The year was 1979 when cinema-goers first heard those immortal words: “She’s the last of the V8s.” Over the ensuing 46 years, that now-iconic line from Mad Max – and the legendary machine to which it referred – has been responsible for an insatiable desire among countless gearheads worldwide to own a nasty black Falcon coupe just like Max’s.

First published in the April 2025 issue of Street Machine

Melburnian Nicholas Cini was one of them. “Ever since I saw the movie, Falcon coupes have been my favourite car,” he says. In 2018, Nick finally got to own his dream car when he bought a tatty XB hardtop out of Queensland. Having been out of the panel beating game for some 15 years at the time, Nick knew he had a job on his hands to revive his new prize, but the skills learnt while plying his trade would serve him well.

“It had a lot of rust, which I cut out and replaced at home in my garage,” Nick says. “Other than paint and trim, I pretty much built the whole car myself.”

Surrounded by petrolhead friends and cousins, Nick was determined to make his build stand out from the crowd. “I wanted to be different; that’s why I chose the Boss 290,” he says of the unusual choice of mill that now occupies the XB’s engine bay.

Rather than source a separate engine and gearbox, Nick purchased a complete, running Boss 290-powered BF equipped with a Tremec six-speed manual. “It was hard to pull apart a perfectly good car, but it was the best option,” he says.

Step one of wedging the big quad-cam V8 between the XB’s shock towers was to ditch the factory double A-arm front end in favour of RRS struts and an RRS power rack. The struts allowed the towers to be notched out, creating the necessary clearance for the Boss’s broad rocker covers. Rather than use the matching RRS notching kit, Nick decided to put his metalwork skills to good use, fashioning new, sculpted notching plates out of 3mm-thick steel.

The 5.4-litre Boss 290 has been kept essentially stock aside from a lumpier set of Crow cams, matching valve springs and an FPV Cobra R intake. The BF’s aftermarket Pacemaker extractors also help it exhale a little easier. Surprisingly, the BF pipes slotted into place with only a few minor modifications. To get the quad-cam up and running, the factory ECU was sent off to have the security system, ABS and a few other features disabled.

From the outset, Nick wanted as much rubber stuffed under the rear guards as physically possible. To achieve this admirable goal, a McDonald Brothers triangulated four-link set-up was added, and the car was then mini-tubbed to the chassis rails. Yet even with a narrowed nine-inch and the extra room provided by the tubs and the absence of leaf springs, the quarters had to be pumped 25mm per side to clear those girthy, Hoosier-lettered Mickey Ts. But it was worth it, as the hardtop now has attitude to burn.

Apart from the stretched quarters, the only other body mod was the addition of a BMW sunroof, which Nick says was an easy choice to make. “The roof already had a hole in it,” he reasons. “I looked at a factory sunroof, but that was way too expensive, so I used one from a ’97 3 Series BMW.”

When it comes to paint options for an XB hardtop, black sure is beautiful – as long as your panel and paint is impeccable. Once again, Nick rolled up his sleeves and set about ironing out the body’s wrinkles and imperfections to prepare it for its new clothes, and he’s obviously lost none of his touch, as the coupe’s panels are now handsomely ripple-free.

The Falcon was then dragged to EA Bodyworks, where Nick’s cousin Emanuel shot it in Mipa Super Black. “It’s the blackest black we could find – no metallics, no pearls,” says Nick. “Other blacks were too much on the blue or red side; Super Black is pure black.” The results speak for themselves, as the sumptuous paint looks deep enough to dive into.

Inside, the car features matching XR8 buckets front and rear, a BF steering column, twin digital dash displays, and a custom, full-length console that Nick built himself, along with new doorcards. Nick also used the armrests from the BF to take advantage of their integrated power window switches. The whole shebang has been trimmed in black leather by Nick’s mate Andrew Homburg.

With all those modifications, the Falcon needed full engineering. “Before starting the build, I went to the engineer, told him what I wanted, and he told me what I needed to do,” says Nick. Come final inspection, the only thing the engineer asked for was to upgrade the XB’s front brakes to the larger rotors and beefier twin-piston calipers from the BF. Other than that, it passed with flying colours.

With its killer stance and exquisite panel and paint, Nick’s black hardtop now snaps necks wherever it goes, and his family are all for it. “My 11-year-old son Zane came out in the garage and sat with me quite a lot during the build,” Nick says. “He loves the car and is at me every other weekend to take it out for a cruise.”

Zane’s encouragement is certainly working, as Nick has racked up 1500km since completing the six-year build around 18 months ago.

But as bad-arse as the coupe already is, Nick wants more. After tossing around the idea of supercharging the Boss 290, his current line of thinking is to have a big swing of the bat and save up for a Harrop-blown Godzilla. That will certainly test the grip capabilities of those fat Mickey Thompsons!

NICHOLAS CINI
FORD XB FALCON COUPE

THANKS
Emanuel at EA Bodyworks; Andrew Homburg; my wife Romina and my kids Leona, Zane and Alyssa for supporting and encouraging me.