wheels The 1953

2013 HOW could Australia’s only contribution to tacked-on, separate tray of earlier the world’s vocabulary of automotive styles utes, Bandt’s design clothed the cargo Greatest FORD not make this list? Young Lew Bandt was the compartment in a smooth continuation of the only designer employed by coupe’s bodywork. It looked good, the coupe- 6 in the early 1930s, when the company’s size passenger compartment was roomy, and COUPE management thought it might be worthwhile banks would loan farmers money to buy it. years building something suggested in a letter The influence of Ford Australia’s 1934 1from the wife of a Gippsland0 farmer. Coupe Utility can be traced all the way to UTILITY The problem was that the car-based today’s Commodore Ute, but Bandt’s brilliance utes of the day were crude. Functional also reached across the Pacific Ocean. In Australian load carriers for sure, but cramped and the late 1950s first Ford, then Chevrolet, uncomfortable to ride in, and lacking launched long-running model lines that owed any hint of stylishness. The farmer’s wife a conceptual debt to the idea of the young yearned for something better. Australian. Americans probably imagine their Turning her dream into reality became Ranchero or El Camino is as American as a job for Bandt, then in his early 20s. His apple pie, but they’re the brainchildren of 0 solution was based on Ford’s sidevalve a bloke who undoubtedly preferred his Car – V8-powered 40A Coupe. Instead of the portable pastry filled with meat. Ever

Words john carey

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70 www.wheelsmag.com.au FG Greatness isn’t the same thing as great that also are the most outstanding. The sales. Ford’s FG Falcon is selling at a slower basic models have benefited most from rate than any other model in the nameplate’s changes, everything from the switch to half-century history in Australia. But it’s six-speed ZF automatic transmissions arguably a better car than any of the across the entire range with the 2010 Mk II three million or so Falcons, spanning six facelift to the introduction of better basic generations, produced before it. infotainment electronics. Soon after launch it became the first The 2012 introduction of the 2.0-litre, four- Australian-made car ever to earn a five- cylinder Ecoboost variant was what propelled star rating from the Australian New Car the FG Falcon into this elite company. Assessment Program. And since then Look around the world for cars which, like Ford Australia has steadily improved it, install four- and six-cylinder engines, as and expanded the FG line-up. well as V8s, and you’ll find Audi, BMW and The super-fast performance variants from Mercedes-Benz leading the list. The Ecoboost FPV, recently brought in-house by Ford Falcon proves that Ford Australia’s engineers Australia with a buy-out of former partner are as adept as any European at doing Prodrive’s share of the business, may get downsizing that works brilliantly. the most motoring-mag ink. Recording the It’s remarkable that Ford Australia has best 0-100km/h times ever seen from an managed, in hard times, to create such honest Australian-made model will do that. and admirable cars. Remarkable, too, that its 8 But it’s the most affordable versions of FG work is sneered at or ignored by so many. HOLDEN HQ

Australians were to make the HQ the best-selling Holden of all time, buying close to half a million of them between 1971 and 1974. But that unrivalled sales tally of 485,650 isn’t the reason it’s here. This wasn’t a perfect Holden. Anyone who’d thumbed through the 1971 Car of the Year issue of Wheels would have known the HQ didn’t win because it was built for comfort, not for speed … nor corners, either, for that matter. ‘Jet-smooth ride’ was the advertising promise, and the slogan’s emphasis on ride comfort was no accident. The HQ featured Holden’s first all-coil spring suspension, but American managing director George Roberts had insisted it should ride like a Cadillac of the day. Sadly inevitable was that it would also handle like one. Still, the HQ does deserve inclusion among Australia’s greats. It was the first really all-new Holden since the 48-215, but unlike the first Holden, the HQ was engineered here. And the company made the most of the opportunity. As well9 as the Belmont, Kingswood and Premier sedan line-up, there was a wagon, a ute, a panel van, a coupe, a cab-chassis ute and a long-wheelbase luxury version. It was a massive effort, and highlighted the design and engineering ingenuity of the Australian industry. Holden’s engineers also endowed the HQ with a very tough monocoque body. It was a car that could take punishment, when most roads dished it out by the bucketful. The HQ also must be numbered among the best-looking cars Australia has produced. A Pontiac designer on loan from Detroit, John Schinella, styled the HQ, with plenty of help from young Australians in Holden’s studio. Its remarkably slim A-pillars and great forward vision are reminders that, in some ways at least, the past really was better.

