before but i hear that they are the norm in Irvine where Saleen is located. that must be pretty cool to see.

supposedly, via the gossip line, Steve Saleen was "booted" from his own company via the board because of his S7 project. supposedly they felt he spent WAY too much money on that project.... i was curious why he "retired" and then popped up a few months later working for an indian(?) or chinese(?) car manufacturer. i was told that was the real reason why he "retired".

 

[JimD]

ive been to the saleen show twice before. there was even a Saleen Expedition on display, that obviously never went into production. somebody must have owned it though because it was outside of the building with all the other owners' cars (not in front like the ones pictured in the OP). also inside was the only Saleen Thunderbird which looked DAMN sexy imo!

ive personally NEVER seen an S7 driving down ANY road before but i hear that they are the norm in Irvine where Saleen is located. that must be pretty cool to see.

supposedly, via the gossip line, Steve Saleen was "booted" from his own company via the board because of his S7 project. supposedly they felt he spent WAY too much money on that project.... i was curious why he "retired" and then popped up a few months later working for an indian(?) or chinese(?) car manufacturer. i was told that was the real reason why he "retired".

There's more than one reason why they call such things gossip...

I think it can be said that Steve and his key people pretty much got frustrated with the management and resigned. The board was pretty much dumbfounded and the PR department scrambled trying to come up with some spin on his departure and called it a "retirement."

Upon his resignation, Steve did immediately take an enterprising offer to utilize his expertise in the Federal certification process (dating back to the S351 program in the mid-'90s) and, along with some major re-engineering, is working to make some non-compliant Chinese vehicles be compliant to standards in Mexico and North America. Certainly a project not without its controversy, that stage of his "retirement" is coming to fruition after only 11 months, though it will likely continue for some time. His team expects the new designs to be fully compliant and its just a matter of processing the paperwork.

There are some other ventures recently announced, including a new brand called SMS, which will be a new breed of performance automobiles based on popular platforms from various makes, as well as hints at an all-new super car. He's also readying the launch of a racing team, among a couple of other projects including performance parts for Mustangs.

I don't know about a Saleen Expedition, but it was likely just an enthusiast's custom project.

And I don't think the S7 program played a key part in Steve's departure, though it probably didn't help. The Federal air bag requirement deadline was approaching, and it was either certify an air bag or cease street production, and management didn't want to spend the money while they're struggling to keep core operations liquid as it is.