“New” 35-Mile 1993 Ford Mustang SVT Cobra Is One Foxy Lady That’s Still In Wraps

Ford’s Fox-body Mustang was on its farewell tour in 1993, ready to be put out to pasture at the end of an impressive run that stretched back to 1979.

But rather than die quietly, the third-generation Mustang went out with a Cobra-tuned bang thanks to the handiwork of Ford’s Special Vehicle Team and its Mustang SVT Cobra.

A one-year special, the 1993 SVT Cobra looked surprisingly restrained on the outside, but hid some tasty performance features underneath that mild-mannered exterior. Though the engine was based on the same 5.0-liter V8 fitted to the regular Mustang GT, the SVT got special GT40 heads, an uprated cam and intake manifold, larger injectors and a tuned exhaust system.

The resulting 235 hp (238 PS) and 280 lb-ft (380 Nm) stats might look disappointingly meek from a 2022 vantage point, but they were considered reasonably strong 30 years ago and represented a gain of 30 hp (30 PS) over a stock GT. Dyno tests suggest the SVT motor actually made over 260 hp (264 PS), and whatever the true power is, it was enough for Road & Track to record a solid 14.5-second quarter mile, having passed 60 mph (96 km/h) in 5.9 seconds along the way.

The pristine car pictured here has certainly never been subjected to drag strip abuse. In its 29 years it has only covered 35 miles (56 km), the equivalent of 5 quarter mile runs per year. Finished in bright Teal Blue, one of four colors available, it still has its window sticker affixed to the passenger door glass and the full complement of protective interior wrappers. Ford’s other SVT Mustang for 1993, the Cobra R, was a hardcore track-ready machine with a stripped down interior, but the street-biased Cobra retained its power accessories.

The window sticker shows the 1993 MSRP of a brand new delivery mileage SVT as $20,902, the equivalent of $40,600 in today’s dollars. But with five days to go this as-new example has already been bid up to $75,500 on Bring-a-Trailer, and you can guarantee that it’s not done climbing.

One of 4,993 examples made for 1993, and surely among the best, this stunning SVT would make a great addition to an expansive car collection. But wouldn’t it bug you not being able to take it out on the street and smoke the tires from a stoplight now and again? Owning one of these ultra low-mileage cars that can’t realistically be driven (and certainly not how Ford intended) must be like being blessed with an adult movie star’s toolkit and a cursed with a senior citizen’s stamina and torsional rigidity.

If you think you can handle that kind of pleasure/pain scenario, get your bids in before the auction closes on May 11.