Greg Bowden and his Barra Cortina

Today’s Haltech Hero, Greg Bowden hails from South Australia and, much like his Barra-powered TC Cortina, is a master of understatement. So when he told us that there’s much more to this build than meets the eye we just had to take a closer look.

Greg’s love of cars started with his first car ride at the tender age of 15. Being hooked on cars from those early days of driving and the freedom that it brings is a recurring theme we often see amongst many car enthusiasts. Except Greg actually got his first car years before he was even legally allowed to drive!

Even though Greg cites the GT40 as his “favourite” car – the Ford Corina comes a close second. A very, very close second. This 1973 TC Cortina was purchased by Greg’s partner and we’re told it was actually in a fairly good condition. Rather than leaving it as the factory intended and wait for its “classic” value to go up, Greg instead decided to turn it into a “fun machine” – a race car that wasn’t confined by any rules or boundaries.

He wanted a powerful machine that he could take drag racing, circuit racing and, most importantly, Greg’s favourite hill climb events. Apart from the top coat of paint, everything you see here was built in Greg’s shed with the help of family, friends and beer of course.

Rumbling under the bonnet is an Australian-made, four-litre, straight-six Ford Barra turbo. The engine itself is fairly stock with Greg opting to upgrade parts for reliability rather than power. The turbo is a factory GT35/40 unit sitting on a 6Boost manifold.

This thirsty boy runs a Raceworks fuel cell tank linked up to a Bosch 044 fuel pump that feeds into a surge pot. The fuel is then delivered to Raceworks fuel rails and injectors that feed it to the engine. Running on E85 and 17 pounds of boost the car made a solid 412KW (550hp) at the wheels.

A centre shift conversion for the Ford T56 gearbox puts the gear stick within the driver’s comfortable reach. The power gets transferred to the wheels via a shortened BorgWarner 86 diff, with TruTrac centre and Altra 9 custom made axles.

Utilizing most of the factory engine harness, Greg opted to use Haltech’s popular Barra Pro Plugin ECU. The ECU provides Greg with plenty of in-built functions such as Traction Control, Launch Control, Boost Control and most importantly, Engine Protection. With the addition of a wideband kit, this simple setup provides total control of the engine as well as plenty of headroom for future mods.

The exterior, just like the rest of the car, is an expression of Greg’s personality and his desire to make things exactly the way he likes them.

Greg says the exterior of the car has been greatly influenced by the “Time Attack” look to which he attributes the aggressive-looking front and back spoilers, splitters and diffusers.

The suspension includes AVO double adjustable coilovers and brakes sourced from a Ford XR6 turbo ute. The car sits on a set of 17inch Rota Titan F wheels (front) and 18inch Rota Titan R (rear) all wrapped in Dunlop DZ03G tyres.

Greg’s Cortina is not just a fun car to drive, it’s a jack-of-all-trades racer and, perhaps most importantly – it’s exactly what Greg wanted. Needless to say Greg’s pretty chuffed with how the car turned out, so chuffed in fact, he’s already found himself another project car…

Yes, you guessed it, it’s another Cortina…