The WORST Falcon model, and why.

[Swordie]

Originally Posted by vbvbvb088

What I find interesting is that I work with a 23yo who is into hotted up 80 90s Japanese cars. Every Friday he attends a met up of hundred of like minded people.... amongst this group VL Commodores are present and they all like them. I wonder why VL appeals to people who were not born when VL's made?

My guess popularity started with the 3.0Turbo VL. That was the most desirable.

I have driven the na VL when new plus the Skyline which had the same motor. It was a really nice motor for its time. After the VN came out the 3.0 was fondly looked on as a great motor.

[XRtowcar]

XE was a shocker. Mine was a S Pak manual EfI, no air, no power steering.
Clutch weight of a truck. Heavy steering. Firewall rusted through at eight years of age.
Water leaks around front and rear screens. Blown head gasket.
Didn’t touch a Ford for nine years after it.

[marty351]

Originally Posted by XRtowcar

XE was a shocker. Mine was a S Pak manual EfI, no air, no power steering.
Clutch weight of a truck. Heavy steering. Firewall rusted through at eight years of age.
Water leaks around front and rear screens. Blown head gasket.
Didn’t touch a Ford for nine years after it.

Sounds like you got a lemon.
Mates dad bought new an 84 s pak, 20 years and 325k later still going strong. Only sold it on because injectors needed doing and didn't want to spend. Still got $4,000 for it. Bloke who bought it rebuilt the engine and is still in operation,

[Dr Smith]

As a counter view...

My family and my own individual purchases must have been graced with FoMoCo Oz good luck.
From my parents first brand new new Falcon purchases: XP, XW, XE, ELii no problems and always serviced by the book although my father preferred replacing parts before they wore whenever told they would need replacing next service. Two of these were used a delivery vehicles as well and racked up 300,000+km
XF replaced stolen XE and was second hand....lifters replaced and the dealer was the problem in this case...
My own new purchases after inheriting the same above XW & XE were BA FG....and on my 3rd Terry now.

I know the first ever Falcon wasn't durable enough for Australian conditions and fixed in later iterations.
EA was release too early and rushed to market...yet still one of the best balanced designs I've seen in a large sedan.
BA had issues and again maybe should have been delayed on release however my only issue was the recall for water pump, think it was due to o-ring into the rear(?)
I did test drive a new SYII Terry Ghia turbo and almost bought it but did a house extension instead.
FG was a G6ET and I should have kept it.

[Sprintey]

Good post Dr Smith, we've been lucky as well. ED was excellent - they probably had ironed out all the bugs - and had additional soundproofing on the EA/EB - that was a really nice car, very reliable. MIL's AUII was superb, SY has been a good car over 300,000km but you must maintain the suspension, and FG is very reliable - many of my son's mates (FG is his car) have now switched to an FG as well, as their cars suffered major mechanical problems and they traded.

[Bossxr8]

Originally Posted by Sprintey

Good post Dr Smith, we've been lucky as well. ED was excellent - they probably had ironed out all the bugs - and had additional soundproofing on the EA/EB - that was a really nice car, very reliable. MIL's AUII was superb, SY has been a good car over 300,000km but you must maintain the suspension, and FG is very reliable - many of my son's mates (FG is his car) have now switched to an FG as well, as their cars suffered major mechanical problems and they traded.

I have too. Outside of general maintenance, and wear items like bushes etc, I haven't had any major problems bar 1 BTR rebuild, and that was because it was abused. I've never had one crap itself completely, or require major work. Can't say anyone in my family has either. They might have their little issues, but they are generally rugged and dependable. It's just the little things that can let them down. Mixer shafts etc.

[Sprintey]

Yep, the only day the ED (bought 2nd hand 50,000km) ever misbehaved was when the Ms reported the coolant temp going high and then stopped the car. I was at work and went "d'oh there goes the head gasket", but no, it was just a split radiator hose. Miss that car.

[Franco Cozzo]

Has anyone mentioned Falcon power windows yet? Its like Ford couldn't perfect power windows that work for longer than the warranty period.

https://powerwin.com.au/shop.html#!/...=0&sort=normal

How good is it when you have a business with a special section for 'Ford fixes'

[roKWiz]

Originally Posted by Franco Cozzo

Has anyone mentioned Falcon power windows yet?

Nup, never heard of those.