72 www.wheelsmag.com.au www.wheelsmag.com.au 73 VALIANT CHARGER E38/E49

These days $2 million might buy a car (six inches). Even though it was essentially carburettors, to nearly 210kW. Revised 7 maker a new doorhandle design. In the a bobtail rear-end grafted onto the gear ratios for6 the three-speed manual were early 1970s it was enough to develop a mainstream model’s nose, it worked. With also part of the deal. From Charger’s second new variant of an existing car. Chrysler the aid of a memorable and effective ad year of production, 1972, the E49 option Australia’s Valiant Charger project relied campaign with its ‘Hey Charger!’ catchline, package upped power again, to 225kW, and on a brand of resourcefulness that was the Valiant’s looks attracted hordes of included a four-speed Borg Warner manual. becoming a trademark of the Australian paying customers. These homologation option packs never HOLDEN 48-215 car industry. This can-do, low-cost spirit To the car’s beauty could be added a delivered victory at Bathurst, but magazine had already produced big results on streak of beastliness. Although V8 engines testers found the Charger was a V8-beater You can’t knit a plane, a ship or a gun. locomotive driver from Bathurst was first Holden. The car, based on an unused small budgets; cars like Ford’s XR were part of the Charger model mix, it on their dragstrips. Through World War II, Australia wasn’t photographed beside the first Holden at design for a compact, post-war Chevrolet, was Falcon station wagon and Holden’s HK was the better handling high-performance Created on a shoestring budget by an riding on the sheep’s back quite as high its official introduction in November 1948. very basic: 45kW 2.2-litre (133 cubic inch) Monaro coupe. But the Charger was more versions of Chrysler’s in-line six that outfit overshadowed by both Holden and as it would in the early 1950s, but its Prime Minister Ben Chifley had waited years in-line six, three-speed column-shift manual audacious, more special. powered the car to greatness. Right from Ford Australia, the E38 and E49 were dependence on agriculture concerned for this moment. He’d been Treasurer when, and rear-drive. But it was roomy, tough and One thing that made it so was stylishness. the beginning, the E38 option package lifted the most outstanding cars produced by the country’s leaders. Isolated and with the war still raging, discussions began quicker than many contemporaries. At first, The Charger was built on a version of the the power of the 4.3-litre (265 cubic inch) Australia’s brief but glorious late ’60s to threatened, Australia’s lack of industrial with both General Motors and Ford on how Holden production literally couldn’t keep up VH Valiant platform, shortened by 150mm engine, with its trio of twin-throat Weber early ’70s muscle-car era. capacity was an obvious weakness. During best to start a peacetime car industry in with demand. It was said people bought cars the war there was an urgent program to Australia. General Motors’ less costly scheme like the Standard Vanguard because they increase Australia’s capacity to make the won government favour. By 1946 a small couldn’t get a Holden. complex machines needed to fight. But what, team of Australian engineers was in Detroit The 48-215 wasn’t only a showroom once the shooting stopped, would sustain working on prototypes and Chifley, after the success. Here was proof Australia could the nation’s new-found manufacturing death of John Curtin in July 1945, had been produce more than countless bales of wool. ability? The answer, Australia’s wartime Prime Minister for a year. It was an accomplishment to be proud of, Labor leaders decided, was cars… Today it’s impossible to imagine any result and it changed what Australians thought of That’s why a hat-clutching former of government policy being as popular as that themselves and their nation’s capability.

