Now in its sixth year, the ‘Australian of the Year’ award has been announced by the country’s performance-car industry this Australia Day.
1971 – Ron Harrop – Harrop’s Howler FJ Holden.
The Australian Performance Automotive Council (APAC) has named Ron Harrop the industry’s ‘2024 Australian of the Year’.
Arguably best known to younger generations as the man behind Harrop Engineering – the firm responsible for making fast Holdens and Fords even faster – Ron Harrop got his start in motorsports through the family business, machining and fabricating parts for Norm Beechey and Bob Jane in the late 1960s.
While Harrop Engineering continued to supply equipment to Harry Firth and the Holden Dealer Team in the 1970s, Ron competed at Bathurst in HDT cars in the 1970s, hanging up his helmet to focus on the business in 1986.
Ron eventually became chief engineer for the Holden Racing Team in 1994, seeing the team through a golden era until his departure five years later.
Harrop Engineering would continue on to become an OEM supplier of parts to Holden and Ford – and their performance subsidiaries HSV and FPV – as well as providing performance parts to car companies such as Toyota and Lotus.
While his son Tim continues to take the family business to new heights, Ron has taken on the job of historian to ensure future generations can learn of Australia’s engineering feats in the performance-car industry.
“Ron Harrop has made the Australian performance automotive industry a respected world leader and we congratulate and thank him for his foresight and sheer dedication to our country’s automotive industry and acknowledge his achievements with the [APAC’s] ‘Australian of the Year’ award 2024,” the council said in a written statement.
A Spanish car brand owned by Volkswagen may now be poised to add a new electric car to its line-up later this decade, after it was marked for death late last year amid sliding sales.
Seat Mii.
Volkswagen-owned Spanish car maker Seat – sold in Australia from 1995 to 1997 – may be thrown a lifeline with a new electric car rather than meet its demise by the end of the decade, according to a new report.
Last year the Seat car marque was in line to be phased out – and turned into a maker of mopeds and e-scooters – amid declining sales, and the growth of its more profitable Cupra sibling brand.
Now a report from the UK’s Autocar claims it may be saved from death with a new entry-level model based on Volkswagen’s upcoming ID.1 electric city car.
It was previously expected there would be no more new Seat cars after the current models reach the end of their life cycles, due in the next few years.
Seat and Cupra UK boss Marcus Gossen told the publication Seat “will have a car in five years’ time”, and that “we’re working hard to have the right entry level for the [Volkswagen] Group, and the lead for that is Seat SA in Spain.”
The executive’s comments are carefully worded, as the Seat SA organisation also includes Cupra – which is known to be taking the lead on the VW Group’s new electric city car projects – and there is a chance the life cycles of the brand’s current cars may be extended to last for another five years.
Autocar claims Seat could gain a version of the upcoming Volkswagen ID.1, due in 2027 as the company’s entry-level electric vehicle priced from about £20,000 ($AU38,600).
This ID.1 will be smaller than the Polo-sized ID.2 – which will be twinned with the Cupra Raval, with development of both cars led by Cupra – but is expected to share many components with the larger hatch, including a shortened version of Volkswagen’s front-wheel drive MEB Entry platform.
If a Seat version of the ID.1 becomes a reality, Autocar speculates it would be cheaper than the Volkswagen – and represent the entry point into the entire VW Group range – given the Seat brand is positioned below Volkswagen within the Group.
“There’s no statement about [an electric] product for Seat today. There’s always room for dreams,” said Mr Gossen. “With the ID.1, you only make it work by sharing [technology].”
The ID.1 will be the indirect replacement for the Volkswagen e-Up, which was also sold with Seat badges as the Mii prior to 2021 (pictured top of story).
Cupra’s entry-level electric model will be called the Raval, but it will share its underpinnings and footprint with the larger ID.2.
After being acquired from the Spanish government in 1986 by the Volkswagen Group, Seat began selling lower-cost vehicles based on Volkswagen underpinnings, something it continues to do in almost 40 countries, including New Zealand.
