You saw the wife's, here's mine *Update* with pics

[Mr. OAM]

What the heck is it??

It is a 1973 Australian Ford XB Falcon. No, it's not a Torino, it's not a "Mexican Mustang", it's not a Javelin. It does not share body panels, or many parts, with any American car, or car built anywhere else in the world.


If you remember seeing Mad Max with a VERY young Mel Gibson, in the last third of the movie he finally drives that black car with the blower through the hood. In Road Warrior they call the car an Interceptor.

"Gotta hand it to you treasure, an Interceptor. Last of the V8's. A piece of history...."

Well I brought the car over from Australia to build one. I saw the movie in the theaters when I was 16. It was the most incredible car I had ever seen. I figured they built it especially for the movie and I could never have one. In 2003 I found out it was built from a production car and that was all I need to know.


Steve



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[Knuckles@Empire]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

soooooooooooo sick O0

 

[Mr. OAM]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

How it's going to look when it is done. This one belongs to a friend in Canada. His is DONE!!

Steve

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[eliyarbrough]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

I have never heard of that car, I think. I like the before better. You have nice cars!

 

[Mr. OAM]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

Thanks. My wife would rather I leave the car stock too. It is a hard decision but I have put years of thinking into it.


Find the Special Edition of Mad Max. It was done in 2002 I think.

Steve

 

[Whistler98]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

Nice find!

 

[281cammer]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

Nice looking Falcon, always makes me mad when I think of all the cool Ford's the Aussie boys get.

 

[Convertible 5.0]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

They didn't get ALL the cool falcons. I just recently sold this nice Bird to a guy in NYC. I had to for several years.

Rust Free 1963 Ford Falcon Futura Scatback Springtime Edition (A/C) Original 260 V8 with original 95,000 miles. White outside, Red Inside. C4 Auto Installed with highway gears. Front and Rear Beefy sway-away bars. New Larger Tank, New Carb and Intake. Excellent Street Car. Many Trophies.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2411723088515631666

 

[95-stang]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

There's a couple of people over here with Mad Max replicas, one has a dummy supercharger. [ugh].
Hard to customize it when you have such a rare car over there.

 

[Mr. OAM]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

Great looking Falcon, Green SVT. Those earliest Falcons didn't always look too mean. Congratuations for inducing attitude in that one. Very cool.


There are more than a couple Interceptor replicas in the US. Also between the US and some in Canada there is at least 100 Aussie Falcons in North America.

As for the blower being fake, that is the only way to replicate the on/off switchable feature that you see in the movie. Many people really want to be able to replicate that ability, and many spectators familiar with the movie expect it. After all, that's how the car was in the movie, and wasn't that so cool, even if it is just fantasy?

There are a couple people with real blown replicas and of those only one has the functional fuel injection. The injector that you see on top of the blower was a Scott Super Slot injector from the 1960's. It only did idle and wide open throttle and was mechanical injection. There is a company out west that reproduces, with permission, this injector and it can be bought in either a dummy model or fully functional with electronic fuel injection and a stand alone controller. As you can imagine that is BIG bucks. If I were to build mine fully functional with electronic replica injector it would take me another year and another $15,000 when you consider building the engine to take it, as well as modifying the chassis and the initial cash outlay. I am building mine with the switchable blower first. I am getting the dummy injector that I will be able to machine and install electronic injection in later myself. I will have fun for as long as I enjoy it. If I start to get bored with it I will then make the blower and injection functional and begin the enjoyment all over again.

Here's the website I made to document this project.....

http://xaxbinterceptor.tripod.com

It is a little bit behind. I need to buy more server space to be able to update it.

Steve

 

[95-stang]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

I can imagine if your wife's like mine, she wont be THAT understanding at that sort of money.

Still i prefer to see the blower going round, even though the on\off switch in the film gives it that "extra boost" sort of rush.

 

[scarface]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

I was thinking Mad Max as soon as I read what it was...very cool car..

BTW, half of these people are too young to know who/what Mad Max is...lol

 

[Mr. OAM]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

BTW, half of these people are too young to know who/what Mad Max is...lol

I know..........I know..........



Being car guys you need to be up to speed on the classic car movies. Vanishing Point, Bullitt, Gone in 60 Seconds (1974 I think), Mad Max, American Graffitti, Smokey and the Bandit, Cannonball Run, and Gumball Rally just to name a few. This was before all the computer crap and everything you saw the car do really happened, even if it was just a stunt car. Someone really did that with a car. Nothing looks as real as real and they didn't keep cutting and cutting from close-up to close-up.

........aaahhhhh................the good ol' days.