74 www.wheelsmag.com.au www.wheelsmag.com.au 75 FORD XR FALCON GT Australian ’60s cinema never produced an Windsor V8 was an option across the new equivalent of the famed pursuit scene from range from its 1966 launch, it wasn’t until the Bullitt, that nine-minute chunk of carefully following year that the Mustang claim really choreographed 1968 excitement that changed came true. The Falcon GT combined the forever the way car chases were filmed. Argue, high-performance 168kW version of the little if you like, about which actor could have been Windsor V8 used by its American cousin car our Steve McQueen. Discuss which of our cities and a four-speed floor-shift manual, instead might have taken the place of San Francisco. of the regular range’s three-speed. But there can be no question which car would Nearly all of the GTs produced were have best fitted the role of McQueen’s snarling, painted a bronze colour named ‘GT Gold’, smoking Mustang GT fastback… and gold is exactly what the car earned Ford Australia promoted its 1966 XR at Mount Panorama in the Gallaher 500 as the ‘Mustang Bred Falcon’, and the the same year it was launched. The 1967 car won a second-in-a-row Wheels Car of Bathurst victory of Harry Firth and Fred the Year award. One of the chief reasons Gibson earned instant racetrack credibility the trophy ended up on Ford Australia’s for the GT, and provided the blueprint for mantelpiece is that the company had generations of road-going V8 sedans to responded to the magazine’s insistent come. The arrival of the XR GT was a calls for Made in Australia V8 power. pivotal moment in our motoring history, While Ford’s 4.7-litre (289 cubic inch) one with enduring consequences.

HOLDEN V2 MONARO Conspiracy, for some reason, has a Totally unexpected, the impact of the style emerged unscathed. Although a bad name. But cunning and connivance Coupe Concept at the Sydney show, late in supercharged V6 version was offered was what it took to give the spark of life 1998 was so huge it must have registered initially, hardly anyone wanted the to a concept that brightened a dull era on seismographs. Media instantly decided coarse and uninspiring 3.8-litre. But for the Australian industry. it had to be called Monaro and should be General Motors’ 5.7-litre Gen III V8, Holden design boss Mike Simcoe had put into production pronto. well, that was a different matter… started work on a VT Commodore-based It was Wiemels’ replacement, Peter By 2002, following a visit to Australia by coupe at home, sticking tape drawings to Hanenberger, who made sure that it GM product supremo, the legendary Bob one of his walls. Work continued in secret in happened. The German executive arrived Lutz, plans were afoot to turn the Monaro Holden’s studios as the conspiracy spread. early in 1999, and was soon working on a into a GTO for Pontiac in North America. The project was only revealed to Holden watertight business case. This involved rather more than a simple managing director Jim Wiemels four weeks There were compromises on the way grille redesign, but by 2003 the deal was ahead of the Sydney motor show. The to getting the V2, as it was known official. Soon it was a Vauxhall in England, American exec must have been surprised, internally, into production in late 2001. too. As conspiracies go, the Commodore but he let them build the concept car. But the car’s elegant and understated Coupe was a surprising success. 5 4 3

FORD BA FALCON XR6 TURBO Nothing underlined Falcon’s 2002 great in 2000. Trevor Worthington, from country The 240kW turbo ‘Barra’ of the new-for- leap forward more emphatically than Victoria, had worked for Ford since 1985, in BA XR6 Turbo model instantly made every the XR6 Turbo. At the 1998 launch of its Australia, Taiwan and the USA. He had firm Australian-made V8 then on sale seem predecessor, the AU, senior executives ideas on how things had gone wrong with AU, stupid. Performance testing soon proved involved in its design, engineering and and even firmer ideas on how they should be that neither VY Commodore nor BA Falcon development seemed proudest of the fixed. Under his leadership, Ford Australia’s V8s could match its pace. The super six’s way they’d brought the project in on time designers and engineers came up with the spread of torque was broad and beautifully and under budget. Misers manufacture best Falcon for more than three decades. delivered. Sounded good, too. misery, as buyers found out. There was a new independent rear BA’s mostly new chassis, especially the To reverse Falcon’s sales nosedive, more suspension beneath all BA sedans, ‘Control Blade’ IRS, meant the XR6 Turbo had to be done than scraping off the last- sophisticated (for the time) electronic wasn’t overwhelmed by its engine. There minute layer of ‘New Edge’ global design systems, a vastly improved interior and was a distinctly European flavour to the philosophy that had been applied as the an exterior that looked nothing like the way the Turbo drove. No accident; leader AU neared production. While the car looked AU. But it was Falcon’s practically all-new of the BA vehicle dynamics team was a like the design team had stopped work in six-cylinder engine that made the most talented Dutchman, Alex de Vlugt. the middle of an argument, even worse difference. Improved in every way, the After years learning to expect as little was that it drove as though engineered Geelong-manufactured 4.0-litre codenamed as possible from Ford Australia and Falcon, by people who didn’t care about anything ‘Barra’ was more refined and more the BA XR6 Turbo was a massive moment. except the price of its parts. powerful in its basic, naturally aspirated Brilliantly quick, wonderfully refined and No-one knew all this better than the man form. And also had the strength needed to huge fun to drive, it snarled defiantly that who was appointed Falcon car line director cope with the stresses of turbocharging. Ford Australia had changed its ways.

