The owner of this Australian Falcon Ute refers to it as a 1990 XF model, but that’s doing the car a real disservice. How can I be so sure? A quick look at the supplied photos and description made me fairly sure that this was wrong, and decoding the VIN confirms this as being a 1995 Ford Falcon XG Ute, and that is a really positive thing for the next owner. While the vehicles look very similar, there are some pretty major differences between the XF and the XG. This is a model that I have plenty of hands-on experience with. My daily driver for the past 8-years has been a 1995 Falcon XG Ute. This Falcon is located in Moreno Valley, California, and is listed for sale here on eBay.
Confusing the XF and XG models of the Falcon can be quite easy, as there is not a lot of difference in the physical appearance between the two. Apart from the side repeater lights, the 4.0 badges on the front fenders, and the body-side moldings, the most obvious difference is the grille. The one fitted to this vehicle is the XF grille, as the XG grille is a single-slot unit with a Ford badge in the center. The basic body of the Falcon Ute was a long-lived item, having first seen the light of day with the release of the Falcon XD in 1979. The exterior of the car only received some fairly minor cosmetic changes between then and when this car rolled off the line in 1995. The body of this particular vehicle looks pretty reasonable. The most commonly damaged part of the vehicle is the tail-gate, and this car is no exception. These are actually pretty easy to repair, although in Australia you can still purchase brand new panels, and these can be easily shipped to the USA.
The interior of the Falcon looks quite tidy. The cloth seat upholstery is fairly hard-wearing, and the seat on this one looks good. The dash also looks to be in good condition, and from what I can see, so do the door trims. The weakest point inside a Falcon Ute is the headliner. This is a padded cloth item that is glued to a hard card base. Heat and time will cause the glue and foam to fail, and the cloth can fall down around your ears. This is actually a surprisingly easy fix, and this is definitely something that I’ve learned from experience. If it does happen, it’s easy to replace the foam with a new piece of normal ¼” foam glued to the card, and any type of flat material (cloth or vinyl) can then be glued in place. You don’t need to get anything specially made. It’s characteristics like this that made the Falcon Ute such a success in Australia. This repair is an example of how easy these are to work on in general.
There are no engine photos with this car, which is a shame because this is the area of greatest difference between the XG and earlier models. Up until the XG was introduced, the Falcon Utes were all equipped with either a push-rod six-cylinder engine or on the earliest examples, a V8 was optional. The XG introduced a fuel-injected 4.0-liter OHC straight-six engine, which produces a rather healthy 198hp. In the XG this could be mated to either a 5-speed manual or 4-speed automatic transmission. This Ute is fitted with the 4-speed auto, which is a pretty tough unit. The transmission is electronically controlled and has a dual-mode function. In “power” mode, the shift points are moved further up the engine’s rev range, which is a great assistance when towing heavy loads…and these will tow pretty decent loads. I used to regularly tow loads of around 2-tons with mine, which it did easily. The driving experience in an XG Ute is also quite pleasant, as they are fitted with power steering as standard, along with 4-wheel power disc brakes. The owner says that this XG runs and drives well.
The Ford Falcon XG Ute is a really great car. They are comfortable, the engine produces good power, and they are notoriously long-lived. This particular car looks like a really good one, and with a claimed 100,000 miles on the clock, it should have a lot of years of service left in it. At the time of writing, bidding has reached $1,225, but the reserve hasn’t been met. There is also a BIN option of $5,500, which still seems to be very reasonable. I’d buy it if I didn’t already own one.
Cool trucklet. Perhaps it’s titled as a ’91 to work around US restrictions on on importation.
That would turn a few heads in California, especially when there was only the driver on-board.
Like Adam said, the OHC-6 is a pretty rugged unit and I’ll add that they can be made to produce a fair amount of HP.
Being a 1995 would have made it illegal to import to the US under the 25 year rule… so if it Is really a 1995 and not a 1990, I would stay away. Wouldn’t want this to be crushed like some of those gray market defenders.
Nice ute,I have an AU2 with the same set up but LPG powered with just over 40k miles on it.
It’s an 02 model sold new in the UK in 04 by a company that was importing them alongside the sedans & wagons for builders of funeral cars until production ceased.
To American readers; are there any cars you guys see Australian importanting from USA to Oz and wonder why they bothered??
As an Australian I wonder why anyone would waste money transporting this lump of junk stateside. Uniqueness I suppose.
In Australia now these are getting hard to find, not that anyone would want one, most were used by ‘tradies’ and have had the arse bashed out of them, most of the survivors are in a sorry condition and only worth scrap value, but perhaps in time they might live again. Quality was poor on them and you always had a spare outside drivers door handle in the glove box, they always broke off at the most in-opportune moment, very poor casting, the hinges weren’t much better and the doors always sagged, so much so you had to lift them into place to close them, the sedans and wagons weren’t any better!
There have been a few Australians that have been critical of these old utes, but maybe their experience has been different to mine. This is my ’95 model. She’s got 300,000km (186,000 miles) on the clock. The hood and tailgate have been repainted (stone-chips on the hood, tailgate dropped onto the tow hitch). I’ve replaced a faulty coil, a faulty fuel pump, and a shift solenoid in the transmission. Both door handles are original, and the alloy “hopper-stopper” on the front was installed after I hit a kangaroo returning home with the race car one night after a race meeting. It gets regularly serviced and properly maintained, and on regular highway runs, it returns 28mpg. It’s as tight as a drum.
Nice ute Adam, not too many ‘good’ ones left these days, usually all the ones I see on a daily basis are as scruffy as hell, rarely you might see a good one in a car show etc. but they’re few and far between these days, the Holden utes are the same, either close to perfect or close to scrap, beaten to hell and gone, the same with the early Dodge utes. I suppose it can only get better as they get older. Not being the ‘family’ type vehicle they weren’t as popular, more of a work horse, so not as well looked after.
Thanks for that Tony. I agree with you on the state of most of them. I bought mine specifically as a tow vehicle, but when I retired from racing I just couldn’t bear to part with it. It does get a lot of admiring comments.
This was how heavily I used to have it loaded up. It was a pretty decent load. The belly lockers on the trailer were full of tools and spares, and so was the back of the ute.
thats a sweet truck you have there Adam. looks able to pull quite a load too. I think it is awesome. a shout to you car brothers across the big pond. car brothers live all over the world.
Thanks for that Hollywood. The trailer, race car, and spares tipped the scales at just on 2 tons, but that old girl towed it with ease. I was going to sell it when I hung up the helmet, but I couldn’t part with it. I still get people commenting on how good it looks today. I put a cover over the dash and sheep-skin seat covers on the seats, and when you remove those, it looks fantastic inside as well.
Hey. Adam. Are you an aussie, originally from Newcastle ?
Is it just Me,,or is Their a Hint of a 1990″s 5.0 Mustang front end? The steering looks like a late 80’s model. Just caught my eye. Cool vehicle.
Hi Bobby BEVERIDGE, I’m pretty sure that I know who you’re talking about. I don’t hail from there, and I was nowhere near as successful in speedway as the other Adam Clarke that I believe that you are thinking of. Mind you, I wish that I had been. Thank you for asking though.
Thanks Adam. Yeah he was fairly consistent. So are you an aussie or a yank ?
He was pretty awesome in speedcars. I’m an Aussie mate. I’ve just been lucky enough to be mixed up with motorsport and classic cars for a lot of years. It’s a real passion for me, so I consider myself very fortunate to be able to write for Barn Finds.