Steve

 

[scarface]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

Im up to date on them..I remember when MM was in the theaters. those old movies are classic The ones that came out before the mid 70s I have seen as an adult...

Im very jealous of your car sir.

 

[Mr. OAM]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

You are obviously up to date. Thanks for the compliment on my car. No need to be jealous, if you take a look at the present state of disassembly. The plan is to get it blasted and in epoxy primer before winter.


Steve

 

[scarface]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

well keep us up to date! THats a build I would love to follow.


One question, any issues getting it titled in the states?

 

[Convertible 5.0]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

Being car guys you need to be up to speed on the classic car movies. Vanishing Point, Bullitt, Gone in 60 Seconds (1974 I think), Mad Max, American Graffitti, Smokey and the Bandit, Cannonball Run, and Gumball Rally just to name a few. This was before all the computer crap and everything you saw the car do really happened, even if it was just a stunt car. Someone really did that with a car. Nothing looks as real as real and they didn't keep cutting and cutting from close-up to close-up.

........aaahhhhh................the good ol' days.
Steve

Did you leave out the 1979 Good ole Boys on purpose.. Ah it wasn't Movie?.. but TV, eh?

Yeeeee Hawwww.. *General Flying Overhead*

 

[Mr. OAM]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

well keep us up to date! THats a build I would love to follow.


One question, any issues getting it titled in the states?

No issues. You have to take it to a dealer to get it inspected like any other out of State vehicle. THe inspection is to make sure that the car matches the paperwork. This enables the State to do a search on it to verify that it doesn't have any reports about being stolen or anything.

The steering wheel is on the right hand side. I get a lot of questions about that. Yes, it is legal or else you wouldn't be able to buy old postal vehicles at auction. It is a stick shift, you shift with your left hand. The gate is the same as the shifters here so all the gears are in the same place. It is like shifting from the passenger seat in any other car. The pedals are the same or else I never would have bought the car. The hardest part was figuring out how to move the turn signal that is on the right side of the steering column. When I tried to notice how I do it in my truck I forgot how to since I was paying attention to what I have always done automatically. I finally got it figured out so I could downshift, hit the turn signal, and hold the steering wheel all at the same time.


Right, I left out The Dukes of Hazzard on purpose because I was only listing movies. That's a TV show. BUT, it was derived from another car movie called Moonrunners which was a much more serious movie, and it had the General Lee in it. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071854/ It was from 1975.

Grady and Bobby Lee run moonshine for Uncle Jesse, who prides himself on his old-school moonshining methods, and refuses to buckle in to the 'big business moonshine' of Jake, who controls these parts for New York mobsters.

I loved that TV show. For some reason I can't remember ever seeing a Charger of that generation before the show, and it just floored me. I loved that car, not because of the paint job but because of the body style. My first car was a 1968 Dodge Charger that I bought at 18 in 1982. I was a Mopar Man right up to 2003 when I found out that the Interceptor was a Ford. Yeah, I know a lot of stuff about mopars. They are predominently still my favorite body styles. Even then, though, the '69-70 sportsroof Mustang was my favorite Mustang.

Steve

 

[scarface]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

Thats great that it is a legal car, I do understand about driving on the wrong side... I drive a commercial vehicle a few years back that drove from the right side only. After a while I had a hard time driving a big truck from the left hand side..lol


On a side note, I did not know that about the "moonrunners" I will have to check that one out

 

[Mr. OAM]

Re: You saw the wife's, here's mine

After driving the car for a couple weeks straight I had a hard time adjusting back too. Not real hard, it just felt odd to drive "regular" again.


I happened to catch that movie purely by accident. It was late one night, around midnight, not long after Dukes of Hazzard started, and I was flipping through the channels and saw the title come on. At first I thought it was going to be a space movie so I decided to watch it. I soon learned it wasn't going to be a space movie but by then I was caught up in the story. Then when I saw the General I thought "Aaaaahhhh......this has to be where the idea came from. There was even an Uncle Jessie. It was kinda like a parallel universe thing.


Anyways....

The Falcons in Australia in the 60's looked almost identical to the Falcons here. When Ford was coming out with the Torino they told Australia that this was going to be their new Falcon. The Australians knew that was not going to do well in their market so, without going into much detail, they designed their own new Falcon. Dearborn was so impressed that they granted Ford Australia their own design department after that. The XA Falcon was born, which look just like mine only the front end is slightly different and the tail lights are different.

The white striping on the Starsky and Hutch Torino comes from Australia. It was used on the XA-XB Falcons before the show ever came out. It was an option on the "Horn" cars, a special dealer package in Australia.


Steve