WI: More World Cars

The Capri was not meant to be a practical economy car. It was a pony car.
Also it was only sold by Lincoln Mercury dealers. Which yes that made it cost a little more the one big thing they had advantage of that I can never figure out why American manufacturers never did was he came with a V for at least a couple of I know of personally
 
Also it was only sold by Lincoln Mercury dealers. Which yes that made it cost a little more the one big thing they had advantage of that I can never figure out why American manufacturers never did was he came with a V for at least a couple of I know of personally

Yes. I was comparing them to the original RWD British Escorts that are still in demand as competition cars. They never did have an official V6 version, though there were plenty of unofficial ones. The Capri was a pussycat by comparison
 

kernals12

Banned
Yes. I was comparing them to the original RWD British Escorts that are still in demand as competition cars. They never did have an official V6 version, though there were plenty of unofficial ones. The Capri was a pussycat by comparison
It was attractive, which is what matters.
 
Yamaha managed to get 220 Horsepower out of the 3 Liter V6 that went into the Taurus SHO.

Making power wasn't a problem, they knew how to do that. The 2.3L Turbo of 1979 made 130 HP, while the 302 2bbl made 140-- not much more than the 255, but the seat of the pants, 'Butt-o-Meter' made it feel like a whole different class of vehicle, mostly due to better gearing and not losing power above 40 mph vs the 255

But meeting EPA emission levels along with somehow needing to meet 19mpg CAFE Fuel standards for the '79 model year onwards meant they had to make a lot of slugs, like the diesel Escort and the 255 on the Fox body platform, because power and drivability were not under Government Mandate.
After a few years, the Throttle Body FI came along, and decided that poor performance was hurting sales, even if it made hitting the Federal Standards easier. So the 255 went away, lamented by no one.
The 1984 5.0L made 165HP, while the new AOD 4 speed auto(from 81 onwards) helped with drivability and with MPG.

Note that Ford hadn't gone with V8s with high RPMs to make power since the end of the '60s when they retired the FE line
 

kernals12

Banned
Making power wasn't a problem, they knew how to do that. The 2.3L Turbo of 1979 made 130 HP, while the 302 2bbl made 140-- not much more than the 255, but the seat of the pants, 'Butt-o-Meter' made it feel like a whole different class of vehicle, mostly due to better gearing and not losing power above 40 mph vs the 255

But meeting EPA emission levels along with somehow needing to meet 19mpg CAFE Fuel standards for the '79 model year onwards meant they had to make a lot of slugs, like the diesel Escort and the 255 on the Fox body platform, because power and drivability were not under Government Mandate.
After a few years, the Throttle Body FI came along, and decided that poor performance was hurting sales, even if it made hitting the Federal Standards easier. So the 255 went away, lamented by no one.
The 1984 5.0L made 165HP, while the new AOD 4 speed auto(from 81 onwards) helped with drivability and with MPG.

Note that Ford hadn't gone with V8s with high RPMs to make power since the end of the '60s when they retired the FE line
So what's your point?
 
So what's your point?

That Ford had zero interest in really high performance V8 performance, Ford started to replace the Mustang by having Mazda take over the idle Michigan Casting plant at Flat Rock, and do a performance car based off the MX-6, with that planning starting in 1985, with the Fox Mustang to be phased out.

But the guys who bought the 5.0 LX and GT had zero interest in that redone MX-6 what would be known as the Probe. Ford's plan to get the RWD performance looking drivers to look towards turbos started, and ended, with the SVO and the Turbo 4, and refocused on V8s for the upcoming modular V8 line.

And then they do the SHO for Taurus, rather than in a new SVO Mustang or Probe GT
 

kernals12

Banned
The Volkswagen Golf is one of the few models sold worldwide that have a lot of common features even with local safety regulations. Sadly, the Focus will soon be no more in the USA market, though.
They will be selling a jacked up version with plastic cladding.
 
Here's a few Australian cars I'd like to see step out onto the world stage, coming through 'The Dipper' in 1969.

allen-and-matich-bathurst-1969.jpg
 
I always wondered why the Pinto ever had to exist in the first place - the new for 1970 Ford Cortina was only 4.5" longer than the Pinto (despite it having a 7" longer wheelbase) and the Mark II Escort (introduced in 1974) would have been a good replacement for either one, particularly as the Pinto name was by then more or less cursed. (The Mark II Escort has the same wheelbase as the Pinto but is 7" shorter.)

