I found it disturbing when some people on this forum said the 500 and Fusion did not come out with new powertrains. The reason this is disturbing is that ford put out these two models with radical changes to the powertrains, a new transmission.
In fact, if I am correct, both cars came out with two new trannies. For the 500, both transmissions were completely new. Lets start by looking at the Taurus before it. In that car you had the option of two engines, the pushrod 3.0 and the DOHC 3.0. Trust me, you'll have to look a lot longer for the DOHC than the pushrod engine. But thats not the scoop here, we are all aware that the engine in the 500 was the DOHC version that was in so few Tauruses. The real story is in that transmission. The old taurus had a 4 speed tranny, which owed its most recent incarnation to evolution from the lessons learned on previous 4 speed automatic transmissions in the taurus and ford minivans.
The new transmission had 6 gears. Because of this, gear ratios were not only closer than the old transmission, but owners could also enjoy a higher first gear ratio and lower overdrive gear ratio. The benifits of this transmission were better gas mileage and acceleration equivalent to that of more powerful vehicles of the same year. This was a completely new transmission. I have not done any research on this, but I would be surprised if more than 10% of the parts in the new tranny are interchangeable with the old.
Also, the CVT transmission was available the same year as the launch of the 500. As far as I am aware, however, there weren't any advantages to that one. If I remember correctly, the 6 speed enjoyed better fuel mileage.
Then we look at the fusion and Edge. The fusion not only got the 6 speed from the 500, but the 4 cylinder model had a new 5 speed auto. The engine also made more power than the old 3.0. And the Edge started with the 3.5.
True, none of these cars came with a completely new powertrain, but each one was introduced with something new, and possibly revolutionary.
