Were Australian Fords Rubbish?

[Crazy Dazz]

It's something we take almost as read, that the cars we built were inferior in build quality, finish, and QA/QC. It's certainly stated as axiomatic every time we ask why the Falcon and Territory couldn't be more widely exported.
The anecdotal evidence is there to support it; bits falling off, notorious problems, suicidal ball-joints, rust spots, etc, etc.
Toyota's are of course much better built, and that's not to mention European cars.
There's no point even arguing, because if dare to suggest otherwise, this thread will be inundated with the tales of Toyota reliability, and the Falcon's ubiquitous crappiness.

And lets not even get started on how uneconomical they are.

I could offer up my own anecdotal evidence of owning a variety of cars over 30+ years, but obviously I'm Crazy and in the minority.

Thing is, I like to look at things from an economic perspective, as I find the market to be a fairly impartial judge.

I can't speak to other states, but in WA many years back the restrictions on taxi's were eased to allow a much wider variety of mid to large sized cars.
So obviously the entire taxi fleet converted to Mercedes and Volvos.

No, wait, that's right they didn't.
There was a short-lived flurry of Nissans, Camrys and Magnas, and then the vast majority reverted back to Falcons and Commodes.

So here you have an industry where unreliability is lost income, where every cent spent on maintaining their vehicle to the required standard comes straight off the bottom line, and fuel consumption is a MAJOR expense.

Obviously it is a somewhat particular market, the cars must be of a certain size (wheelbase) and naturally must be capable of carry at least 4 passengers, however there are PLENTY of cars that fit the bill: Hyundai, Honda, Nissan, Toyota, VW, Kia, Mazda, Subaru, Holden, Peugeot, Citroen, and Opel ALL make cars that satisfy the criteria. Many of them cheaper than a Falcon, most with economical 4 cylinders, and many of them Diesel.

The simple fact is that Falcons (and commodes) fitted with LPG, are more economical to operate over an extended lifespan and many hundreds of thousands of kilometres. Ultimately that comes down to reliability and cost of repairs.

I'm not suggesting for a moment that everyone should rush out and buy Falcons. Most people don't need to carry 4 adult passengers, and few will do 100,000kms per year. Nor am I suggesting that the taxi industry itself creates a great demand. The WA Industry has about 2,000, and the average lifespan is probably 5+ years.

Just making the point that maybe these cars are not the rubbish people claim.