New Falcon GTHO inches closer

[frd906]

New Falcon GTHO inches closer




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New Falcon GTHO inches closer
words - Joshua Dowling
Exclusive: to be called Phase 5, here for 40th anniversary in 2011

» Get the best price on a new FPV Ford Performance Vehicles may be popping champagne corks to celebrate the unveiling of its most powerful car to date – the new supercharged V8 Falcon GT – but the company is already working on going one step better with a modern equivalent of the mighty Falcon GTHO.

However, the new super V8, designed to coincide with the 40th anniversary of the GTHO's Bathurst victory in October 2011, will not wear a GTHO badge because it is deemed too sacred.

At the launch of the new supercharged V8 in Melbourne this week, executives from Ford Performance Vehicles said development of an even hotter version of the just-released engine is already underway.

When asked how plans to resurrect the GTHO were progressing and if the new engine gave FPV the right equipment for the job, the boss of FPV Rod Barrett said:

"There's not one person at FPV that wouldn't love us to have a GTHO. And I'm going to say the same thing now as I've said since August 2007. If we're going to do it, we're going to do it right.

"We've probably got the tools to do it now. The decision really is whether we want to do it. And that decision has not been made. I can tell you as we sit here today that categorically ‘no', there is no decision on a GTHO."

When asked about an even more powerful version of the GT, Bryan Mears, the Asia-Pacific head of Prodrive, the parent company of FPV, told reporters: "We'd be silly to limit ourselves. We didn't spend this money for nothing. We always want to produce the best vehicle we can. We've now got an engine that we can see a long way into the future.

"No-one can predict customer trends and needs and expectations. But in our niche I think we've got a good feel for what that might be."

While no-one from FPV would confirm plans for the hi-po GT, Mears did rule out calling it a GTHO.

"If we made a car in the future that had attributes of the GTHO … it wouldn't be a GTHO, it would be the modern version," he said.

"I'd caution everyone, the GTHO with its mythology … there will never be another GTHO. It was a truly special car for a truly special time in Australian motoring history. It's a sacred badge.

"I don't see the point of using the [GTHO badge]. I find it unlikely that we would be putting a car out that has GTHO on the back of it.

"People would put a microscope on it. What we will do is to continue to develop vehicles with customer expectations in mind."

The Carsales Network understands that at the top of the names list is "Phase 5". Given that the GTHO was a Phase III and a handful of Phase IVs were made before plans to build them were scrapped after the supercar scare in the late 1970s, Phase 5 would be a natural progression.

For now, though, FPV is staying quiet on what name it would use.

"We have development plans well into the future," said Mears. "The highest priority for us is to give our customers a terrific experience driving our cars. And in the future, as needs occur, we'll definitely be looking at the potential is of this engine."

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[DJM83]

Sorry Matt but these GTHO threads are getting tiring