Topic: Greetings from Downunder

[Oz66FB]

hi all

my name's Ben and I live in the Barossa Valley, South Australia.
I have 3 Ford V8's
1) 1966 Fastback, mild 302, older "restoration" still improving it (hopefully a pic below)
2) 1970 Fairlane, 351C, drives well but near terminal rust issues.
3) 1971 Falcon GT open track race car, 408W in progress.

2 small kids, large mortgage yada yada ...there is never enough $ or time for the cars
Anyways, I hope you guys can help me with the suspension/ steering side of things with the stang and in return I hope to be able to help in other areas.

cheers
Ben

[Soaring]

Welcome to the site.  Glad you could made it here Aussie. 

[Thierry]

 Welcome here Ben. I'm glad to see an Aussie among us. I use to live in Sydney and Kalgoorlie when I was a kid. Is your Mustang a right hand drive? What is its history, I don't think they where imported by Ford Australia and you already had a great pony over there with the Ford Falcon. Feel free to post photos of your Falcon and Fairlane, I am sure we are all interested in other classics than the Mustang.
If you need help, post away and we will try our best to answer your questions 

[66GTKFB]

Let me guess, you're in the wine business. Nice to talk to you again.
Jim

[Soaring]

Let me guess, you're in the wine business. Nice to talk to you again.
Jim

Yeah, Ben is our down under buddy from another site.  Welcome Ben, and come here often.  The best of the best post here.  It's a little slow now, but we will get her cranked up soon. 

[Oz66FB]

g'day Jim, i knew you'd pop up somewhere!

Thierry, my car is still left hand drive and was imported from the US in about 1996 as a box full of junk. PO "restored" it (badly) and I have been slowly fixing it up since I bought in in '98.

they did import a few hundred coupes in 65/66 and converted them to RHD in one of the local Ford factories.  I have only ever seen one. They had a few unique features like a remote brake booster mounted on the inner fender. I'm pretty sure we only got the C codes.

in 1967, Ford Australia started buidling their own V8 cars (prior to that any Ford V8 was an import). It was a 4 door Falcon designated XR and was pretty much Mustang running gear anyway.  We used to get a fair few Galaxies for the large car market but in '67 they started making Fairlanes (ZA). They were the same platform with a longer nose and tail.

My Falcon XY and Fairlane ZD are the 4th model in the line. Options were 250 i6, 302 or 351C. Top loader or C4. The Windsor was dropped in favor of the Cleve in mid '70 so there are a few crossovers.

I'll post up some pics later
Cheers
Ben

[Soaring]

Ben, I can almost hear your Aussie accent.    Welcome to this site.  Jim and a few of the good ones from the other site are here, so this place should be jumping in a few weeks. 

[Thierry]

 I remember the Falcon featured in the Mad Max movies. I was a teenager when I first saw the first Mad Max and not much into cars then but I loved it and it's probably this one and the Holden Monaro my parents use to own that got me into muscle cars.
 Australian muscle cars combined the power of American V8 cars and the handling and braking of European sport cars and didn't have the pollution restriction the Mustang had after 1973. Lately, we had a taste of the Australian made muscle cars with the Pontiac GTO (Holden Monaro) but it didn't have the success it deserved. Is this car popular in Australia? I personally didn't like the design.