In Australia, Seat re-entered the market in 2022, under the guise of its performance-oriented off-shoot Cupra.
The Cupra Ateca and Cupra Leon are high-performance variants of vehicles which Seat sells in international markets with the same name. The Cupra Formentor and Born are exclusive to Cupra, though the latter is based on the VW ID.3.
The German automaker is reportedly planning to save more than $AU16.2 billion by 2026 with the introduction of a new cost-saving program.
Volkswagen is planning to save a reported €10 billion ($AU16.2 billion) by introducing a new cost-cutting program – dubbed the ‘Accelerate Forward/ Road to 6.5’ – which will see the development time of new vehicles slashed from 50 months to 36 months.
According to the German automaker, the savings initiative aims to generate a 6.5 per cent return on sales by 2026 and will see a restructure in the brand’s “administration, technical development, material costs, products, price/mix, vehicle constructions as well as sales and quality”.
Volkswagen has previously mentioned the development, design and engineering of a new vehicle normally took more than four years – and the car manufacturer claims this move was made in part to introduce new models faster into the market “without sacrificing quality or safety”.
As part of the program, Volkswagen plans to reduce the number of test vehicles during the technical development period by 50 per cent – which could potentially save the German brand approximately €400 million ($AU647.6 million)
Volkswagen management claims “workforce reduction measures” are in place during the cost-cutting initiative and will reportedly see a hiring freeze as well as partial retirement offered to employees born in 1967 or 1968, or for severely handicapped employees.
The German automaker projects the program will generate earnings of up to €4 billion ($AU6.4 billion) as early as 2024.
Other measures in the savings initiative include “improved procurement services” which the company projects to generate an annual savings of more than €320 million ($AU518.2 million) – an unspecified “enhanced after-sales business” which it claims will earn more than €250 million ($AU408 million) for the brand yearly – and further optimisation of production times allegedly saving the company more than €200 million ($AU323 million) annually.
The Active Air Skirt is designed to add precious miles to an electric car’s driving range – or enable it to go faster…
Hyundai and Kia have applied to patent the Active Air Skirt (AAS), a device helping extend electric vehicle range by allowing a car to slip more easily through the air.
The AAS directs moving air from below the car’s front bumper to the wheel arches, reducing under-vehicle turbulence while at speeds above 80km/h.
It uses a pair of moving flaps, which cannot be seen under normal circumstances, to cover the front tyres according to vehicle speed.
The flaps retract to their original position – exposing the front tyres – when sensors detect wind resistance against the vehicle is stronger than the car’s forward motion.
The system operates at 80km/h or above, but won’t retract until 70km/h, the different speeds are intended to reduce frequent opening and closing as speed changes.
The benefits, says the joint Hyundai and Kia statement, include greater electric battery range and improved stability meaning less power is needed to move the vehicle forward. Data shows a 2.8 per cent improvement in aerodynamic efficiency.
Tests in the Genesis GV60 – Genesis being the luxury Hyundai Motor Group’s luxury brand – show the AAS system added around six kilometres to
the GV60’s official 466km range.
The device only covers the front tyres – not the entire vehicle’s front – as the Hyundai/Kia E-GMP (Electric Global Modular Platform) floor used by the GV60 is already flat, making it highly efficient at controlling airflow.
The EGMP also underpins the Hyundai Ioniq 5 and Ioniq 6 as well as the Kia EV5 and EV6 electric cars.
Further benefits of the AAS include reduced wind noise – especially critical for car makers to control in electric cars given the lack of engine noise.
While an energy-saving device, the AAS can also deliver benefits to high-performance driving, functioning at up to 200km/h. It provides an increase in downforce – the air pushing the car to the ground – to improve traction, also meaning faster cornering speeds.
This also means better stability at higher speeds, the statement says.
Many car makers have used moving components to improve airflow – known as ‘active aerodynamics’ – but Hyundai and Kia say they are focussed on such technology as an effective way to enhance electric vehicle capability.
