Round two commences for Spike’s Performance and Refinishing of Plant City, Florida. Dean P Santiago “aka Spike” and Marco Lorenzo  have teamed up with “Matt and Sherri”, of Florida Street Machine for the build of a ’67 two door Falcon that will be cloned into an Australian RHD XR GT Falcon two door. The dynamic duo of Spike’s Performance and Refinishing will be making their sophomore appearance at SEMA this year with this car.

The Australian XR series Falcon introduced in 1966, was promoted as the Mustang bred Falcon. This was the first Australian Falcon to be offered with a V8 engine. V8s were previously reserved for the more upscale cars.

The dawn of the muscle age in Australia began with Ford’s marketing focus between the relationship of the Falcon and the Mustang’s sporty appearance. This led to the introduction of the Falcon GT variant of the XR in 1967 featuring a 225 hp version of the 289 Windsor V8. This project is unique as the majority of all Falcons produced in Australia have been four door. This XR GT is a two door right hand driver which is very rare.

Currently Phase One of this unique build has begun. Full details of the build are being kept under wraps however, we have a sneak peak of the work completed to date. As each phase is completed Spike’s has offered to let us peek inside to see how the project progresses leading up to its SEMA debut.

To date the car has been stripped down to the frame and the conversion from left hand to right hand drive completed. Next in the process, the assessment of the alignment of all panels, doors, hood, fenders and trunk will be performed to determine what work is needed.

All holes for the moldings were welded all rust spots repaired. Working primarily by hand these modern day metal Michelangelos, are creating their next masterpiece leaving no part of the car untouched.

We’re looking forward to following the progression of this build. We’ll be looking for the finished product at SEMA this fall, and it should garner a lot of attention from the worldwide audience in attendance at the show.