Autoblog

Click above for photo gallery. Follow the jump for the video.

Ford Performance Vehicles' new range of Ford FG Falcon-derived super sedans and utes is mind-bendingly appealing. Big turbocharged or NA power, bright colors, and that menacing Alice Cooper eye makeup in front make for an entire farmer's market of forbidden fruit. Sure, on this side of the world, Ford's SVT performance division gives us the Shelby GT500 and the even more monstrous Shelby GT500KR -- but seriously, as hot as the factory super-Stangs are, the lineup of FPV rides you see above is hot enough to turn that desert sand into glass. Only, they can't -- because everything you see there is virtual. Both the backdrop and the cars are CGI. The photo-realistic vehicle models were created using the real cars' CAD data for a brand new FPV TV spot that premieres in Australia this Sunday. If you don't live in Oz, no worries -- FPV sent us a copy of the spot, which is now embedded after the jump for your enjoyment. And you will enjoy it. Right now, there's a void in our lives shaped like an all-black FPV F6, and this commercial's as close as we're going to come to filling it.


[Source: FPV]

It wouldn't be correct to say that all Ferrari drivers can't drive. What we can say is that a lot of Ferrari drivers are probably not short of ego, and also probably have little idea of what their cars can do when pressed. Combine a robust confidence with a watching crowd, add a high-powered and sometimes testy car, thrown in a little bit of ignorance... and a pole.. and what you get is the image above.

A man in Australia pulled out of a garage in his Ferrari 360 Spyder, took his chance to impress some gathered folks at cafes lining the street, and floored it. The car, as they say in the business, got away from him. The pole in the median did not. We're never happy to see (another) wrecked Ferrari, or to see a man carted away from his toy by the police, so to you kids with Ferraris, please learn from this and stop the madness.

Our favorite part of this picture is that, having made his boo-boo and probably realizing what he's in for, the driver is still just sitting in the car, although the guy in the blue shirt flexing in the background also gets a special mention... Thanks for the tip, Sam!

[Source: EHOWA]

The Australian government has both feet firmly planted on the hybrid bandwagon, and the blokes down under are looking for more of the automotive combo platter in its fleet. The government already has 355 Toyota and Honda hybrids in its fleet, but Aussie lawmakers would like to utilize its own home-grown workforce for future models. NSW Premier Morris Lemma wants the option to purchase hybrids from both both GM-owned Holden and Ford of Australia, and has even guaranteed that his government will be one of the first customers in line if Holden offered a battery-assisted Commodore within two years, as has been reported. Unfortunately, a promise from the government for a few hundred sales is hardly enough incentive on its own for an automaker to begin developing a hybrid, so both Holden and Ford will no doubt be investigating closely whether or not there's enough demand in the Australian market for a gas-electric hybrid to support the investment.

[Source: The Australian]

Click above for a high res gallery of the new FG01 racing car

Just as civilian Ford Falcon drivers have a new ride in which to roll, the racers who pilot the competition version of the sedan in Australia's V8 Supercar series now have an FG Falcon to call their own. The FG01 V8 Supercar will be officially unveiled at this weekend's race in Melbourne, where it'll entertain with some demo laps and then reside in the pits. According to Ford, the race car was designed to maximize driver safety while minimizing teams' operating, maintenance, and repair costs. Best of all, unlike the "stock" cars run in our various NASCAR series, Australia's V8 supercars actually bear more than a passing resemblance to their production counterparts -- four doors and all. There's no mistaking the fact that this car is derived from the Falcon XR8. Plus, it has a Giant Effing Wing that makes the apparatus hung off of some Pikes Peak hillclimb cars look like the ducktail on a '73 Carrera RS. Awesome. The FG01 will go into battle against its Holden counterparts next season.


[Source: Ford Racing Australia]

Click on image above for more spy shots at G8Nation.

Two 2010 Pontiac G8 Sport Trucks were recently spied in Australia loaded on the back of a transporter. Although seemingly dipped in camouflage decals, the profile of this not-going-to-be-named-El-Camino is easily distinguishable, even without a clear shot of the obvious Pontiac grill. Previewed at the 2008 New York Auto Show, the G8-based Sport Truck will be powered by a 6.0-liter V-8 rated at 361 horsepower. It should scoot to 60 mph in just over five seconds. Those of us in North America can expect this cargo-bedded Aussie import to arrive on our shores in late 2009.

