Aussie Muscle car History part 1 and 2
Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2012 1:25 amWith the interest in the Upcoming Falcon hardtop from Scalextric, and the previously released Torana.
I have realised that although we Aussies may be well acquainted with American Muscle cars and racecars in general.
Our mates on the forum from other countries such as the US may not be as familiar with Aussie muscle.
After exchanging a few PMs with Harry, we thought it might be an idea to shed some light on these mystery cars from Down Under.
Over the coming weeks I'll attempt to give you guys an abbreviated series of stories relating to these cars that so closely mirrored what was happening in the US.
As well as that I might throw in a few snippets about some favorite US Muscle that came to race in Australia.
Although We could go way back I thought I'd limit these insights from about 1967 when the real Aussie Muscle car war started until about 1984 when a change in racing regulations (the introduction of international group A) changed the face of Australian car car racing until the mid 90's when the V8 supercars series started.
It is probably important to realise that up until and including 1972, Australian Touring car racing was run as two distinct categories.
Firstly there was the Australian touring car championship, run to an improved production formula that featured such cars as the Moffat Mustang and Jane Camaro, with a mixture of "improved" Aussie cars and BDA Escorts and the like.
Secondly there were the Production cars, which was a series that was for virtually bog standard locally available cars off the showroom floor. This was what the Bathurst 1000 (earlier 500). Was run for and was the jewel in the crown for the manufacturers, a real life win on Sunday sell on Monday approach. Some teams even drove the registered cars to Bathurst raced them and drove them home again.
The Improved exotics did race at Bathurst, but not at the 1000 in October. They had their own series of sprint races at Bathurst at Easter.
So with that in mind we start.
The 500 mile and later 1000k race at Bathurst had been running for a few years, having moved from Philip Island. The races up until this time had been won by a variety of cars including minis, cortinas and the like.
But Ford Australia really wanted to win with the locally produced Falcon, which was the big seller in the Ford range.
In 1967 Ford produced the new Falcon XR, with which they were providing various Police Forces with a 289 ci version. This became the basis of the XR GT Falcon available in just enough numbers to allow them to race at Bathurst and in any colour you wanted, as long as it was gold.
The big Fords won and the public went wild for the falcon and Australia fell in love with V8 Muscle. Holden responded with the 327 and 350 Monaros and Ford came back with a series of GT Falcons culminating in the GTHO phase 1,2 and 3 series. Chrysler got in the act with their pacers and chargers although took a slightly different engine route. They did have some very nice US sourced V8s but the really quick Charger was the triple webbered 265 ci Hemi 6cyl.
So it went with GM Holden, Ford and Chrysler Valiant. Building faster and faster cars that were freely available to anyone. It was a real trap for the carmakers at the time, you had to sell a number of cars in order to race them at Bathurst, in order to sell more of them when you won. It was actually true at the time, that when you won Bathurst in, let’s say a GTHO, sales of the falcons right the way through the range went up.
In 1972 the bubble burst. A story hit the papers that the big 3 manufacturers were about to release new "160 MPH Supercars" onto the public. Reports spread that these "public slaughtering deathtraps would fall into the hands of an unsuspecting public causing mayhem and Death". The road safety people got in on the act and the government got nervous. The cars themselves weren't actually banned, but the governments of the day threatened boycots of the manufacturer’s products.
Thus the GTHO phase 4 Falcon, was canned (although 3 or 4 did escape) the LJ V8 torana died without ever seeing the light of day and the New Charger E55 although actually getting to the market was detuned via a soft cam etc and then died a quiet death.
The Confederation of Australian Motorsport then changed the Bathurst rules to that of Improved Production for local cars which became group C and ended the Production car power wars.
The existing Improved production imports such as the Camaros and Mustangs were relegated to the Sports sedan ranks, which was a relatively minor series in that there was no big marquis events like Bathurst.
The Falcon Gt (without the HO option) struggled on until 76 but each subsequent model became less powerful. The Torana V8 was eventually built but in the heavier and larger LH and LX series of cars not the nimble lightweight LJ and the R/T series of chargers just stopped being made..
Theres obviously a lot more to it all, but that’s a rough idea.
So enough background, next up we’ll start on some Aussie cars. But feel free to comment, ask questions or make any corrections that you see fit. It's all up for discussion, if I've made a mistake let us know.
