OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums General Discussion Forum Off Topics The Last Falcon !

Hi all,

What a disappointment it is that tomorrow the 7th of October the last "Ford Falcon" will come off the end of the Broadmeadows line. Also will be the last Territory in silver. (see photo's below)

It's only fitting that it will be a Blue one. This is so sad for Australian manufacturing.





Along with the last Falcon tomorrow, in the State of South Australia the Last "Holden Cruze" will come off the end of the Elizabeth assembly line marking the beginning of the end for GMH which will stick it out until the end of next year as they want to celebrate a particular milestone for the company next October (12 months from now)then they'll continue on until Christmas Break Up. It will be interesting what the last model vehicle will be to come off that line, Caprice, Calais or just a normal Commodore ?

Still not sure how much after that point in time that Toyota will call it quits.

Honestly can we all see ourselves driving around in Haval's in the near future, well not this little black duck that's for sure. I'll still be driving around in my vintage VS Calais for many years to come.

Roll on Bathurst !

Cheers,
BB.

PS. Below are a couple of shots of the last Falcon ute in white that rolled off a couple of months ago now.

And our immigration program is going gang busters with nothing for them to do, factories closing down every day and it is all the little ones that you never hear about, take away food shops etc that feed off these factories in the area, they shut down and 4/5 people loose their jobs and they don't even rate a mention

Who can blame the manufacturers when you take a close look at the ridiculous demands of the unions that care about nothing more than how much they can line the pockets of their bosses and the workers can go on the dole queue.

Trev, unions may contribute a bit, but without them people would be completely exploited, just look at the countries that are now doing all the manufacturing for not much more than a bowl of rice a day. The problem is that the cost of living in Aus is just too expensive driven mostly by the cost of housing, and regardless of union demands most younger people these days working for wages will never be able to buy a house. I heard this morning that every Falcon that rolled off the line over the last few years, it cost the government $7000 in bail out funding

The way I look at it all it's like a chain and a link is missing. If all the jobs go overseas who will have the money to buy anything ? then if there's nothing bought then the companies fold. Yes and why keep bringing in more so called refugees that are not interested in working but rather get walked through the Centrelink system after closing time so we don't see a thing.
Just what this country needs eh ? and the people that have contributed to this once great country are treated like crims when they apply for any sort of hand out in a time of need. Our wonderful governments just keep saying, "just get a job". It'd be nice if we could all double dip like the pollies do and be able to collect a pension when they retire, but are still able to work as a high paid consultant without it affecting their gold card benefits. Cumon, get real and set an example, and not a bad one.

It's all the trend of us becoming a banana republic with no middle class just the ultra rich and the ultra poor, and we well and truly know what the rich do to the poor.

Norm, there wouldn't have been any need to bail out each vehicle by $7000 if the unions had allowed productivity improvements instead of demanding things like one union supervisor for every three workers, that did no work on the line, just stood around and watched so they could call a strike if the wrong person picked up someones spanner, an extra 2 weeks paid "union training leave" or some such name, can't remember exactly what they called it, and casuals couldn't be hired or fired without the union approval at times when demand went up and down as is normal in vehicle production. Go back and look how Toyota tried to negotiate a better deal and were screwed over. I wonder why they are still here at all. And when Holden got it's bailout funds from Rudd/Gillard/Rudd, that was supposed to ensure they stayed producing, the money all ended up in union pockets. And that tired old, if not for unions we would all be exploited story is rubbish. If you don't like your pay and conditions, don't work for them. There are more than enough avenues for people to pursue unfair workplaces these days without union bosses raking in big fat salaries and crying about "poor workers."

Spot on. But think about all the jobs that are being destroyed or prevented by "environmental groups" and red tape. There are multi billion dollar projects being dragged through the court over and over again but the court won't award damages against these vandals so as soon as they have lost one round they start another under a different guise. And even if they do award damages, the groups just laugh at the courts and never pay anyway and nothing is done about them.

BB I was discussing this with a Com Bank manager a couple of weeks ago at a bbq, he has a woman from an African country who comes in every fortnight and pulls out $5000 in Centrelink benefits and the only words she utters is "give me" as she pushes her paperwork at him. He has to be so careful as to what he says

Yes why do we always pander to minority groups, go overseas to the Middle East and see how well they would look after us.
The best way is to look after ones self.

