Mike Copeland’s 500 Horsepower Hydrogen-Powered Ford Falcon Futura

By BRIAN WAGNER APRIL 06, 2023

Mike Copeland and his company Diversified Creations has an impressive resume of cool car builds. The level of detail and craftsmanship Copeland’s team puts into each project is impressive. Copeland’s 1964 Falcon Futura is a real looker, but it’s the Hydrogen-fed Gen III Coyote that will really grab your attention.

Anybody can build a Mustang or Camaro, so Copeland wanted to create a project car that would stand out in a crowd, so the Falcon was selected as his canvas. The Falcon’s Gen III Coyote mill runs on a new type of Hydrogen technology that Copeland developed, and boy does it add some power. The Hydrogen-powered Coyote has been designed to use water injection to control the burn rate of the Hydrogen fuel. The end result is a naturally aspirated Coyote that cranks out 500 horsepower and can be spun up to 8,000 RPM.

During the muscle car era, performance junkies wanted to dump the clutch on their killer four-speed in their new car. Amid those years, the manual transmission was not exclusive to the hot-rodder. It was the standard option in most cars and was a way of life. Automatic transmissions were a luxury that many did not feel was needed.

Now, many enthusiasts want the experience of grabbing gears in their classic, but also want a clutch that doesn’t require enough force to cause leg cramps when holding the pedal. To learn more about clutch design — why some have a harder-to-push pedal than others and selecting the best parts for your need — we reached out to the folks at McLeod to get some insight