The Grenada/Taurus/Falcon to me makes perhaps the greatest missed opportunity of all. The Taurus and Grenada came to market within six months of each other and shared engines, the Taurus two inches longer but with two inch shorter wheelbase and an inch narrower, while the EA Falcon was the widest of the three (by 2.5"), by 1" shorter than the Taurus. Why not design the cars on one platform and figure out the one you thought would work best? One of the things the Taurus (and indeed the EA Falcon) was liked for was the better handling and performance compared to its full-sized rival cars. Using the wide-track platform of the EA Falcon, the suspension of the Grenada and the body styling of the Taurus would give you the best of all worlds, as well as great interior room (helped by the wider platform) and better handling, as well as allowing the use of all Ford engines from the Pinto inline-four to the big Barra inline-six from the EA Falcon, which got fuel injection and a new cylinder head for the EA. Taurus styling and comfort, the luxury amenities of the Grenada, the interior space of the Falcon and great driving and handling, available with a big range of engines (and V8s do fit in the EA....) and built rather better than other cars Ford produced at the time (and the EA had serious build quality issues early on, too, which this could nip in the bud) and you have not only the giant winner of OTL but perhaps an even bigger one.

Combine the above with the Sierra in North America instead of the dull (and frequently very badly built) Tempo and the World Car Escort (and the Mustang, which could easily be upgraded for sale in Europe and Australia, and the Fiesta, which is probably never going to be too great in North America but did well in Europe) and you have a complete modern car lineup. What a huighely successful Taurus like this could also do is set off an arms race in Detroit for better-driving cars and not just better-styled cars. The implications of that could be enormous.... :)
 
Can-Am style cars perhaps making their way to North America to run against the real deal? :)

It happened in1967 with the Matich SR3 and SR3A. Frank Matich took the SR3 with a 4.4l Olds alloy V8 and the SR3A with a 4.4l Repco V8, but for little result. Australian sports car races were only 80 miles long and CAMS rule put a 5l limit on engine size, which favoured very, very light cars lacking the structural strength to handle 200 mile Can Am races while being competitive on speed. When it finished the SR3 was a reasonable mid level Can Am car, but the usual result was a DNF.

In my mind the twin answer to this problem is for CAMS to make the engine limit 6l and make the premier sports car race the Australian Tourist Trophy a 200 mile race. That would create opportunities for the Repco V8 as well as chev and ford V8s and lead to tougher cars that were also fast.
 
It happened in1967 with the Matich SR3 and SR3A. Frank Matich took the SR3 with a 4.4l Olds alloy V8 and the SR3A with a 4.4l Repco V8, but for little result. Australian sports car races were only 80 miles long and CAMS rule put a 5l limit on engine size, which favoured very, very light cars lacking the structural strength to handle 200 mile Can Am races while being competitive on speed. When it finished the SR3 was a reasonable mid level Can Am car, but the usual result was a DNF.

In my mind the twin answer to this problem is for CAMS to make the engine limit 6l and make the premier sports car race the Australian Tourist Trophy a 200 mile race. That would create opportunities for the Repco V8 as well as chev and ford V8s and lead to tougher cars that were also fast.

That would help matters, but the extra weight of the cars runs into the problem of the SR3/SR3A being by 1967-68 probably underpowered against the Can-Am monsters. They'd need bigger than a six-liter engine by that point, as the big guns in Can-Am were by that point had 650+ horsepower behind them.
 
That would help matters, but the extra weight of the cars runs into the problem of the SR3/SR3A being by 1967-68 probably underpowered against the Can-Am monsters. They'd need bigger than a six-liter engine by that point, as the big guns in Can-Am were by that point had 650+ horsepower behind them.

The SR3s best result, indeed the only result in the US for an Australian Group A sports racing car, was 8th at a USRRC event at Laguna Seca in May 67 from a field of 31 cars 21 of which had Chev V8s. This was with the earlier 4.4 litre Traco Olds engine.

