Browse over 9,000 car reviews

Four-cylinder Falcon fast track

The new Falcon four will be the greenest large family car available in Australia when it hits the road in 2011.

The engine investment secures the jobs of the company's Broadmeadows and Geelong workers.

The new Falcon four will be the greenest large family car available in Australia when it hits the road in 2011. It is one of three new engines planned for the locally made Falcon and Territory. All three engines are part of Ford's global EcoBoost engine strategy announced in the United States earlier this week.

Apart from the four-cylinder, the Falcon will also get a hi-tech dedicated LPG six-cylinder engine from next July and the Territory will get a turbodiesel in 2011. But because of the decision, Ford Australia has axed plans to build the Focus small car at Broadmeadows. Focus production was due to start from 2011.

However, Ford Australia president, Marin Burela, said no jobs would be lost and the EcoBoost plan would provide jobs stability. Burela said the global financial crisis had made local Focus production unviable and it would have been unprofitable.

"The economic climate has changed," he said. "To make a small car viable in this country we needed to bring the most competitive levels of opportunities with that vehicle. "After studying it there was no appropriate way of producing the vehicle locally."

The Federal Government will contribute $42 million to Ford's engine plan under its Green Car Innovation Fund as part of its $6.2 billion investment package for the local car industry. The Victorian Government has also contributed an unnamed amount.

Industry Minister Senator Kim Carr and the federal secretary of the AMWU vehicle division, Ian Jones, welcomed the decision.

"It is an investment in confidence," Jones said. "The workers have been praying for this for some time."

Carr said the investment came at a time when the world was going through the worst recession in 100 years.

"The global car industry is going through the most radical shake-up in living memory and in this environment the Australian industry is attracting new investment," he said. "The green car fund has given this industry certainty."

Burela said the EcoBoost four cylinder would have the same performance but better economy and lower greenhouse emissions than an equivalent six-cylinder engine. It will be sold side-by-side with the Falcon six.

Ford will source the four-cylinder engine abroad while the existing Falcon six will continue to be built at Ford's Geelong engine plant. The turbodiesel will also be sourced from overseas.

Last November, Ford renewed its commitment to the six-cylinder Falcon engine in place of an imported V6 engine.