Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue 90 i Australian Muscle Car

Sydney Motorsport Park’s Premier Suite is located in the competitors paddock high above the pit lane garages. The air-conditioned suite provides an affordable location to entertain clients, friends or employees. The Premier Suite offers the opportunity for individuals and small groups to gather at reserved tables.Entertain business associates or round up a group of friends. Reserved tables and seating are identified with your name, company name or host’s name. Use the air-conditioned Premier Suite as your day-long race base. Serviced rest rooms are nearby. Benefits include: • Non-transferable Premier Suite wristbands. • Morning Tea, Buffet lunch and Afternoon Tea. • Brewed tea and coffee all day. • Cash bar (hosts may arrange a tab for guests). • Entry to track/competitor paddock/grandstand. • In-suite live TV coverage • In-suite computerised TV…

“We had the best years at Ford. We were producing cars that were made in Australia, we had interesting work to do, and it was great.” John Mole is speaking about the experience of his own 31 years at Ford Australia, but he could easily be speaking for the many thousands of people who have also worked at the company. “One of the good things about working at Ford was the moral integrity. People like to give big companies a hard time, but I know the customers always got treated well. And the engineering was good,” Mole says. He is 75 now and living in Geelong, driving a Ford Territory partly from pride and loyalty and partly because he still gets a 22 percent discounted priced. Mole joined FoMoCo in…

The passing of Wayne Draper in 2012 was the loss of one of Australia’s great automotive designers. While you might think the story of such a character would be of endless hours scribbling designs and sculpting clay, Draper’s story is of a man obsessed by his passion. He broke the rules and risked his career to preserve an era of muscle cars that would have otherwise been lost. In his later years Draper would be hit by a string of tragedies and challenges, but during his early time at Ford he took his luck and wasn’t afraid to risk it all. Straight out of school Draper studied industrial design at RMIT Melbourne with a talent for design and a love of cars. His mentor encouraged him to apply at Ford,…

It’s perhaps not surprising that Craig Dean’s business is in American muscle cars. A love of Detroit Iron is something that runs deep in the Dean family. While other kids in the 1970s were strapped into the rear seat of the family Kingswood, Falcon or Valiant (or even a Japanese car), young Craig got to ride in the back of an exotic, head-turning, big V8 American coupe. “My father always drove American cars,” Craig says, “importing them to Australia and then having them converted to right-hand drive.” When Craig left school he joined the Royal Australian Air Force as an apprentice mechanic. “In the RAAF I learned to work on anything known to man that goes on road or supports an aircraft,” he says. “They trained us pretty well. If…

America’s Trans-Am TA2 formula has launched in Australia. The TA2 Racing Australia category is already firing on all cylinders, with sizeable grids of modern muscle cars hitting local racetracks in the second half of 2016. TA2 pays homage to the muscle car rivalry of the Sports Car Club of America’s Trans-American Sedan Championship which was established in 1966. From its humble beginnings, Trans-Am led to decades of great races and legendary drivers, none greater than the ‘pony car wars’ between 1966 and 1972. This was an era that left a distinct mark not only on the Trans-Am identity, but the global automotive landscape. During this golden era, the series was bolstered by heavy factory involvement, big-name drivers, and cars that were closely related to what could be purchased straight off…

2014 FPV GT-F At the apex of replicas – if you’ll excuse the pun – is this stunning, highly-detailed 1:18 resin model of the FPV GT-F from Apex Replicas. Finished in Octane with black stripes, and due for release early in 2017, this limited edition, individually numbered model is now available to pre-order online at www.apexreplicas.com.au Ford XA Falcon GT Hardtop We reckon this 1:18 scale replica of the iconic XA Falcon GT Hardtop will become as sought-after as its full-size vesrion – especially when it’s finished in Summer Gold, with black bonnet and front spoiler, heaps of chromework, finely detailed features, custom wheels and tyres. Only 804 pieces have been produced, so get in quick at www.biante.com.au or your favourite Biante stockist. Two Red Bulls and a record breaker…

