Saying that you’ve got the fastest street-legal naturally aspirated small-block anything in Australia that can still wear plates and drive on the street is a statement, indeed. The anti-hot rodding stance that most of the governments have taken in the land down under would have normally relegated a car like Alon Vella’s 1971 Ford Capri to club plates or to the trailer. And that would be a damn shame indeed, as the little emerald-colored Ford is a beast! This is a car that is consistently in the upper eight-second range, is neat as a pin and is as angry as an annoyed lion. About as loud as one, too…the 450-cube Windsor screams in the upper end of the RPM range and puts down power consistently enough that Vella has won Street Machine’s Drag Challenge Weekend’s Radial Aspirated (N/A) class four times running. Green doesn’t mean go, it means gone, long gone!
What a relief!
I automatically assumed this little green gem would be Chevy powered but it seems that unlike their American counterparts Aussie hot rodders believe in Ford power for Fords – but I’d like to know how they managed to get 450 cubes from a 351 Windsor.
Dart block.
I presume that it’s a tall deck 454? Has to be a very serious build to put out HP needed to run those times. I actually owned a US version (Mercury) of the car back in the 70’s. I think it was a 1974 (?) with the V6 and a four speed. It wasn’t that fast but was a real hoot to drive. Especially taking it up into the mountains on ski days. I can’t imagine that little car with 800-900 HP!