Ford Falcon XA GT Hardtop And Four Door.

The Broadmeadows plant manager Don Deveson had a XA hardtop that was sent to detroit for evaluation, and the yanks returned it with a 428.

He used to drive it down the corridors in the plant on weekends and woe betide the workers in any corridor who placed the wire crates of parts too close for him to drive through.

I built an XC Fairmont GXL 351 auto for Edsel Ford 2 and it had to be walked down the line as there was no computer code for it. Manufacturing kicked up a stink but I had little choice but to build what Edsel wanted as his name was on the cars.
Regards Philip A

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Originally Posted by PhilipA

The Broadmeadows plant manager Don Deveson had a XA hardtop that was sent to detroit for evaluation, and the yanks returned it with a 428.

He used to drive it down the corridors in the plant on weekends and woe betide the workers in any corridor who placed the wire crates of parts too close for him to drive through.

I built an XC Fairmont GXL 351 auto for Edsel Ford 2 and it had to be walked down the line as there was no computer code for it. Manufacturing kicked up a stink but I had little choice but to build what Edsel wanted as his name was on the cars.
Regards Philip A

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G'day Philip,What did the Americans think of the Australian Ford muscle cars? And it must have been pretty cool building a car for Edsel.

Well I think they used it in styling clinics however this was just from conversation as the styling clinic was separate to Head Office and had restricted access. Product Development was all secret secret even to senior execs from the Sales Company.

At that time I believe that the OZ Falcons were more attractive than the US ones but Detroit always stonewalled as they had a NIH attitude in Spades.

They allowed Australia to sell to RHD markets and as I stated in another post , we sold 200 falcons XA or XB to Osaka taxis, and to the West Indies. But LHD markets were forbidden and I think this went right through to now , as AFAIK we were never allowed to sell to the Middle East unlike Holden who were.

Holden sold quite a few cars to Malaysia and I had a HX and VB Commodore there. In fact when Malaysia bought in the 2 litre rule the Embassy bought all the Holden spares, and when I arrived I emailed Rare Spares who came up and bought the lot. LOL
Regards Philip A

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G'day Philip,What did the Americans think of the Australian
Ford muscle cars? And it must have been pretty cool building a car for Edsel.

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I used to have lunch with him a bit. He had some er unusual ideas, but you have to hand it to him, it was all his idea to make the Cobra to get rid of the last Hardtop bodies.

I thought it was a stupid idea and that such a garish thing would not sell. How wrong I was.

When I was a young lad one of my jobs was to drive Henry Ford 11 from Brisbane Airport to our regional office in a Galaxie of all things. They had really senstive brakes and I almost blotted my copybook by applying a bit hard coming to a yellow light. Nick Politis was the Regional Manager who hired me and he was in the back also.
Regards Philip A

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Originally Posted by pop058

IIRC, Bill Bourke's big block was a 428 Cobra Jet in an black XWGT. 427 was the SOHC motor

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Interesting there is quite a bit out there on these and as I said I did think originally that Bill Bourkes car was an XY, infact that car you are talking about was an XW GT 4 Door as you have said with a 428 Cobrajet, and is what I remember and was a 4 door not a 2 door. The 4 door XW GT was flown to the US and received the upgrades.
What is also out there and there are many photos on the net is that he did similar with an XT and a 427 but was a 2 door as a concept car, with bodies and panels brought in from detroit.
There is really little information on these cars. The pics of the XT I have seen are Australian spec front and rear end and RHD. No pictures show under the bonnet.
The XW is the one that surfaced a few years ago after thought being lost.
Would be interesting to know the actual facts around these cars.

Will post some more soon including a mag article on the XW 4 door Bill Bourke Falcon, was Onyx black.
The XT is harder to find info on, though I remember something about it being dark Green, though I have also seen Gold ones, so could be wrong with the colour.

OK this is supposed to be the XT 2 door prototype
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/874.jpg

Not sure what this one is, maybe an import conversion XT
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/875.jpg

This one looks to have Aussie rear, but the rest looks US and is a RHD XR
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/876.jpg

OK so here is one of the magazine articles on the XW and interview with Bill Bourke. Quite long but a thorough run down. How much is true, hearsay and fiction? Well its a magazine article so may not be all factual. Article from AMC.
I know I have another somewhere as well.
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/858.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/859.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/860.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/861.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/862.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/863.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/864.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/865.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/866.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/867.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/868.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/869.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/870.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/871.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/872.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...014/09/873.jpg

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Originally Posted by PhilipA

I don't know why there is such an emphasis on the serial prefix to identify the model of a Falcon.

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The 33 denoted GT Sedan, 66 was GT Coupe, 23 IIRC was Falcon 500, 32 was Fairmont, etc, so the JG33/66 prefix is the easiest way to identify the vehicle (or the serial/VIN anyway) as being legitimate

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Originally Posted by PhilipA

The first 2 letters of the serial prefix before the body style refer to the plant of manufature JG =Australia Broadmeadows. AFAIR Brisbane Was JH. On the Falcon GT sites this seems to be mystery.

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Because....

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Originally Posted by PhilipA

All GTs of any description were built in Broadmeadows.

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Originally Posted by PhilipA

AFAIR Brisbane Was JH.

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Correct.

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Originally Posted by pop058

IIRC, Bill Bourke's big block was a 428 Cobra Jet in an black XWGT. 427 was the SOHC motor

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the 427's were available as a regular pushrod engine as well as the SOHC.

If you ever want to irritate the purists, find an XR/XT/XA/XB/EB/EL GT owner and ask them why theyre a member of the Falcon GT owners club.... to pick on technicalities, the only models badged as a "Falcon GT" were XW and XY.....

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Originally Posted by Sprint

SNIP

If you ever want to irritate the purists, find an XR/XT/XA/XB/EB/EL GT owner and ask them why theyre a member of the Falcon GT owners club.... to pick on technicalities, the only models badged as a "Falcon GT" were XW and XY.....

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:confused::confused::confused: My XA had GT badges. As it was a 73, it did not have "Falcon GT" on the VIN plate (72's did), but did have badges on the front guards, boot and centre console..


On another note, I think the 4WD XY utes were all JH prefix.

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On another note, I think the 4WD XY utes were all JH prefix.

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That's because they were all built in Brisbane and I drove every one off the production line.

They were XY utes and when they were tested in the outback, and I remember the test ute was a Hot Orange one, the DANA 30 ?front axles bent and it cracked at the base of the A pillar.

We ordered DANA 44 axles but it took DANA 18 months to supply.

All the XY bodies were built on XY runout and stored in the back yard for about 12 months or so while we built XA .

When the axles arrived we built the XYs on the weekend so that there would be no mix up of parts and I drove them from Final Assembly to the gate. I think it took about 6 weekends to build the 433.

The story of the XY 4WD ute is interesting. Ford had a competition for the Parts reps to come up with ideas for unusual vehicles.

Tom Tarpay was a Parts rep in Brisbane and he thought of the idea that we supplied engines to Jeep, so what about the reverse, putting Jeep running gear under a Falcon. They did the research and found that it was pretty easy to do.

This is also how the SurferRoo came about.

Another side note at this time is that Jersey Stanley was a Service rep at that time also, and he later became MD of Jeep Australia for many years.

Also it was Ford Australia experience with the XY 4WD that turned them off building a 4WD Falcon as they lost heaps on the whole episode. It was also rumoured tha the XA body was not as strong as the XY body because of the long hardtop frameless doors.
Regards Philip A