The AAS is one of a number of aerodynamic experiments being undertaken by Hyundai and Kia, who are looking into air flaps, wheel air curtains and wheel gap reducers.
The category will also allow the car maker to experiment and develop its new ‘N performance parts’ to suit electric cars, showcased by the Hyundai N NXP1 concept car.
In a speech to industry executives, Toyota Chairman Akio Toyoda predicted the global new-car market for electric vehicles will be limited.
The chairman of Toyota predicts electric vehicles will only ever make up 30 per cent of global new-car sales.
Akio Toyoda, chairman and former CEO of Toyota, told the audience at a business event he believes hybrid, hydrogen fuel-cell, and hydrogen combustion engines will form the other 70 per cent of the market, according to company magazine Toyota Times.
Mr Toyoda said the solution to “climb the mountain of carbon neutrality is related to each country’s energy situation”.
“However, one billion people around the world live in areas without electricity. In the case of Toyota, we also supply vehicles to these regions, so a single [battery-electric vehicle] option cannot provide transportation for everyone,” he said in the translated speech.
“That’s why I try to have a variety of options [within Toyota’s line-up].”
Toyota has faced criticism from environmental groups in recent years for resisting the industry trend to move its entire model line-up to electric – instead insisting on continuing to develop hybrid and hydrogen technologies alongside electric vehicles.
“No matter how much progress [battery-electric vehicles] make, I think they will still only have a 30 per cent market share,” Mr Toyoda said.
“Then, the remaining 70 per cent will be [hybrid-electric vehicles], [hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles], and hydrogen engines. And I think [internal-combustion] engine cars will definitely remain.”
Mr Toyoda added that he believed the split would be driven by buyers, rather than “regulatory values or political power”.
“Japan has its own way of doing things. I don’t think the correct answer is to try to imitate the West in everything. I believe that if we continue to be chosen by the market and customers, the future will definitely change.”
The state-owned Mumtalakat Holding Company is reportedly on the brink of acquiring the Surrey automaker.
Bahrain’s state-owned investment fund Mumtalakat Holding Company is reportedly gaining full control of the McLaren Group.
According to a report from Sky News, the sovereign wealth fund will become McLaren’s sole shareholder once the deal is announced.
A reported 20 per cent stake in the company is changing hands as part of this deal, which would leave the Bahrain fund as the sole shareholder of the Woking-based automaker.
In late 2022, Mumtalakat owned a 60 per cent stake in the McLaren Group and reportedly invested a further $US101 million in early 2023.
McLaren has faced pandemic-related supply issues for a number of years, forcing the company to liquidate assets.
The brand first sold off its Surrey headquarters in April 2021, for $US240 million, while remaining as its tenant for the next two decades.
To secure funds for the development of the Artura supercar, McLaren sold off a number of its heritage collection in 2022.
Mumtalakat reportedly paid $US126 million pounds for an undisclosed group of vehicles which is said to have included a Formula One championship car.
In January 1998, then Drive editor Phil Scott primed Australians for the imminent invasion to our shores of big American pick-up trucks
Story by Phil Scott originally published in Drive on 25 January, 1998.
Quick quiz: January 16 (1998) marked the 50th birthday of the largest-selling vehicle in history. Can you name it?
Here’s a clue: as American as a Big Mac with fries, it’s as big as all-Texas and ranks right up there with Levi’s and Coke as an icon of American culture.
For sales achievement, as well as sheer stature, this vee-hickle dwarfs the world’s biggest-selling cars, the Beetle, the Mini and the Model T.
It’s the Ford F-Series pick-up truck and it’s being primed for sale in Australia next year.
Big, blunt-nosed and chromey, with the emphasis on under-bonnet cubic inches, the F-Series has outsold every rival ‘truck’ – and car – in North America for the past 16 years.
Since 1948, 26 million have been sold – quite a few without shotgun racks on the rear parcel shelf.
Where it all began, a 1948 Ford F-3 pick-up
The F-Series is visible proof Americans haven’t downsized. The Toyota Camry may be the biggest-selling car in the US, but the F-Series pick-up outsells it nearly two to one.