78 www.wheelsmag.com.au FORD TERRITORY

In the end, only a handful of votes Australia had its answer ready. Company BMW adopted a strikingly similar double relegated the SX Territory to second place in president Geoff Polites, one of the best car- A-arm design for the second-generation X5. our Top 10 showdown. It really was that close, industry executives the country has ever Dynamics were a Territory strong point. It and Ford’s 2004 all-roader deserves its place produced, took on the task of persuading rode and handled and steered better than high in the list of Australian greats. Detroit to approve the project. With the many crossover SUVs costing much, much The Territory was a brave and brilliant help of a stunning 40 percent scale model more. Still does. Also outstanding was the departure from an accepted, comfortably of what would eventually be named perfect calibration for Australian conditions familiar formula. It was a superbly executed Territory, and a persuasive presentation by of its Bosch-supplied chassis control crossover, with truly world-beating handling, vehicle line director Russell Christophers, electronics. The finesse and effectiveness ride comfort and practicality. Polites flew back with the $500 million of the Territory’s ESC calibration is still The Territory story begins in the late needed to make it a reality. unmatched by most competitors. Inside, 1990s, when Ford Australia’s leadership Territory made intelligent use of Ford the Ford had great seating and a myriad grew concerned that the country’s Australia’s existing component set. It had of places to stash stuff. It was every bit as preferences were changing. Building a Falcon’s 4.0-litre six-cylinder engine and useful as it was enjoyable to drive. large sedan and using it as the basis for a four-speed auto, the ‘Control Blade’ rear Polites died of cancer, aged variety of derivatives – wagons, utes, long- suspension introduced in the 2002 BA, and 60, in 2008. He was running Jaguar wheelbase, and so on – was the model that shared the sedan’s engine box. But the rest and by then, and had just had worked in the past. But with large-car of the body structure was new; it had to be, negotiated Ford’s sale of the Brit brands sales in unstoppable decline, it obviously to accommodate seven-seat and five-seat to Tata of India. He never saw Territory wasn’t going to be sustainable in the future. versions. The front suspension and steering, sales overtake Falcon, to confirm By 2001, after an extensive research which had to be compatible with AWD, was his conviction that Ford Australia’s program had led into the expensive all-new and no-compromise. It was only in sustainability would one day depend 2 development of a detailed design, Ford 2006, two years after Territory’s launch, that on the vehicle he had brought to life.

80 www.wheelsmag.com.au www.wheelsmag.com.au 81 In many ways the VE Commodore is the best car Australia has ever created. At its core are virtues of strength, spaciousness, and sophistication, which serve equally well in everything from a humble V6 Omega Sportwagon fleet car to a growling V8 E Series sports sedan costing twice as much. While it’s the kind of large car that’s become this nation’s speciality, the 2006 VE is different from any holden earlier Commodore. At last given the chance to design, engineer and develop a car from a clean-sheet starting point, Holden grabbed the opportunity with both hands. Boneheads blinded by the expensively burnished images of VE COMMODORE premium brands simply will not believe Australian engineering can equal or best that of, say, Germany. But it’s true. The wholly Holden chassis of the VE invited comparisons with similar-size cars from Munich and Stuttgart. When the VE was launched, seven years ago, there certainly wasn’t a contemporary BMW that steered with the beautifully fluid accuracy and consistency of the Holden. And its suspension set-ups, perfectly calibrated for comfort and control on our roads, were probably superior to most Mercedes. Equally outstanding was the VE’s shape. Every previous Commodore was basically Opel’s work. Turning a European Omega into a car for Australia meant strengthening, stretching and different interiors. But the exterior was always designed to please those living in the Heidelberg that’s not in Melbourne. The internal competition among Holden’s designers for the right to design VE Commodore’s skin was won by Peter Hughes. Way back in 1999 he’d made the sketch that remained a touchstone for the exterior design team throughout the program. It was the starting point for the full- size clay model of his design that was eventually selected ahead of a competing proposal from another Holden designer. It’s a great shape; a perfectly proportioned combination of dynamic drama and easy elegance, 82 www.wheelsmag.com.au 1 VE caught the attention of rival designers for its stance, proportions and simple detailing. Everyone agreed — this was a damn handsome sedan

