Neat question. AC is/was a car company in England. Assorted car makers thought Shelby was a quack and didn't sign up to him. Notice he's been associated with others along the way - Crystler, Ford again and so forth.
You'll find AC and Alpine are car companies and Shelby needed the support of a company who could make up the coach works. Ford made the block AC makes the body and Shelby gets a name.
Ford jumped his bones and got the blueprints to make a road burner out of the Mustangs and a couple Cougars.
Check out some great secrets for the 60s. The 427 "R" code was purposely UNDER rated as to it's actual power delivery. That way folks got a nice surprise vs overrated HP generates dissappointment.
Kekafer(sp?) - a Chrysler guy started the Mercury outboards engines for boats and also underrated the HP which made the competition look stupid when a "Mercury" blew right by them on the water!
The greatest lie was the HP of the 68 Cobra and the rare Cougar XR7-GTE 427R. I drove the Cougar back when newer and all original and couldn't believe that just 390HP could do what that car did! That car accellerated so quickly that the seat back was stressed with your body weight and objects in car became projectiles! Truth came out that it really had over 500HP which wouldn't have been allowed by the DOT.
There's some fun tales from back when and Shelby is surely part of it,
T
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Tom Greenleaf - MetroWest, Boston
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