Later in the year Frank was back with a 4.4 litre Repco 620, the type Brabham used to with the F1 championship in 66 and 67. In 1967 only Chapparal had alloy 427 Chevs, everyone else had small block Chevs of 6 litres or less and a smattering of Weslake-Fords, Olds and Buicks of less than 6.3 litres and horsepower in the 550 area. With his very light car and reasonable power from the OHC Repco Frank was able to run in about the middle of the pack until he DNF'd.

In 1968 shit got real. Maclaren and others had access to the alloy 427 Chev that only Chapparal had in 67, so a lot of top-end cars had 620+ bhp, although most of the field had developments of the 67 small blocks. The points and prize-money went all the way down to 10th place, so the scraps were worth fighting for. Ferrari introduced its P612 with a 6.2 litre V12 with 620bhp that was still competitive in 1969. Frank Matich tried to get the SR4 ready for the 68 season but was too late; the SR4 had a quad cam 4.9 litre Repco 760 V8 with 620-640 bhp that would have been competitive in 68 and maybe 69.

The SR4 is the beast with the wing in the photo above, it was unbeatable against the thin fields in Australia in 1969, about the only similar car was the Bob Jane Mclaren M6 Repco which unlike other customer Mclarens was actiually built by Mclaren not Trojan. The M6 Repco had a 4.9l 740 V8, OHC but only 2 valves per cylinder and with exhausts exiting between the 'V' like Brabham's 67 F1 cars, but this car only raced the SR4 once and came second.

sr-jane.png
 
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what are they, the bottom one actually looks, strangely good.

The front and back cars are Elfin 400s, the front one has a Chev and the back one a Repco while the middle is the Matich SR4 Repco. The red Elfin crashed in this race, killing the driver.

These Group A, Can Am cars are goid looking as well as technically awesome.
 
The front and back cars are Elfin 400s, the front one has a Chev and the back one a Repco while the middle is the Matich SR4 Repco. The red Elfin crashed in this race, killing the driver.

These Group A, Can Am cars are goid looking as well as technically awesome.

I always wondered why the Can-Am cars of the 1967-68 era were not made eligible for the big American endurance races, with Daytona and Sebring of 1968 onward being a battle between the Can-Am cars, the sports prototypes of the day, the five-liter Trans-Am cars and the bigger GT cars of the era. McLaren M8s, Ford GT40s, Porsche 908s, Ferrari 275 GTBs, Chevrolet Camaro Z/28s and Porsche 911s all sharing the track at the same time (not to mention other Trans-Am cars and other GT options - Chevrolet Corvette, Lamborghini Miura, Jaguar E-Type, Shelby Cobra, Toyota 2000GT, Maserati Ghibli, Iso Grifos, et cetera) is a salivating thought....
 
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I always wondered why the Can-Am cars of the 1967-68 era were not made eligible for the big American endurance races, with Daytona and Sebring of 1968 onward being a battle between the Can-Am cars, the sports prototypes of the day, the five-liter Trans-Am cars and the bigger GT cars of the era. McLaren M8s, Ford GT40s, Porsche 908s, Ferrari 275 GTBs, Chevrolet Camaro Z/28s and Porsche 911s all sharing the track at the same time (not to mention other Trans-Am cars and other GT options - Chevrolet Corvette, Lamborghini Miura, Jaguar E-Type, Shelby Cobra, Toyota 2000GT, Maserati Ghibli, Iso Grifos, et cetera) is a salivating thought....

Rules basically. Up to 67 engine capacity for endurance prototypes was unlimited, but they had to have a roof, so the Lola T70, Mclaren M6 and Chaparral all had endurance versions. From 68 only sports cars where 50 and later 25 were built could have 5 litre engines and prototypes had a 3 litre limit. This meant the GT40 and Lola T70 could race with 5 litre engines in endurance races but Can Am cars could not. Eventually Porsche and Ferrari built 25 917/512 with 5 litre engines, which were much faster than the 3 litre prototypes.

Funnily enough a few endurance 917s and 512s entered Can Am races when an endurance and Can Am race were on the same weekend and sometimes did very well indeed.
 
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