1973 Ford XA Falcon Superbird Coupe

Launched in March 1972, the XA was something of a milestone car in Ford Australia's history, being the first car completely designed and built in this country. The XA marked a change in direction for styling, with a larger, more curvaceous shape and for the first time since the mid-1960s a muscular two-door hardtop model was offered, featuring a lowered roofline. Ford released a specially optioned version of the hardtop known as the Superbird, available in three distinctive colour schemes: Polar White with Cosmic Blue stripes, Yellow Fire with Walnut Glow stripes and perhaps most striking of all, Lime Glaze with Jewel Green stripes. The Superbird was launched at the Sydney Motor Show as a marketing exercise from Ford to encourage sales of the slow moving hardtops and featured giant, hand-painted bird graphics. The public reaction at the show, and the following Melbourne Motor Show, was such that Ford put the Superbird into limited production at the asking price of $3,590. All were based on XA hardtops with a 302-cid V8 either in manual or automatic form. Other features included a luxurious interior, dash with full GT instrumentation, styled steel rear window louvre and blacked-out grille in addition to the two-tone paintwork and unique Superbird badging. Although exact production figures aren't confirmed, the generally quoted figure is 700 Superbirds and they are becoming hard to find today, building up a strong following amongst Ford collectors.