Lovers of maligned AU Falcon turn joke into mass gathering
The AU Falcon started life as one of Australia’s most maligned cars, but 21 years on it’s finally found some love and a push to force Ford to build them again is gathering speed.
Melbourne
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The AU Falcon was dependable, durable and, in the eyes of many when it was released 21 years ago, as ugly as sin.
But a social media proposal to get the AU Falcon back onto the old Ford Australia production line, which started as a joke, has turned into a groundswell of love for Ford’s ugly duckling that may attract thousands of fans who adore the car’s reputation for toughness and reliability.
Crowds will gather at the old Ford factory in Broadmeadows for Storm The Old Ford Factory and Restart AU Falcon Production next month to celebrate their love of the car that was loathed by some.
So far, 9300 people say they’re attending the event on Saturday September 7, with another 29,000 expressing an interest.
“I was expecting 500 at best,” the event organiser, who would only identify himself as Blake, told the Herald Sun with a laugh.,
He said the gathering is a takeoff of the Storm Area 51 movement, in which 1.2 million people have expressed an interest in running onto the highly secretive US Air Force Cold War testing range, on September 20.
Area 51 has been at the centre of UFO conspiracy theories for years.
“It seems to have taken off pretty quick. There are 30,000 people on there now and a common thing is that people seem to want to have an AU muster on the day,” Blake said.
Blake, a motor mechanic, said he’s never owned an AU Falcon — he drives an old Mitsubishi Lancer — but the AU Falcon is one of the most reliable cars around.
“I wasn’t planning to by one, but maybe I should. I’ll feel a little bit silly showing up without one,” he said.
“They seem to be quite a well loved car. They were made long enough ago that you look at them with rose-coloured glasses. And I’m a bit too young to remember when they were new.
“They looked a bit strange new but compared to everything else on the road, they stand out, and I still see them coming into work 20 years on.”
So what’s Blake’s favourite AU?
“The Forte (the car’s base model), Series I, The higher the ks, the better.”
WHAT WENT WRONG WITH THE AU?
The AU Falcon was released in September 1998, with a range of six and eight-cylinder engines and sedan, wagon and utility variants.
It was pitched as a car for the future, it’s AU model designation reflecting both the chemical symbol for gold on the periodic table and, at the dawn of the internet age, the .au designation for Australia in URLs.
The car was the first Falcon to offer independent rear suspension (as an option). It came with airconditioning and power steering as standard and included modern touches including a built-in mobile phone cradle and a small, removable, console-mounted desk for the driver’s laptop or paperwork.
Road tests at the time noted the car’s improved performance and refinement over previous Falcon models, but the styling was controversial.
The car reflected Ford’s global “New Edge” design DNA of the time, but it was a culture shock for conservative Falcon buyers with its dramatic curves and sharp lines.
The rival Holden VT Commodore was already established in the market and its much more conventional styling was already a sales winner.
Although the tough-as-nails Falcon ute was still popular with tradies, and taxi and fleet sales were solid, private sedan and wagon sales suffered.
To make matters worse, the AU was in production for four years — a long time in automotive terms.
Ford worked to refine and improve the car with constant tweaks and two major updates over its life in a bid to buy time as Ford Australia poured $500 million into a massive redesign that surfaced as the BA Falcon in 2002.
The rejection of the AU wasn’t at Leyland P76 levels. After all, 322,838 of them were built, but the Falcon led Australian car sales for much of the 80s and ‘90s, and the Commodore stole its crown when the AU hit town.
It’s widely acknowledged as the beginning of the end of Ford’s Australian manufacturing operations.
It was the only Falcon model in the modern V8 Supercars era to fail to win either the V8 Supercars championship or a Bathurst 1000. The AU could not take a trick.
It even made motoring writer Paul Gover’s list of Australia’s greatest car flops, alongside the P76.
But fans reckon you have to work pretty hard to kill an AU.
They were a mainstay of the taxi industry through the 2000s, with a bulletproof reputation for reliability.
Tribute pages on social media feature pictures and memes extolling the virtues of the tough old birds, often with images of AUs that are the worse for wear and grossly overloaded, or are being driven in places meant only for four-wheel drives.
MORE MOTORING: PAUL GOVER’S TOP 50 CARS EVER BUILT
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Despite the lacklustre sales in comparison with previous models, there are still plenty of AU Falcons on the road. And many of those might be heading up Sydney Rd to the old Ford plant next month.
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