Cheers,
BB.

Yes as a Ford man and always having a Falcon or Fairmont (or 2) in my driveway.I must admit a little piece of me has died today.Damn those bloody Japanese etc cars.I guess I'll just have to always have an older car.I just prefer to have something that was build in this great land of aus.I give a massive


To all those poeple that worked hard and gave us some great motor cars.
I just hope they can find something else in life to help support them and their familys.
Good luck all.

G'day all,

Personally, I'm a Holden bloke! But the point remains the same.

I've been watching that documentary about John Howard and Menzies. I'm reminded that back when the FX Holden came out it was a thing of national pride. We could produce a car on our own. Not only that but soon after we proved we could do stuff on the scale of the snowy mountains scheme. The worlds people wanted to be here. We were proving to ourselves that we had grown up as a nation.

I get the ideology that says that vehicle manufacturing is commercial and must stand on its own two feet without tariffs or government intervention. Unfortunately this logic is completely undone if we spent a massive (billions and billions) of dollars to position a submarine contract in south Aus specifically to offset the downturn caused by the collapse of vehicle manufacturing. Might as well have supported the car industry instead. And this doesn't help the folks in Broadmeadows etc either.

I heard a statistic this morning that one third of folks already laid off were unemployed with nothing on the horizon. Heartfelt thoughts to them.

Vale the Austalian vehicle industry and best wishes to those involved

An otherwise ordinary doco that was startling in emphasising Menzies view
to promoting Australian manufacturing and the affordability of housing.

How things have changed ... and the party he founded bears no resemblance
to the party that carries that name today.

The economist gurus of Hayek and Freedman, and their apostles of Thatcher
and Reagan, ushered in a new world order of laissez faire economics,
where 'globalisation' was the mantra chanted and sung throughout the
Western world. The idea was simple in its audacity: let capital move
to where it may be employed most efficiently. Labour would be
rewarded by the magic trickle-down effect. What nonsense!

It is pertinent to say that Australia's lawnmower industry began
because of successive government protectionist policies. It was about
'Nation building'. It was doubly pertinent that this occurred at the
height of the Australian Great Depression in the early 1930s.

I feel domestic politics needs to re-assert itself (over international)
and the priority for any government must be the looking after of its own
citizens and workers, its young and old, the poor, sick, and disadvantaged.

All very sad.
------------------------
Jack

Jack after the war Australia and the rest of the world was on a massive growth and expansion program. New technology was bringing new products that people could afford and to produce these things Australia needed a workforce to do all these things. Times have now changed but we are still bringing in people knowing full well there will never be any chance of them finding work apart from the governments placing them in jobs they "create" in government departments. Sad but we have been lucky enough to have lived through the best period in history for Australia, future generations will suffer badly I'm afraid

Hi all,


I've said all along what the following video (link below) brings to light to us and that it's actually the manufacturers fault as they just didn't want to change and always thought that here in Australia fads would come and go but if they stuck it out then all would be good.................wrong !

When did we ever make a successful 4 cylinder in large masses that people would embrace ?, when did we ever make a successful SUV that the people would embrace ?

This is rather well displayed back in the early 1970's when the Japanese were starting to bring in 4 cylinder cars with bucket seats, 4 speed floorshift, Carpet, radio, 3 speed fan assisted heater, floor mounted handbrake that wasn't shoulder breaking, disc brakes on the front, high beam stalk on the steering column, better instrumentation, etc etc etc. and all as standard equipment mind you.

What was the Australian industry offering as standard equipment ? Bench Seat, 3 Speed Column shift gearbox, radio was optional, heater was optional until the HQ when it became standard, High beam still on the floor, idiot lights (Temp, Gen and Oil) and no gauges apart from Fuel level and Speedo, vinyl flooring. Everything else was just optional.

Many features in the current Commodores and Falcons which are considered ground breaking here have been in European cars for a number of years. Some European cars already had ABS in 1971 and it didn't come to Australia until the early 1990's

So......... who really is to blame for the industries demise, especially when overseas companies have offered better value for money to the average punter. Lets not put the V8's into this category as they only appeal to a small minority which doesn't keep the industry going.

Watch the following video and you be the judge.

[video][/video]
Source:

Cheers,
BB.