We love stories about privateer attacks on the Great Race, especially one-off campaigns in the era when a new car could be purchased from a dealer and raced on the Mountain with minimal upgrades. The Tom Heard Automotive-entered #19 Commodore assault on the 1980 Hardie-Ferodo 1000 is a perfect example. There are glimpses of this Neville Bridges/Sue Ransom-driven VB in the race telecast, especially late in event when it’s trailing smoke. We’ve been in touch with Tom Heard a couple of times over the years and the former mechanical workshop owner provided us with some good background on the assault. Heard told us that he offered a drive to his employee Neville Bridges if Bridges did the bulk of the prep work. Neville jumped at the chance, so Tom bought…

It’s time to write three dates into the Australian history books in giant capital letters, much like an oversized headstone on the grave of the local car industry. They are: 28.06.1960 29.07.2016 7.10.2016 The first one is the day when the original Ford Falcon rolled off the end of the Ford Australia assembly line at Broadmeadows in Melbourne to national acclaim. The second is the date the final Falcon ute – a plain white XR6 automatic – was completed on the very same production line. This was 82 years after the company created its first car-based utility back in 1934. The final ute, the 467,690th produced, won’t carry livestock, tools or trailbikes as it’s destined to be a museum piece. The final one is the sign-off date for the very…

The death of the Falcon is not the end for Ford Australia. More than 1500 engineers, designers and product specialists will still be working on future products and many of them will be based in buildings at Broadmeadows. The You Yangs proving ground, which would not have been created without the Falcon and many other local development programs over the years, also continues. Some of the product development activities at Geelong will also survive. “The product development team is actually growing. Ford globally is investing more in products and Australia is one of the main hubs for that work,” says Ford Australia spokesman, Wes Sherwood. “The pipeline is full of new work. We are refurbishing head office to become our regional product development centre. “We still have our research-and-development centre…

Sharpe family collection This edition we’ve aimed to personalise the shutdown of Ford Australia’s manufacturing operations and that focus extends here to Punter Pics. The images on these pages were taken by or depict the late Geoff Sharpe, one of the Ford works team mechanics during the factory squad’s golden era. The pics were sent to us by his son Aaron. “My Dad, Geoff Sharpe, was part of Allan Moffat’s pit crew in the early ’70s,” Aaron wrote when he made contact with AMC. “I have recently discovered some old slides and thought you might like to have a look.” Would we ever! “It would be good to see some recognition for the Lot 6 people including my father, who passed away when I was seven,” Aaron continued. “Mum tells…

To say that one single car made a driver’s career or its creation can be pinpointed as the key pillar upon which a team’s ascension to the throne as ‘V8 Kings’ was built is most certainly a big call. But when Craig Lowndes and Greg Murphy both agree that the Holden Racing Team’s ‘Supercar’ VR Commodore built in 1996 fits the bill for both of those assertions, it’s bloody difficult to argue. This year is the 20th anniversary of the duo claiming the endurance double at Sandown and Bathurst. It’s also the 20th anniversary of a breakthrough blue ribbon season for HRT where it also claimed the Australian Touring Car Championship for the first time, with Lowndes, as well as the end-of-year Mobil Series in New Zealand with Murphy. At…

Imagine a weekend spent in and around the picturesque Yarra Valley region in rural southeastern Victoria. You are at the wheel of your cherished Aussie muscle car, with a mate or perhaps your partner alongside for the ride as you guide the rumbling beast through the twists and turns of some of the best roads this country has to offer. Except that this is not a normal weekend drive in the country. On this drive, the road has been closed especially for you – the road is yours. It is, for this weekend only, a one-way road: you do not need to worry about anything coming the other way. Afterwards you’ll want to swap stories with some of the other drivers who have just enjoyed the same exhilarating experience that…

George Shepheard’s rallying experience helped him plot victory. George’s father Reg came to Australia with his family from the UK in 1949 as a Redex company executive, sponsoring the first great Round Australia Trials that became known as the Redex Trials in 1953, ’54 and ’55. George made his name navigating in rallies, partnering his mate Colin Bond along with Andy Frankel in the 1964 Ampol Round Australia where they won the under-25 prize in a secondhand VW 1200 Beetle. He went on to partner Gelignite Jack Murray and Evan Green in the 1968 London-to-Sydney, almost winning before an axle broke on the works Austin. Then he and Colin Bond teamed up through the 1970s to become a formidable team in the Australian Rally Championship, winning three national titles in…