precisely and simply detailed. It was admired from afar by eminent designers. Jaguar’s Ian Callum was one of them. He found out who had designed the VE’s exterior from Hughes’ former boss, Mike Simcoe, who was working for General Motors in Detroit by the time the car It’s fortunate that the company was launched. The generous Scot made a point of being led by Peter Hanenberger as the sending Hughes an email saying how much he VE program took shape. The charismatic, admired the VE’s exterior. crafty and persuasive German was a General it’s a greater and more But good looks and fine dynamics aren’t the Motors lifer who knew the outfit inside out. only reasons the Holden heads our 10 Greatest. He also knew Australia well, having spent significant achievement than any It’s no accident that the first three cars on time here in the late 1970s as a chassis our list are products of the noughties. This engineer, tasked with making the HZ Holden was an era when Australia’s car makers were handle with his ‘Radial Tuned Suspension’. other car Australia has ever made facing, for the first time ever, an operating Hanenberger engineered, with the support environment not rigged heavily in their favour. of GM global product boss Bob Lutz, an The Australian car industry spent its youth international role for the Australian-developed wearing a protective tariff burka. At the time architecture. The platform, codenamed of the VE, it was down to a G-string and tassels Zeta, would be an export-ready design, and pasted to its nipples. Back in 1971, for example, capable of adaption for other models made the year of the HQ launch, non-British built in other countries – if it hit targets for cost, imports had 45 percent added to their prices performance, safety and production flexibility. between dock and driveway. By the end of This was a new kind of pressure for Holden. the decade the rate had risen to 57.5 percent, Things didn’t go quite as well as planned. regardless of country of origin. But from the late Exports to the US of the Pontiac G8 version 1980s the Button Plan of Bob Hawke’s Labor of the VE began in 2008, but lasted little more Government began to strip away 2.5 percent a than a year as GM’s mounting troubles led year, gradually exposing both the Australian car to the American brand being axed. But since market and car makers to the lustful gaze of 2009 the current Chevrolet Camaro has been overseas competitors. By the time the VE was built in Canada on a shortened version of ready for market in 2006, tariff protection was Zeta. Now exports to the US of the VE’s direct down to 10 percent. Today the twirling tassels descendant, the Zeta-based VF, are under way are gone, and it’s just five percent. once more. This time badged as a Chevrolet, as There were additional challenges the VE it always should have been. faced. The market share of large cars was in The VE, of course, has its flaws. Heating obvious decline, a consequence not only of and air-con system problems afflicted early the creeping withdrawal of tariff protection production. The base V6 engines, both 3.6-litre but also changes in customer preference at launch and the 3.0-litre direct-injection and Australia’s shift to a more city-centric introduced for the 2010 model year, aren’t as demographic. Holden needed to look beyond smooth or satisfying as they should be. And a Australia’s borders if it was to have a future. four-speed auto was out of place in 2006, even in fleet models like Omega and Berlina. Even with its acknowledged imperfections, the VE Commodore still deserves its place at the top of our list. For its design, engineering, value and versatility, but also because it’s a greater and much more significant achievement than any other car Australia has ever made. Holden began in 1948 with a basic design imported from America. With VE, the voyage was in the opposite direction. More than just a good honest car, this was the Commodore that proved, beyond doubt, that Australia’s got talent. 1www.wheelsmag.com.au 85