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What's in a name?

As I’ve mentioned before, I was pretty happy that Ford had dropped the Futura, Fairmont and Fairmont Ghia nameplates with the launch of the new FG Falcon.

Apparently plenty of people were pretty attached to the old names, at least judging by recent letters to Wheels.

I’m the opposite. I’m actually slightly embarrassed to own a Fairmont. Partly because it's (IMHO) a slightly poncey name, and also a bit posh—which I don’t really like.

I’d prefer that the car be called Falcon because:

  1. I don’t like seeming posh
  2. I like the associations the Falcon name has with Ford’s illustrious racing history.

Specifically, Falcon GTs are Falcon GTs—even if (in the old days) they were based on the Fairmont. That’s pretty much all there is to it.

Drive corrections

The Sydney Morning Herald's Drive writers continue to make really basic errors.

First there was Joshua Dowling's mystifying (and embarrassing) assertion that the original XC Cobras were 400 sedans and utes, not coupés. As every Ford fan knows, the XC Cobra was produced as a way of moving the final 400 of the slow-selling hardtop (two-door coupé) body style, and the only utes ever produced were by street-machiners.

Now Toby Hagon asserts that the G6E is a replacement for the Fairmont Ghia. No, Toby. The G6E is the Fairmont's replacement. The Ghia is replaced at the top of the range by the G6E-Turbo.

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