[bb_zetec]

Myself and Family have owned various Fords over the years...Falcon wise me having 2 XF's, an ED, an AU and now FG.


Looking back on them they never let me down where it counted...my carb XF I remember driving home with a blown head gasket and damaged idle solenoid..it was still able to deliver. Lost a Welsh Plug and the thing overheated on the highway and lived to tell the tale. I think I drove along for about 15 minutes or so before I even had realised that the thing was overheating!


Rust was the main killer of both the XF's I had...and as others have stated the XF Ghia electrics were woeful..i lost track of how many power window switches, regulators and dash pods I went through. The EFI never let me down though.


The ED I had suffered from air conditioning problems and I think it was pretty abused in its previous life but it still served its purpose.


AU I had suffered from Series 1 niggles and build quality problems, it was red and the paint oxidised quickly...off loaded it for as much as I bought it for though so that was a win.

I did own a VL Calais though for a while and that was very unreliable. Not bashing Holden v Ford etc.. but the eletrics all around were abysmal. Numerous crank angle sensor failures in the dizzy, almost every single item item in the interior fell apart, Fuel gauge failures etc...

The RB30 was a great engine packaged in general poor quality build and workmanship that was accepted during that time. I was stranded over 6 times and thought enough was enough...went back to a Ford as I knew they usually pull through when it counts.


The FG I have now is a lot better than the previous cars but again has its niggles and quality dramas that we all accept and live with. It does show in the interior and paint finish especially where costs were cut, but the Barra engine is superb and the best inline 6 to come out of this country.

How the FG will be in another 10 years...well time will tell, but I suspect that the car will fall apart around the drivetrain as most of our Fords usually do.

[Sprintey]

Originally Posted by roKWiz

Nup, never heard of those.

Underrated comment. Mum's VY is wind up windows (was absolute base model) and is prized as such. XW - wind up windows. ED Sprint (yes!) - wind up windows.

Was the evil part called the actuator? Whatever it is, I know it. I wonder how many successive sales they lost when returning customers knew the bl**dy windows would seize at some point between 'opened' and 'closed'. It was probably $1 cheaper per unit to make it out of cheese.

[Bossxr8]

Originally Posted by Crazy Dazz

I wonder if part of the problem was that FoA had become too accustomed to "trailing" Holden?
I reckon by the late 60's we had honestly better cars, but too many people still preferred Holden.
FoA didn't seem to comprehend that even by sticking a new body on the XC, they had knocked the lamentable VB off the Holden pedestal. I can recall there being talk of how Ford needed to make the Falcon smaller to compete.
Then of course they had the amazing success with the Laser, which seemed to convince everyone that badge-engineering was the way to go.

I don't recall the specifics of Capricorn. But I do recall they toyed with the idea of a badge-engineered Luce (929)

After reading this it dawned on me I had referred to Capricorn being based on 626. When it was actually the 929, which you mentioned. Forgot that even existed.

I'm not exactly sure the reasoning of Capricorn to replace the XF. Must have come from Dearborn, who had the FWD Taurus replace some of their big RWD cars.

Originally Posted by XR Martin

Was the front end of early EA susceptible to collapsing?
I seem to recall something about it, and apparently they added a welded 25mm bar across the front of the cross member?

Was that just a myth or did the early EAs not come with that bar. My 89 EA1 had the bar.

I'm pretty sure it was prone to the suspension sagging. Never heard of it actually collapsing, but if my memory serves me right it did sag.

[Swordie]

There was the Brock EA Falcon - "sports camshaft, extractors, full exhaust system and bluebrinted ignition system the big six went from 139kW to a dyno-tuned 164kW- one kilowatt less than the 5.0-litre V8-powered Commodore SS of the time".

An extra 25kw was allot in those days.

https://www.shannons.com.au/auctions...4A4PBP5PFTBDA/

[383hq]

1999 AU falcon has design cues of a 2011 MB CLS class, I'll let others judge whether that means its a decade in front of popular aesthetics as an subjective opinion.

Some durability test results (if they ever saw a public forum) and internal opinion (obviously heavily biased) might suggest that the AU was the better built car, but to fix the aesthetics, BA was bought forward, with cost cutting programs to offset the earlier then expected tooling costs, particularly where the AU was far superior to its major competitor at the time.
Just about everyone agreed it looked better.