Cars have fallen behind so far, they now account for little more than half the market. Ford and Chrysler sell more trucks than cars in North America.
For bulk, even the baby of Ford’s range, the F-150, makes a Mitsubishi Pajero 4WD look demure. In turn, the F-150 is a mere shadow compared with the Chevrolet Suburban.
This nine-seater Chevy blocks out the sun. Against the tape measure it outdoes even the US military’s Hummer to claim the title of World’s Biggest Four-Wheel Drive.
The Suburban arrives in Australia next month – wearing a Holden badge.
For both Ford and General Motors, importing the big American iron is an experiment. The continuing truck boom (which includes 4WD wagons as well as pick-up trucks) has brought bumper profits in the US, where fuel costs a buck a gallon, roughly 45¢ a litre in Australian currency.
Test marketing these monster trucks makes sense, although our sagging dollar and more expensive fuel weigh heavily. Australians show a distinct preference for big, grunty cars and big, grunty Japanese four-wheel drives.
For those buyers, fuel economy doesn’t seem to matter, so why not XXXL American monster trucks?
North America’s obsession with the things grows weirder and bigger by the day. Consider the accessories. Sales of platinum grille ornaments, neon licence plate frames, big chrome wheels and other decorative stuff amounted to $7.5 billion last year. This is up 45 per cent, according to the Detroit News.
My favourite truck story occurred at an international media conference to launch the F-150 in Detroit.
“Three thangs a man needs,” a good ol’ boy drawled from the big screen, “are the Good Lord, a good woman… and a good pick-up truck.”
Stunned silence followed before the international audience roared and fell about, leaving the hosts perplexed.
Dang, the man in the string tie and Stetson was only statin’ the obvious.
The numbers truly are so big they’re causing an outbreak of what the Detroit trade press calls “truck anxiety”. The Big Three are now so dependent on trucks for profit they fear any form of backlash.
Recent articles in the New York Times have them rattled. The paper has been scathing in its attacks on big trucks as profligate users of fuel and gross polluters. They have easier smog rules to meet than those applying to cars.
The fear in Detroit is that social conscience may render the big truck era as redundant as tail fins, whitewalls and chrome spinner hubcaps.
Earlier this month, Ford announced all its 1998 model trucks would be re-engineered to cut smog emissions by half, entitling them to be classified as Low Emission Vehicles.
For now, that move seems like an overreaction. Where trucks accounted for 30 per cent of North American vehicle sales a decade ago, last year it was 46 per cent and rising.
Last year, about 750,000 F-Series found new homes as the American truck market, fuelled by cheap petrol, roared to its fifth successive record.
Toyota is building a copycat US-style truck, the T-100, in an effort to compete. Mercedes-Benz, which makes the M-Class off-road vehicle in Alabama, has also given serious consideration to making a Benz-branded pick-up in the same factory.
But, why?
The stereotype Texan remains a big truck buyer but the boom long ago bypassed its rural, redneck origins.
Last year 90 per cent of pick-up trucks were sold to private buyers. Only one-third used them for any sort of work and just 13 per cent bought pick-ups purely to earn a living.
“The old demographic stereotypes are obsolete,” says Ford’s strategic marketing analyst Joel Pitcoff. “They’re commonplace in the driveways of suburban subdivisions.”
The majority of today’s US truck owners have some college education, with a quarter holding degrees. Nearly half are employed in professional, technical or managerial positions.
Surprise, surprise, nearly all of them are blokes, mostly in their 40s.
These well-heeled suburbanites own a fleet of vehicles: the majority have three or more and nearly one third own at least four!
Ford estimates owners buy about $1600 worth of bits to customise their trucks. Lighted running boards, tray liners, painted headlight covers, strobe lights, air horns – the usual gumpf.
Hell, you can order your F-150 with a choice of five separate V8 engines. But if the F-150 is a little too effete then step right up (literally) to an F-Series Super Duty, an F-250 or F-350.
