AU best thought out model range?

[Bucknaked]

I find it hard to understand how loyal Blue Blooded fans, hold real contempt and hate for a model such as the AU. If it wears an oval Badge, then its a ford.

[csv8]

My BA MK 2 GHIA is povo pack trim. The ventilation ducts, the clock surround, centre stack and door spears should have been in wood trim. NOT povo pack grey, piano black and satin. The GHIA interior should have been made more dressed up. The front end is different, yes, leather seating, funny instrument panel pattern, don't quite make the grade. FG is in the same boat. Look at a V Series dunnydore, quite different to the povo models. FORD needs to get new stylists and interior designers.

[LeadFoot81]

The designers are limited by what the company can afford to spend on the product unfortunately.

Originally Posted by csv8

My BA MK 2 GHIA is povo pack trim. The ventilation ducts, the clock surround, centre stack and door spears should have been in wood trim. NOT povo pack grey, piano black and satin. The GHIA interior should have been made more dressed up. The front end is different, yes, leather seating, funny instrument panel pattern, don't quite make the grade. FG is in the same boat. Look at a V Series dunnydore, quite different to the povo models. FORD needs to get new stylists and interior designers.

[csv8]

Then they shouldn't sell a car that doesn't live up to its name !

[LeadFoot81]

I hear ya! Thats why Im not interested in any XR post AU3.

Originally Posted by csv8

Then they shouldn't sell a car that doesn't live up to its name !

[MitchG]

Originally Posted by prydey

i can sit in an XT and then hop in the top of the line G6ET and apart from some different trim materials and colours, the basic design is identical accross the whole range.

Even the B series falcons had diffrent streering wheels...FG there all the same, leather or rubber even the FPVs got nothing diffrent...

[chevypower]

AU2 and AU3 looked alright, unrefined though, Mercedes CLS is reminiscent in styling of the AU, shares some cues, but thats where it ends, the CLS is better profiled and obviously more refined, silly to even compare them really. I find that most cars look too similar to each other these days anyway.

[mrbaxr6t]

Originally Posted by Bucknaked

Isn't shockwave a BA2 Colour?

I have seen BA mkIIs in this exact same color yes I even ahve a friend that owns one in shockwave he insists its a different color, when I bought the car I was told it is shockwave in color its like a deep ocean blue and is a great color. I strongly believe that the AU also introduced a new era in the choices cars were painted in from factory, the colors imho became much braver and all AU's are nice colors.

The instrument clusters as many have said is radically different and not interchangeable from say a futura to a XR it almost looks like they developed several dash designs and weren't entirely sure which one to use, so they used them all. The media panned the AU and this panning carried over to the consumer, more recent example was the media repeatedly bombarding us saying "everybody is selling larger cars in favour of smaller ones" when we look at the sales data they weren't then it eventually got into peoples heads that everybody was doing it and they began to. If memory serves Ford were also panned as they spent an absolute fortune giving us the AU - and it was crap according to them.

[Bossxr8]

Originally Posted by mrbaxr6t

I have seen BA mkIIs in this exact same color yes I even ahve a friend that owns one in shockwave he insists its a different color, when I bought the car I was told it is shockwave in color its like a deep ocean blue and is a great color. I strongly believe that the AU also introduced a new era in the choices cars were painted in from factory, the colors imho became much braver and all AU's are nice colors.

The instrument clusters as many have said is radically different and not interchangeable from say a futura to a XR it almost looks like they developed several dash designs and weren't entirely sure which one to use, so they used them all. The media panned the AU and this panning carried over to the consumer, more recent example was the media repeatedly bombarding us saying "everybody is selling larger cars in favour of smaller ones" when we look at the sales data they weren't then it eventually got into peoples heads that everybody was doing it and they began to. If memory serves Ford were also panned as they spent an absolute fortune giving us the AU - and it was crap according to them.

The blue that was available on AU's was called Narooma Blue, which is similar to Shockwave, but not the same.

[v8falconsrule]

Originally Posted by Bucknaked

Isn't shockwave a BA2 Colour?

yep sure was, right up until conquer replaced it in the bf range.

[Bucknaked]

I love the shockwave colour. I wish it was an AU colour. Conquer is almost as nice.