I know the Hamb is dedicated to pre 1964 vehicles. Well the first Ford Falcon rolled off the ***embly line at the new Broadmeadows plant in June of 1960. The Falcon stayed in production since then, but will come to an end this October, along with all other Ford Production in Australia. I was trying to pen together an article for the Falcon Club of America newsletter, and its hard to take a paragraph or two to cover the production life of a nameplate that existed this long. Not to mention 100 years of auto manufacturing in Australia. So I have attached a copy of the information that I had collected from a few sources in Oz. I am sure there is more to some of this story than I have covered as well. Its mainly about the Falcon. Holden (GM) will also cease production of cars in Oz as well.
I work for a multi franchise dealership and one of our brands that we sell is ford. When it was announced that they were going to cease production they explained that the Australian produced cars are a small percentage of what is sold. (the imported models sell alot better) and from a global standpoint it is not worth spending millons in R+D for a car that is only available in one market and offers a tiny percentage of sales. A sad fact I know, I know plenty of people who either work or have worked in the ford factories (geelong and broadmeadows). There have been rumours that the factories may be used to produce other vehicles (including Chinese cars????) But that won't help the people out of a job now and it won't help our economy.
wow. I know that Aussie Falcon took the 6 banger Ford engine and kept it alive and evolving for a long long time. These are crazy times.
The Jalopy Journal
