Aussie Motoring

1971 GTHO Phase III Falcon stolen in Perth

Earlier this month fully restored red version of this classic Australian muscle car was stolen from a collector in Perth. Sadly this car is now right out of circulation and, unless the thieves are caught, it’s unlikely it will ever be seen again. With only 300 of these cars ever produced these days such a vehicle could never be re-birthed.

I had the good fortune of being able to photograph (and listen to) this 1970 version of the Falcon GT here in Queensland earlier this year. You can read more about this particular car here

You know, marketing is a strange beast; sometimes you don’t want people to see the product until the day you’re about to launch it and other times you want them to see it way in advance and sometimes you don’t want them to know that you want them see it well before the launch.

Confused? Don’t feel bad about it … just accept that and you’ll understand why photographs of the 2008 Ford Falcon, the car to take on the VE Commodore and hopefully help Ford recover some market share, were found on a rubbish tip in Melbourne.

Of course they just happened to be dropped in the rubbish at the Ford plant and end up on the tip, somebody who knows about cars and recognised it as the yet to be released Ford Falcon,just happened to find them and recognise them for what they were … yeah right!

Still, the 2008 Falcon - codenamed Orion (would Phoenix have been more appropriate?) - is a great looking car and you can see those rubbish-tip photos and read more about the new car here

Get a sweet suspension deal

The new BF Falcon XR6 Cab Chassis MkII is one mean combo of workhorse and sports machine and it comes at a sweet price that, for a limited time, is one hell of a lot sweeter.

Now you get to choose between half-tonne suspension and 17″ alloys or a one-tonne suspension and 16″ alloys at no extra cost.

But it really is only for a limited time.

The Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries announced today new car sales continue to lag behind sales for the same time last year. 1079 fewer new vehicles were sold during July than for July 2005. That monthly drop now means that 3.1% fewer new cars have been sold so far this year compared to the same period last year.

Toyota sold the most number of new vehicles with 16,977; Holden came second with 11,129 new vehicles sold and Ford could only manage third with 9,627.

The top selling car was the Toyota Corolla with 4711 units sold during July. Holden sold 4022 Commodores and Ford sold 3951 Falcons.

Kia

On a worldwide basis Kia reported a 2.3% decrease in overseas sales despite recording 1.8% increase in US sales. In Europe, where Kia is in the midst of bringing a new plant online, sales were down 1.4% although that drop in sales may turn around when they release their new European built small car code named the ED in December.

The new European built Kia will only be sold in Europe

‘Check back next month’ seems to be the main response when Tom Gorman, Ford Australia’s president was asked what Ford was planning on doing to meet the new competition.

Ford will be releasing an updated Falcon next month but one thing Ford claims it won’t be doing is cutting prices to keep Falcon sales happening.

Ford Australia has released a special edition Falcon XR6 cab chassis that comes fitted with:

Traction Control

Anti-lock brakes with Electronic Brakeforce Distribution

XR sports seats

XR sports instrumetn cluster

Alloy pedals

17″ 5 spoke alloy wheels

And if you do use your Falcon XR6 cab chassis for some serios work the new special edition also comes with optional one tonne suspension complete with 16″ one tonne rated alloy wheels.

Ford Australia has released the special edition Falcon SR sedan.

It comes with $7,000 worth of extras that include:

Side airbags for driver and front passenger

Six-stack CD

Reverse sensing

17″ alloy wheels

Leather wrapped steering wheel

Sequential sports shift

Sports suspension

Rear power windows

SR badging and spoiler

Prices start at $33,490