Ford's V8 ute to die with FPV

Ford has confirmed there will be no XR8 ute when the iconic badge returns to showrooms in late 2014 as part of the final Falcon overhaul prior to the end of the Blue Oval’s local manufacturing no later than October 2016.

That means the death of the Ford Performance Vehicles (FPV) range next year will also signal the demise of the V8-powered Ford Falcon utility, a vehicle which can trace its lineage all the way back to the vehicle which is said to have created the category, original Ford ‘coupe ute’ V8 developed by Lew Bandt in Geelong and first sold in 1934.

Instead, buyers of Ford performance utes will have to turn to the turbocharged 4.0-litre XR6 Turbo – at least until the imported Mustang coupe arrives.

And anyone anticipating a power step-up for the special-edition models marking the departure of FPV will be also disappointed.

The message from inside Ford is there will be some modifications, including cosmetic updates, but no drivetrain upgrades.

The decision to only roll out a sedan version of the XR8 is simply a matter of economics, Ford Public Affairs Director Sinead Phipps told motoring.com.au.

“We’ve decided that the V8 ute market is so small that we are just going to concentrate on the sedan,” she said.

The ute market has been in steady decline for some years, with 8686 Falcons and Holden VF utes sold so far in 2013. The Holden, in which V8 sales account for nearly 50 per cent of volume, has claimed 4782 of those sales.

The XR8 ute was first launched in 1999 as part of the AU Falcon range. It was powered by a 5.0-litre pushrod V8 engine that produced 185kW and 412Nm.

By the time the FG XR8 ute was retired in September 2011 it was powered by the Boss 5.4-litre DOHC V8 and produced 290kW and 520Nm.

That left FPV to offer the only V8 ute in the Ford line-up, the GS, which produce 315kW and 545Nm from its supercharged ‘Miami’ 5.0-litre engine.

The question now is which version of the supercharged V8 will power the returned XR8 sedan – the 315kW GS engine or the 335kW version currently offered with the FPV GT and GT-P sedans.

That’s an important detail Ford is yet to reveal, and nor has it confirmed whether FPV’s 310KW F6 version of the locally-built turbocharged 4.0-litre inline engine will survive in some form.

Phipps said Ford announced the end of FPV and the return of XR8 so early because it wanted to give people time to plan their purchases.

But it is also understood that Ford decided to pre-empt leaks that were almost certainly bound to start as the dealer ordering process of FPV’s special models began.

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