A Trip Down Memory Lane – Part 1

You may have seen in our Ten Things You Didn’t Know About Haltech video or learned elsewhere around the traps, that a project car from Modern Motor Magazine was instrumental in steering a young Steve Mitchell down the path of starting the Haltech we all know and love today.

Thanks to our good friends at ARE Media, the current owners of Motor Magazine (and therefore the back catalogue of its predecessor Modern Motor), in celebration of our 35th Anniversary, we’re able to take you for a peek into the pages of those old magazines that kicked it all off.

Between March and November 1987, Modern Motor editor, Barry Lake, chronicled the build of a bright red, Aussie-built, Ford XF Falcon dubbed the Mobil Modern Motor Falcon.

Due to Australian emissions laws at the time, Ford never offered the XF with a V8 engine, thus Editor Lake had hoped to fit an unleaded-fuel suitable V8 from a then-current model Bronco. However, in discussions with Ford’s Chief Engineer, David Ford, he learned that this was going to be too great an engineering task to take on – So the decision was made to fit the Falcon’s standard 4.1L six with a supercharger, which brought with it a list of challenges all of its own. Not in the least, adjusting the car’s electronics to suit the new engine requirements.

Barry assigned accomplished motoring journalist, racer, and all-round automotive “fix-it-man” Ed Vieusseux as the project manager and set some goals: The Falcon had to at least match the performance of some of the popular Aussie muscle of the day. Namely Peter Brock’s HDT Holdens. Plus it had to be street legal and comply with all Australian Design Rules, including exhaust emissions, so that it could be thought of as a true contender to the aforementioned Holdens.

What follows is the text verbatim from Part Four of the Project Car build, as published in the June 1987 Issue of Modern Motor, when “Fuelling the beast” was starting to become serious business. Republished with permission from ARE Media:

We had spoken to engineers all over the world about the problem of providing more fuel at the correct time and in the cor­rect quantity for the requirements – very much changed from standard – of our Mobil-Modern MOTOR Super­charged Falcon. We had gone from the Ford Motor Company to specialist US automotive electronics companies which produce one-off computerised systems for prototype cars, to similar experts in the UK and also to anyone who was anyone in automotive elec­tronics in Australia. 

What we learned – or rather re­learned – is that there are numerous ways of approaching any problem. We had suggestions that varied from rela­tively simple to highly technical; from adequate to highly efficient; and from relatively inexpensive to very costly. 

A further factor in the equation was our desire to use local parts, technology and talent wherever possible and also that we wanted to do as much of the de­sign and development work as possible ourselves. This was never intended to be a “kit car” built up from over-the­counter items readily available to any­one. This was to be our own design; a unique and well-engineered car. 

We were pondering on which route to take with the electronic side of things when Ed Vieusseux, currently em­ployed by us full-time on this project, stumbled across a genius operating out of a well-equipped and well-lit base­ment garage and workshop in a fashionable Sydney suburb. 

Steven Mitchell was a real find. He is a young man who has a list of achieve­ments that belie his years. He studied electrical engineering at Sydney Uni­versity and spent two years with Sadgrove and Bower Fuel Systems at Hornsby as grounding for his self­owned business Invent Engineering.

Steve’s speciality is electronic fuel in­jection and he supplies high-tech after­market electronic equipment to such companies as Benson’s Turbo Centre and The Turbo Connection, both in Sydney.

He is a car nut who has owned 26 assorted vehicles in the past five or six years, the latest brace being an Alfa­sud and a highly-modified and nicely dressed-up VW Beetle.

When Ed first heard of Steven he was told that he wouldn’t have time to look at our problem; he was too busy perfec­ting his most ambitious creation – a computerised diagnostic system that could analyse any electronic fuel injec­tion system on any make or model of car, and which would more accurately pinpoint problems than current diag­nostic systems.

Steve believes his unit will revolutionise the tune-up business, most operators being unable to afford an ever-increasing number of expensive and specialised diagnostic units for make after make of car

It turned out that Steve was extremely busy in his space-age hideaway – but not so much so that he was not interest­ed in our project. He is the type of per­son who can not resist a challenge and doesn’t care how many hours a day he has to work to solve any new problem. 

Steve saw the chance to help us as an opportunity to develop a fuel injection system that, suitably modified, could have a wide range of applications in the automotive after-market. It certainly wouldn’t do him any harm, either, to gain a name for himself in the business through the fame – if not fortune – that a successful relationship with this very special car could bring him. 

Steve’s brief was to produce a system that would allow the car to perform well without flat spots or knocking, but it must still pass the government emission control regulations and re­main fuel-efficient. In his own words: “This is a tall order.” 

Please join us for the next installment where Barry takes us a bit deeper into the 1980’s nerdiness of early electronic fuel injection.