Supercar scare

The Supercar scare was a national controversy that arose in Australia in 1972 in regard to the sale to the public of high performance "homologation special" versions of Australian-built passenger cars.

Despite the popular belief of the performance motoring public of the time that focuses solely on Evan Green's 25 July 1972 headline article on proposed Australian "supercars",[1] in fact the controversy had started many years as early as 1967, as Evan Green's article was released and printed barely a week before the very last and final announcements were made by the relevant companies and authorities that ended all supercar programs.

Public complaints and government minister concerns had originally started before the Ford XR GT was even officially released in 1967, as reported by various mainstream Australian newspapers of the time.

In late 1971, well prior to the Evan Green article being published in Sydney in mid-1972, a magazine had shown a Ford Falcon GTHO Phase III being driven (legally) at over 225 km/h (140 mph) on a Victorian public highway.

Firth ran the car in Sports Sedans (fitted with front and rear spoilers) in a successful attempt to disguise that the V8 Torana was intended to be raced in the Bathurst 500 later in the year.

Two VH Valiant Chargers with 340ci engines, 4-speed manual transmissions, and heavy duty Chrysler-built rear axles were sighted briefly in a Melbourne dealership only days prior to the publishing of Evan Green's article; this pair had "disappeared" by the very next morning (Monday 26th).

The Evan Green article quoted New South Wales Transport Minister Milton Morris as saying that he was appalled at these cars - which he labelled "bullets on wheels"[1] - being sold to ordinary motorists and that "if manufacturers are making these supercars available to the general public because this is a condition of eligibility for the Bathurst 500, then I think it is imperative that race organisers closely examine their rules.

Brock reported that in testing, the first time both he and Colin Bond gave the car full acceleration, it broke the windscreen due to the V8's much greater torque.

[8] The next day, on 30 June 1972, a spokesman for General Motors-Holden's announced that the company had abandoned its plans to build and race a V8 powered Torana "because of concern expressed by government leaders".

[10] On the same day, Chrysler said that it had abandoned development of a V8 competition version of the Charger R/T and that it would "withdraw from "direct participation" in series production racing, including the Bathurst 500".

[12] A similar issue happened with factory Ford driver Allan Moffat, who had been heavily involved in the testing and development of the Phase IV Falcon (four were built and three are known to survive as of 2020).