ECOnetic Falcon?

The news back in January that Ford has secured funding for the 2014 Falcon was long on promotion, but short on technical details.

Ford remains tight-lipped about the specifications for the new car, but Sinead Phipps, the company's Public Affairs Director, has confirmed it won't be Euro 5-compliant from launch; it will have to be tweaked for the emissions standard if it's to continue in production beyond 2016.

"[Euro 5] comes in for new vehicles in 2014, but for all vehicles it's not until 2016," Phipps told motoring.com.au. 'New' in this context refers to vehicles that are introduced to the market for the first time in 2014, as opposed to a new generation model bearing an existing nameplate — as the Falcon will be.

"It won't be what we would consider an all-new vehicle; it will be an update — and a significant portion of it will be directed towards fuel efficiency improvements, but it won't be to make the engine Euro 5 compliant, at that stage," Phipps continued.

Ford has already confirmed the 2014 Falcon will offer improved aerodynamic qualities, lower rolling-resistance tyres and a new six-speed transmission to reduce CO2 emissions by 5.3 per cent. The company has not been forthcoming about any other changes for the sake of fuel efficiency, but Phipps offered the analogy of the Fiesta ECOnetic as a way Ford might holistically upgrade the Falcon for lower fuel use and cleaner running.

"There are lots of things you can do that are more incremental improvements, rather than one big drastic change. Just look at the Fiesta ECOnetic... When you add up all the different things that were part of that vehicle, it got to a point where it was very fuel-efficient, but there was not one single stand-out technology — such as a hybrid, for example, that you could hang your hat on. It was just a combination of a number of things.

"Fuel efficiency improvements are one of the targets of that program, but we haven't put a number on what they're going to be yet. The product development team is going through that work now and setting up their targets and setting up their engineering plans to get to targets, but it's far too soon for us to go into those details.

Holden is understood to have the Commodore on a crash diet for its next iteration and Ford seems likely to follow suit with the Falcon. Indeed, Ford has already confirmed that among the changes mooted for the new Falcon will be those aimed at improving the car's crash safety. That signals significant structural changes, which would allow the latitude to lighten the car as well as make it stronger. A lower kerb mass would benefit the EcoBoost four-cylinder variants in particular.

Depending on the commercial success of the EcoBoost engine, from its introduction later this month, it may represent the best chance for the Falcon to remain in production beyond 2016... but possibly at the expense of the Geelong-built inline six.

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