Ford Shelby Mustang Super Snake revealed

The Ford Mustang is one of the most well known and affordable muscle cars in the world, but a new version blows all others off the road.

Ford’s V8-powered muscle car has got a wild makeover.

American tuner Shelby has worked its magic over the Ford Mustang, producing a new performance beast.

Dubbed the Shelby Super Snake, the American muscle car is limited to just 98 examples — to celebrate the late Carroll Shelby’s 98th birthday.

The Ford Shelby Mustang Super Snake comes as a coupe or a two-seater speedster.

Shelby has taken the regular 5.0-litre V8 found in the stock Mustang GT and adds a massive supercharger, which boosts power to 615kW. That is a massive jump over the regular Mustang’s already ample 339kW.

The 615kW power outputs put the Super Snake in rare company among some of the world’s most powerful cars. It eclipses supercars such as the $600,000-plus Ferrari 812 Superfast and the $800,000 Lamborghini Aventador S, but at a fraction of the cost.

Power has been boosted by close to 300kW.

It comes with the choice of a manual and automatic transmission and is priced from $US133,785 ($172,650).

Torque figures remain a mystery but it would most certainly be a lot more than the regular Mustang’s 556Nm.

Shelby says the Super Snake can sprint to 100km/h from a standstill in a little more than 3.5 seconds.

Handsome and beefed up looks are part of the appeal of the Shelby Mustangs.

To handle the increased performance the Mustang has been equipped with a number of mechanical upgrades including better suspension to improve handling, increased cooling to help the engine’s performance and a boosted exhaust.

Massive Brembo brakes and Shelby’s cooling system help boost stopping power.

Only 98 of the coupe and convertible will be made.

There is also a handsome hard-top convertible version. The two-seat speedster costs an extra $US5000.

Unfortunately the Shelby Super Snake won’t make it Down Under, but Ford Australia has its own high-performance Mustang – the R-Spec.

This has been tuned by local outfit Herrod Performance, which has added a supercharger and plenty of performance kit to the regular GT Mustang.

Prices start from about $180,000.

This boosts the Mustang’s outputs to an estimated 500kW+ and more than 800Nm.

But the added performance will cost you setting customers about $115,000 drive-away — about $40,000 more than the regular V8 Mustang.

But you’ll have to hurry if you want this kind of Aussie muscle, there are only 500 on offer in Australia and they are almost all gone.

Ford Mustang R-Spec is available to Aussie customers.