[Source: G8Nation]

There's an old saying, you only want what you can't have. It holds particularly true in the context of Australia's Mitsubishi 380. The vehicle's Adelaide manufacturing facility was recently shuttered, partially due to lack of interest in the six-cylinder sedan. However, the vehicle's cancellation announcement ended up increasing demand for the final batch of 380s to roll off the assembly line. For that reason, Mitsubishi decided to auction off the final car to its suddenly sentimental Aussie dealers. The last domestically produced 380 ended up fetching $100,000 Australian dollars ($93,364) after all was said and done, which is more than three times its MSRP. John Hughes Mitsubishi, a Perth, Australia dealership, coughed up the cash for the winning bid. Mitsubishi also gave it the honor of choosing a charity to benefit from the proceeds of the sale. Knowing that the 380 in Australia is basically a Down Under-ified version of the Galant on sale in North America, is there any circumstance under which you could imagine paying that much for a Galant?

[Source: Ward's Auto]

Somewhere, a father in Melbourne weeps. There were 16 Ferrari 360 Challenge Stradales imported to Australia and New Zealand. There are now 15. A proud dad gave his son the keys to his so-rare-it's-almost-extinct Ferrari, and his son got a little too frisky with the audacious redhead. She didn't appreciate his advances, he lost control of the situation, and that little redhead introduced him to a pole... at a high rate of speed by the looks of it.

And as if that didn't beat all, the kid had to call home. While news crews watched. And filmed. Only to have newspapers and blogs spread the story around the world. No word on what his father said, but it probably rhymed with "Why I oughta @#%$*&%!"

Police say the driver was speeding, which means he must not have seen these commercials. But now, at least, he has a theme song, so sing along: "To you other kids all across the land, take it from me, parents just don't understand..." Thanks for the tip, Patrick!

[Source: Sydney Morning Herald]

That didn't take long. After Monday's article in the Detroit News reporting that Ford's U.S. operations were going to be developing its own RWD platform here in the States, the FoMoCo crew from Down Under refutes that story saying, "It's too early to speculate on that." With the dollar not holding up like it used to, the idea that Stateside Ford engineers would develop their own left-hand drive, RWD architecture seems sound, especially considering that the Falcon's underpinnings can't support switching the controls from starboard to port. If Ford's U.S. team can manage to provide both, then there's going to be a serious glut of manufacturing and engineering jobs in Australia if and when it happens.

[Source: CarPoint via TTAC]

Ford has apparently finally heard the call and green-lighted development of a new global rear wheel drive platform and a family of vehicles to be built on it. However, unlike General Motors, Ford will not rely on its Australian division to do the heavy lifting. Since the collapse of the U.S. dollar has made the United States a low cost country, the development of the new platform has been moved back to Dearborn. The most recent attempt at a rear-drive architecture that debuted on the latest Australian Ford Falcon was something of a debacle for the company. Unlike Holden, which designed its RWD Zeta platform to be built in right- and left-hand-drive versions, the new Falcon platform is right-hand drive only. This new Ford architecture to be developed near Detroit, however, will spawn models for both the Ford and Lincoln brands, including an all-new Mustang. With Ford making a major push to reduce weight in future models, hopefully these new cars will come in a lot lighter than the GM equivalents, as well.

[Source: Detroit News]

One of the few problems with being the purveyors of a highly desired commodity is that people will do anything to get their hands on it, sometimes before you're willing to give it to them. Such is the case with Nissan and people importing GT-R's into Australia through the "grey-market."

A supposedly leaked memo from Nissan Australia to dealers Down Under requests that they keep an eye out for grey-market GT-Rs and to send in a tip to Nissan HQ reporting the "potential damage" and "stolen customers" that the vehicles are apparently causing. While we understand that Nissan is trying to protect sales, the fact remains that if the GT-R was obtained through legal means, there's not much they can do about it. And we highly doubt that many of Nissan's potential customers are going to go through the hassle of importing a GT-R when sales are expected to being in the early part of 2009.

[Source: GTRBlog]