Truck: Tickford AUII XR8 ute
Pod Name: AU2XR8.pod
Version: MTM2
Released: 28 April 2003


Thanks for downloading one of my latest MTM2 trucks - a painstaking replica of the Series-II AU XR8 Falcon utility. I hope you enjoy it!

The Falcon made its debut in Australia in September 1960 with the XL, based on the US/Canadian designs with minor modifications for Australian conditions. After 1970 production of the Falcon ceased in the US, and with the launch of the XA in 1971, the Falcon became a uniquely Australian car: there was no longer a US equivalent, the car was designed specifically for the local market. The AU Falcon was introduced in September 1998 as the first of a totally new shape to represent the then pride of Ford Australia (hence the name 'AU' as in representing Australia). Today, the Falcon is Australia's last entirely locally designed, developed and manufactured car (excluding the V8 motor).

The long awaited AU utility finally arrived in the middle of 1999 to an astonished audience, and the AUII mid-life upgrade came late in 2000. If the base AU ute's styling created a handsome vehicle, and it's driving dynamics are better than any vehicle bereft of a balanced front/rear weight bias has any right to be, the XR6 & XR8 just manage to do everything right  and must just about be one of the most desirable two wheel drive utilities anywhere in the world. Either that or Ford have the world's first two door 2 seater with a huge boot!

This truck is a development of the AU XR8 ute I released on my website in February 2003, itself based on the AU Falcon model I started building sometime around mid-late 2001. The plan was to build a model of the AU Falcon ute entirely from scratch in BINedit (documenting it as a tutorial for my BINedit Resource website), and use the base vehicle to produce a likeness of the XR models by building a new nose and implementing a few other changes here and there.

This truck was practically entirely hand-built by me. As stated, the body was built starting from an entirely blank slate in BINedit - every vertex and face being manually placed (and then with a new nose cone housing the distinctive round quad-headlights) - and the sportsbar was made in the same manner. The tyres are heavily customised from an existing set, and the frame is a cut-down version from BigDOGGe's converted-from-NFS Holden ute truck. All the textures are hand-drawn, save for the headlights and taillights and the face of the wheels, which were copied from photographs, and the texture for the underside of the chassis, which came from the Ford TS50 in Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit II. I also made custom 'light fuzz' textures all round to properly fit the lights of the truck.

The truck shares the same wheelbase as its two older brethren, so the handling is the same... nice, sharp handling, perhaps a little on the nervous side but with very accurate pointability.

After all is said and done, with all the hours of hard work fading away, I'm extremely proud of this truck. This is my BABY. You are welcome to use any of it's parts, or the truck as a whole, in your projects (just don't go saying you made the whole darn thing...). I'd love to hear if you intend use it for any repaints (or something a little more wild...) - there's no need to ask permission, I just wanna know your projects :)


Suggestions and comments welcome please.
You can e-mail me at d2smtm2@email.com
Check out my websites at http://mtm2.com/~d2s/

That's about all... have fun with this!

---Drive2Survive
"Live for the Ride. Drive to Survive."