There were Ford Fairmonts before the Fox body. They look an awful lot like Mad Max’s Pursuit Special and are not common in the United States. In fact, I’ve personally only seen one, ever in the sheetmetal. Fairmont was an upscaled trim level for the Falcon, one that brought better interiors and different exterior lights. Otherwise, it’s the Falcon that you already know about, which means that it’s now super-desirable, super-expensive to acquire, and in the right hands, capable of pure witchcraft. In the case of Paul Hamilton’s machine, that witchcraft has been brewing for a couple of decades. His daily driver for years, he had built it into a drag car and originally was running the car naturally aspirated, but on the 2017 Drag Challenge event, one of the roller lifters siezed up and to save the rest of the mill, bowed out on the first day. It was about the same time that the first musing of going turbocharged was heard…and it was no mere threat.
The engine is a 600ci mill that is set up for twin Garrett GTX45 turbochargers, Haltech management, and plenty of rubber hanging out of the back to manage the head of steam that kind of kit creates once the Powerglide dictates how fast the prop shaft spins. And it’s not gentle about it’s work in any fashion…the goal is a seven-second time slip, and that looks likely once the Fairmont’s suspension gets dialed in. Meantime, this is a car that has to be driven with care!
worth mentioning too that this is a street driven car, this was part of Drag Challenge ( sorta like Drag Week but in Australia, saw 40+ Degrees C heat and pissing down rain)