Ford announced a revitalized line of crate engines at SEMA this week. These are updates to existing crate engines. Relating these engines to the original BOSS 302 is debatable - the heads are totally unrelated (and thats a good thing) and the rest of the engine is simply a small evolution from existing crate engines. The BOSS marketing "tage" is new.
So, good, people needing a non-emissions 302 engine have a new source. They will probably end up under the hood of pre-emissions Mustangs, Cougars, Fairlanes, and F-150s.
But, bad, the press release has also been wildly misinterpretted by some elements of the press.
Ford designed an all-new engine several years ago under the codename of Hurricane. It was a large displacement engine, 6.2 liters, intended for trucks (including large SUVs) and Mustangs. It was cancelled due to budget constraints. Recently, however, it was revived because of the clear need to compete with GM's LS engine family in trucks (very profitable) and Mustangs (where the modular motor has run it's course, or never got any investment depending on your perspective). The marketing name of this all-new engine was changed to BOSS because of the negative connotations of the word "hurricane".
So some confusion over the double use of the tag BOSS has come in. Some opportunistic websites and members of the press misinterpretted the use of the term BOSS by Fords aftermarket group to mean that it was related to or somehow a preview of the upcoming new BOSS truck/Mustang engine. That couldn't be further from the truth. The BOSS crate engine has no relationship to the upcoming BOSS truck/Mustang engine at all... except thru a marketing nametag. The BOSS crate engine is technically obsolete and is not desirable for any kind of production car or truck role. It certainly has no efficiency, emissions, or mileage capabilities whatsoever.
So draw a line between the BOSS crate engine, and the BOSS truck/Mustang engine. The truck/Mustang engine is thought to debut in the 2008 F-150 and probably in a Mustang after that (and whether the restyled and repowered Mustang debuts for 2009 or 2010 is still an open question). The new F-150 is an unknown at this point... whether it will be a rework (most likely, borrowing from the front end of the Expedition architecture ) or is all-new is unknown (unannounced) at this point. Another unknown are any technical details of the BOSS (Hurricane) engine except the displacement.