No longer the workhorse, more the urban combat vehicle, Ford’s super-selling pick-up truck was bought in lieu of a passenger car by an astonishing 160,000 Americans last year. To put those numbers into perspective, 160,000 car “defectors” to the F-150 represent the combined total of Falcon and Commodore sales in Australia.
Will Australians warm to this imminent American landing? The next two years will tell. Meanwhile, Chrysler is giving its plans plenty of thought.
The outfit that enjoyed such spectacular success in Australia selling its Jeep brand has a bumper truck catalogue with macho names such as Ram (an eight-litre V10 with a nose like a Mack truck), Durango and Dakota (roll the sound-track from The Magnificent Seven) and its latest whopper, the simply named Big Red Truck.
Subtle? No way!
Notes from Detroit
Collector’s edition
Ford is selling collectible toy models of its 50th anniversary pick-up trucks not just through dealers and hobby shops but via mail-order catalogues and the QVC shopping network. They’ll get the five-truck boxed set. Wal-Mart, Kmart and Toys ‘R’ Us will market do-it-yourself models.
A recent Tonka Toy F-150 sold out in a blink. The craze even has its own magazine: Toy Trucker And Contractor. Only in America …
Chrome is good
To Australian eyes it might look like a Louisville interstate semi but in the US the Lincoln Navigator, a behemoth weighing twice as much as a Commodore wagon, is the hot ticket. Powered by a 5.4-litre V8, the Navigator is setting sales records.
Purple prose
“The rugged landscape of Utah’s red-rock canyon country is a place that separates the men from the boys… the contenders from the pretenders… the thoroughbreds from the also-rans.”
Chevrolet puts another cliche or two on the barbie in a brochure to launch its new Silverado pick-up trucks at the Detroit Show. A cowboy on a horse did the motor show honours, with free neckerchiefs for the media. The Italians were mightily amused.
Loaded
There’s nothing basic about GMC’s Yukon Denali full-size pick-up trucks. No sir! We’re talking heated leather seats, Bose sound systems and on-board satellite navigation – presumably for those cowboys born under a wanderin’ star.
So, what happened next?
Australia did end up on the receiving end of a range of F-Series pick-up trucks, with both the larger F-250 and F-350 arriving on our shores in 2001. Strangely, missing in action from our local line-up was the more compact F-150 which, you have to imagine, would have been the volume seller in Australia.
Still, when Ford in US was selling every single F-150 it could make in any given year, it’s little wonder there remained a reluctance to sacrifice all those fat American profits for a few right-hand drive models on a far-flung outpost.
Australian-delivered F-350
Aussie buyers, while not embracing the larger F-250 and F-350 pick-ups, did buy them in sufficient quantities to ensure they remained available for around five or six years. At their peak, Ford sold 2480 of its pair of Yankee load-luggers in 2002, their first full year on sale.
By the time sales dwindled to a trickle, total sales in Australia for the six years from 2001-07 across both models ran to just under 9000, not a bad return on investment for the Blue Oval.
This year marks the return of the F-Series truck to Australia, with Ford Australia importing the best-selling F-150 and tasking the conversion of left- to right-hand drive to Melbourne-based RMA Automotive. But local sales hit a roadblock earlier this month, with Ford Australia pausing deliveries and issuing a stop-sale notice while a suspected fault related to the turbocharger is investigated.
Ford’s entry into the market with its F-150 (pictured above) comes on the back of customer demand for larger pick-up trucks, with Ram and Chevrolet posting sales too large to ignore. Toyota has followed suit, bringing its full-size Tundra pick-up Down Under in a bid to capture a slice of the large pick-up truck pie.
None of this has gone unnoticed with the general public, sparking debate about the appropriateness of American pick-up trucks in Australia.
But despite the unease amongst certain sections of the public, it’s the buyers who have spoken, snapping up the American creations in ever-bigger numbers. It’s clear, American pick-up trucks are here to stay. RM
Have your say, should Australians embrace these larger style pick-up trucks or are our dual-cab utes already big enough? Let us know in the comments below.