There is no other motor racing circuit in Australia like Mallala. Not now anyway. In the 1960s it was one of three racetracks in operation that were reincarnated Royal Australian Air Force bases. The others were Lowood (Queensland) and Caversham (Western Australia), both of which had hosted their last race meetings by the end of the 1960s. Mallala looks more British than your typical permanent Aussie motor racing facility. The Old Dart’s racing scene is still heavily populated by tracks that owe their existence to being surplus to requirement after World War II. The Silverstone, Croft, Goodwood, Thruxton, Castle Combe and Snetterton circuits feature layouts incorporating sections of former aircraft runways and taxiways. Mallala Motor Sport Park still retains the feel of an airfield. Maybe it’s the three-storey khaki-cladded control…

The last day for the Ford Australia factory at Broadmeadows will be a deeply personal one for members of the Blue Oval family. It will be the same for the workers at the Ford facilities in Geelong, a city that has relied for generations on its carmaking abilities. But don’t expect a media frenzy, a flag-waving visit by senior politicians or a media circus on October 7. “It’s going to be a private event for the manufacturing employees. They are going to decide how they want that activity to go. “It’s their event,” says Ford Australia spokesman, Wes Sherwood. He says the day the Falcon dies will not be the end of the story or the celebrations. “We absolutely realise that people will want to see and farewell the final…

If you name a high-performance Ford from the past 50 years there is a fair chance Max Kenworthy has owned it – including an actual Bathurst-winning chassis. One of his earliest cars was the very Cortina GT that Bob Jane and Harry Firth took to victory at Mount Panorama in 1963, and he’s also owned a string of GT Falcons in various body shapes, an original Mustang, both Laser and Telstar turbos, then ESP and XR Falcons. “I’ve always been a real muscle car man. I’ve sorta got Ford blood,” Kenworthy says. That’s no surprise, considering he has seen it all at Ford after starting as an apprentice toolmaker and working his way through to senior management in human resources during 42 years with the company. Not only that, but…

A last cheerio to Ford Anyone who has spent a lifetime in motor racing, as I have, knows that competition is the key to excellence. Well, in the immediate post-war years Ford were involved in a hell of a competition – not on the race track, but just to make and sell cars in this country, a race in which they had been left behind by GM-H. It’s worth reminding ourselves what an astonishing period of time we are talking about. The first Ford was imported into Australia as long ago as 1904; Ford began assembling cars down here in 1925; but when the war years ended, it was the opposition who got the jump on them when it came to building cars specifically in and for this country. In…

Chrysler enjoyed a much higher market share in New Zealand than in Australia, actually outselling the Ford Falcon right up to the early 1970s. When Australian Chrysler fans wish to brag about glory on the racing circuits, they instinctively look across the Tasman Sea to New Zealand. They will proudly tell you that Chrysler won NZ’s Bathurst equivalent, the B&H 500, nine years in a row and the Charger was the most successful production racecar in the country’s history. A lesser known fact is that Chrysler also enjoyed a much higher market share in New Zealand than in Australia, actually outselling the Ford Falcon right up to the early 1970s. To learn how all of this came about we have to start at the top, with the remarkable ‘Mr Todd’.…

For Sydney-based rally enthusiast and engineer Anthony ‘Bean’ Edwards, the Holden Round Australia service vans held a special fascination particularly since he was a good friend of Barry Ferguson’s sons and had helped with various aspects of the restoration of Barry’s Round Australia Commodore after he had found it and purchased it in 2008. “I’d spent the last 15 years building and servicing rally cars and was looking for a project that would combine my rallying and car restoration interests,” said Anthony. “I wanted a muscle car but didn’t want a show pony, I wanted a practical and fast V8 that I could also use to service on rallies, so a replica of the HDT van seemed perfect. “The idea really came to me when I was servicing for Barry…