The Ford Mustang Ghia Vignale FF was a concept car built by Ford's Ghia design studio in Turin on the basis of the contemporary compact Mustang generation, fitted with a Ferguson Formula permanent four-wheel-drive system. It was shown publicly at the Turin auto show in November 1984 alongside the Ghia Vignale TSX-4, though images and details of its construction had already been published in the summer of that year. Ford had previously presented the car in Dearborn, Michigan, where Design vice president Donald F. Kopka described it as a design study not planned for production, intended to demonstrate form and function that might later find practical application.
The double-F designation referred to the Ferguson four-wheel-drive system, engineered by FF Developments Ltd of Coventry, England, the same company behind the Jensen Interceptor FF, regarded as the first modern 4x4 production car from 1967. Ford had already experimented with a Mustang FF test vehicle in 1968/69. In the Ghia Vignale FF, a transfer box split drive to front and rear axles, with a viscous coupling acting as a limited-slip center differential; the front suspension and steering were modified to accommodate the new front driveline components, including a front propshaft running alongside and under the engine. The standard 2.3-liter overhead-cam four-cylinder engine, which normally drove only the rigid Mustang rear axle, was built in turbocharged, intercooled, fuel-injected form for this single study vehicle, producing 177 hp at 4400 rpm and 210 Nm of torque at 3000 rpm, sent through a five-speed gearbox to both axles via 16-inch cast alloy wheels shared in design with the production Mustang SVO turbo.
The Vignale name revived a historic coachbuilding marque that Ford had absorbed into its Ghia operations; both the Ghia studio and its former rival Vignale had been brought into the American company around 1970, with the Vignale plant closing at the end of 1974 after production of the De Tomaso Pantera for the US market ended. Ford revived the Vignale name for this concept car, and it continued to be used on several later Ford styling studies.
Compared with the standard Mustang, Ghia's designers substantially reworked the three-door coupe body, giving it a rounded aerodynamic front, headlamps under plexiglass covers, and a lower bumper-mounted air intake. The hood's side edges extended into supports for vents and the mirrors, the beltline was lowered at the front of the doors, and the fixed door glass had only a lower rear section that lowered electrically. Other features included a domed rear window, three-stage taillights wrapped around the sides, a single-arm wiper, partial belly pan, parking and ice-warning sensors, digital instruments, individually folding rear seats, and a tool kit and first-aid case built into the rear interior side panels. The car measured 458 cm long, 174 cm wide, 136.5 cm high, with a 254.5 cm wheelbase, and seated four.