[Wretched]

BA was the worst one I owned and even through the history of my family.
The style was nice, interior aged badly but the quality of materials was woeful at best and reeked of cost cutting. It spent so much time getting things fixed I had enough and got rid of it.

Some of the issues that I can remember:

• Unpainted areas under the doors
• Went into limp home mode within 2 months
• Two of the locking actuators ceased, only one covered by warranty
• Water pouring in from the passenger footwell due to poor drainage around the windscreen
• Bonnet latch breaking 3 times
• Gearbox whine after 40k km
• Seats lost their support and wore prematurely
• Steering wheel wore out as did the dashboard, didn't appear to cope well with Australian conditions

[62XKFalcon]

As a newbie to the forum as of today, I have read this thread with interest because I am doing minor restoration to a 1962 XK Falcon, which will be 60 years old next year! Original 144 Engine and matching chassis numbers! Owned several Fords over the years, my first an XL Falcon in 1964, a 440 Cortina, 84 Fairmont Ghia, 1999 Courier and driving a 2004 Courier 4Door. The XK was probably the worst Falcon, but they really did work hard to get things right and by the XP, deserved a lot of credit.

[mick taylor]

Originally Posted by 62XKFalcon

As a newbie to the forum as of today, I have read this thread with interest because I am doing minor restoration to a 1962 XK Falcon, which will be 60 years old next year! Original 144 Engine and matching chassis numbers! Owned several Fords over the years, my first an XL Falcon in 1964, a 440 Cortina, 84 Fairmont Ghia, 1999 Courier and driving a 2004 Courier 4Door. The XK was probably the worst Falcon, but they really did work hard to get things right and by the XP, deserved a lot of credit.

What was really wrong with the XK-L Falcons for their day ?
The got cheap 2ed rate quality steel Ball joints made in the UK, the ones in the USA were top quality ball joints.
Apart form that what was wrong with them, nothing back in the day, they were way more advanced than any crappy Holden at the time.
With the power of a big 144 high compression and Low compression could be ordered.
The Holden's only had a 138 low compression rubbish.

Just remember what the roads back in the 60's were like, so many coped a hell of flogging.

I had a ball joint fall out on my HX Holden, it was the thread and nut that let go, not the ball. maybe some idiot tightened the nut up past the specs ?

Just remember that the XK got the big 170 in the last few months as well.

But as to the worst Falcon, as to what is the real issue.

XA-B-C were the biggest rust buckets for sure.

The very first EA engines had problems with the heads, they came with a shrouded casting in the chamber that went out beside the valve to reduce emissions but they created a hot spot to ping and blow head gaskets I believe, I was working at Ford at the time and they were full on pulling heads off every day.

The biggest joke of any Falcon would have to be the EA with the 3sp auto I drove a Fairmont Ghia 3.9L EFI and 1st gear was way to high, that it could not spin the wheels taking off on grass.

[janddbone]

EF!!!

[janddbone]

EA 3spd could spin a single wheel all day! Ha ha!!! The high first gear i nthe four speed was always a problem right through to the end.

[xb74_black]

On my xf 351 pano i despaired with the original dash - i fitted vdo water temp and oil pressure guages, a tacho and used the GPS for accurate speed. Eventually i fitted black cardboard over the blinking dashboard lights.

[jpd80]

XP Falcon, never go into a left corner fast, the tyres howl and you go straight on into oncoming traffic.
I learned this as a young driver in my dad’s car, needless to say the old boy wasn’t impressed by my stupidity.

[FairmontGS]

Originally Posted by jpd80

XP Falcon, never go into a left corner fast, the tyres howl and you go straight on into oncoming traffic.
I learned this as a young driver in my dad’s car, needless to say the old boy wasn’t impressed by my stupidity.

This ^^^^^

XP 2 door - so much rust, body flex and so little performance. I could never get one to corner. We scrapped a few of them in the 80s.

[slowsnake]

I would say that thinking back to the 80's there were quite a few XA and XB cars and vans still around, I had a XB van 302ci donk and if I opened the passenger door and stood on the sill with the door open I could lift the turret, windscreen surround and roof up with my shoulder nearly an inch, I bought it with a pink slip too....went like a bird, but scary, of course I welded the door jamb back together, I was chasing rust for a week, nasty!