Mechanic : The last of the V8 Interceptors... a piece of history!
Mechanic : Would've been a shame to blow it up.
The Pursuit Special, also referred to as the Last of the V8 Interceptors, is the iconic black GT Falcon muscle car featuring a distinctive supercharger driven by the title character Mad Max during much of the Mad Max franchise, where it appears in Mad Max, Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior and in Mad Max: Fury Road, as well as both video games.
The first car shown in the film with the title of Pursuit Special is a 1972 HQ Holden Monaro[V8 coupe stolen by Nightrider (played by Vince Gil), an escaped cop killer, who dies in an accident that destroys the vehicle. The more famous Pursuit Special is a heavily modified Ford Falcon XB GT, built on a vehicle originally assembled stock at the Ford plant in November 1973. Maxwell "Mad Max" Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) is offered the black Pursuit Special, as an incentive to stay on the force as their top pursuit man after he reveals his desire to resign. Although Max turns the offer down, he later uses the black car to exact his revenge on an outlaw motorcycle gang who killed his wife and son.
The vehicle started out as a standard white 351 cu in (5.8 L) Australian built 1973 Ford Falcon XB GT Hardtop when in 1976, filmmakers Byron Kennedy and George Miller began preproduction on Mad Max. The movie's art director Jon Dowding designed the Interceptor and commissioned Melbourne-based car customizers Graf-X International to modify the GT Falcon. Peter Arcadipane, Ray Beckerley, John Evans, and painter Rod Smythe transformed the car as specified for the film.
The main modifications are the black paint scheme, roof and boot spoilers, wheel arch flares, and front nose cone and air-dam designed by Arcadipane (marketed as the "Concorde" style). Also, eight individual exhaust side pipes were added (only two of them being functional, others appeared to be working because of the vibrations the first two created). The most famous feature of the car is a Weiand 6-71 supercharger[5] protruding through the bonnet. The impressive looking supercharger, in reality, was nonfunctional; functional superchargers are typically driven constantly by the engine and cannot be switched on and off, as portrayed in the first two Mad Max films.
1973 Ford XB Falcon GT 351
Pursuit Special, when the term is used, generally refers to Max's more famous V8 Interceptor Pursuit Special, a 1973 Ford XB Falcon GT 351, commissioned at great expense by Police Commissioner Labatouche and the Main Force Patrol's (MFP) commander, Fifi Macaffee.
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Ford Falcon XA GT 351 Hardtop, 1972. Also powered by Ford's Cleveland V8 that was imported for the US for the otherwise all-Australian Falcon. In the XA GT it made 300hp. The Cleveland-powered GT only made through one further generation, the XB, before it was discontinued.
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Ford Falcon XB GT coupe
The Main Force Patrol (MFP) cars in the Mad Max franchise are Ford Falcon XB GT coupes.
The Main Force Patrol (MFP) were the Australian Federal Police special task force depicted in Mad Max. It was founded in 1983 by the remnants of the Australian Government. The purpose of the MFP was to support the regular police in combating organized crime, especially savage, motorized criminal biker gangs and marauding punks, and act as a highway patrol on the Transcontinental Highways. They were disbanded after the Apocalypse, as was stated in the Mad Max Fury Road Prequel comics.
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Ford Falcon GT 1971. - source Classic and Modern Show Cars AU.
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