I have realised that although we Aussies may be well acquainted with American Muscle cars and racecars in general.
Our mates on the forum from other countries such as the US may not be as familiar with Aussie muscle.
After exchanging a few PMs with Harry, we thought it might be an idea to shed some light on these mystery cars from Down Under.
Over the coming weeks I'll attempt to give you guys an abbreviated series of stories relating to these cars that so closely mirrored what was happening in the US.
As well as that I might throw in a few snippets about some favorite US Muscle that came to race in Australia.
Although We could go way back I thought I'd limit these insights from about 1967 when the real Aussie Muscle car war started until about 1984 when a change in racing regulations (the introduction of international group A) changed the face of Australian car car racing until the mid 90's when the V8 supercars series started.
It is probably important to realise that up until and including 1972, Australian Touring car racing was run as two distinct categories.
Firstly there was the Australian touring car championship, run to an improved production formula that featured such cars as the Moffat Mustang and Jane Camaro, with a mixture of "improved" Aussie cars and BDA Escorts and the like.
Secondly there were the Production cars, which was a series that was for virtually bog standard locally available cars off the showroom floor. This was what the Bathurst 1000 (earlier 500). Was run for and was the jewel in the crown for the manufacturers, a real life win on Sunday sell on Monday approach. Some teams even drove the registered cars to Bathurst raced them and drove them home again.
The Improved exotics did race at Bathurst, but not at the 1000 in October. They had their own series of sprint races at Bathurst at Easter.
So with that in mind we start.
The 500 mile and later 1000k race at Bathurst had been running for a few years, having moved from Philip Island. The races up until this time had been won by a variety of cars including minis, cortinas and the like.
But Ford Australia really wanted to win with the locally produced Falcon, which was the big seller in the Ford range.
In 1967 Ford produced the new Falcon XR, with which they were providing various Police Forces with a 289 ci version. This became the basis of the XR GT Falcon available in just enough numbers to allow them to race at Bathurst and in any colour you wanted, as long as it was gold.
The big Fords won and the public went wild for the falcon and Australia fell in love with V8 Muscle. Holden responded with the 327 and 350 Monaros and Ford came back with a series of GT Falcons culminating in the GTHO phase 1,2 and 3 series. Chrysler got in the act with their pacers and chargers although took a slightly different engine route. They did have some very nice US sourced V8s but the really quick Charger was the triple webbered 265 ci Hemi 6cyl.
So it went with GM Holden, Ford and Chrysler Valiant. Building faster and faster cars that were freely available to anyone. It was a real trap for the carmakers at the time, you had to sell a number of cars in order to race them at Bathurst, in order to sell more of them when you won. It was actually true at the time, that when you won Bathurst in, let’s say a GTHO, sales of the falcons right the way through the range went up.
In 1972 the bubble burst. A story hit the papers that the big 3 manufacturers were about to release new "160 MPH Supercars" onto the public. Reports spread that these "public slaughtering deathtraps would fall into the hands of an unsuspecting public causing mayhem and Death". The road safety people got in on the act and the government got nervous. The cars themselves weren't actually banned, but the governments of the day threatened boycots of the manufacturer’s products.
Thus the GTHO phase 4 Falcon, was canned (although 3 or 4 did escape) the LJ V8 torana died without ever seeing the light of day and the New Charger E55 although actually getting to the market was detuned via a soft cam etc and then died a quiet death.
The Confederation of Australian Motorsport then changed the Bathurst rules to that of Improved Production for local cars which became group C and ended the Production car power wars.
The existing Improved production imports such as the Camaros and Mustangs were relegated to the Sports sedan ranks, which was a relatively minor series in that there was no big marquis events like Bathurst.
The Falcon Gt (without the HO option) struggled on until 76 but each subsequent model became less powerful. The Torana V8 was eventually built but in the heavier and larger LH and LX series of cars not the nimble lightweight LJ and the R/T series of chargers just stopped being made..
Theres obviously a lot more to it all, but that’s a rough idea.
So enough background, next up we’ll start on some Aussie cars. But feel free to comment, ask questions or make any corrections that you see fit. It's all up for discussion, if I've made a mistake let us know.
