First published in the February 2008 issue of Street Machine

It’s a pity Ford didn’t have trouble selling XC utes. If it had, it might have tried to perk sales up the same way it did it with the XC hardtop, and produced a Cobra load-lugger. The story is that the Cobra was born to light a fire under the poor sales of the remaining two-door bodies. If fewer tradies and farmers had bought utes, just imagine what might have been.

Well, there’s no need to wonder, as Phil Lacey’s produced a Cobra ute that’s pretty much spot-on for original Cobra specification. He picked up the 1976 XC GS full of dents, rust, sand and daylight and only intended to give it a tidy-up, then drive it around for a while.

With the car completely stripped, Phil spent 18 months slaving away at welding, restoring and smoothing. Along the way he discovered a neat trick when replacing the missing metal in front of the rear wheels. Armed with an AU door skin, he noticed the top part of the door looked like a match for the lower curve on the XC. After a quick measurement, he was right, so technically the ute’s now a three door.

It was a huge task, and literally every nut and bolt came off the car for some attention. When the body was restored and ready for a fresh coat of paint, Phil’s son suggested a Cobra look would suit the XC, which was when the plan began to go white with the twin blue stripes. But there’s no point looking like a Cobra if you haven’t got the bite to go with it.

“I thought that if it looked tough, it should go tough as well,” Phil says. “One thing leads to another and before you know it, you’re way out of control!”

The decision was made to base the ute as far as possible on the Cobra Option 97 Bathurst homologation variant, of which 30 were made. That included 351 Clevo, manual ’box, nine-inch, bonnet scoop, and a host of detail enhancements. Lurking in a shed nearby was a genuine example so Phil was able to measure the stripe dimensions, and match the trim and decals.

A 302 motor received the 351 treatment, with a 60thou overbore for the block which actually took it 362ci, while using standard Cleveland rods, and pistons matched to the bore with chrome-moly rings, and Clevite bearings. It was built by Colin Will (My Shed, Dec ’07).

“The block is actually a JG71, which means it’s out of a P6 LTD,” Phil says. “The folklore is that there’s a heritage with the old LTD blocks, that they were actually GT blocks. This was obviously an excellent block, and we were surprised it’d go out to 60thou overbore as some will go to 20 or 40thou, but not 60. It could be something to do with LTD blocks after all!”

The 2V heads were modified with a port and polish, and a Holley 650 sits atop with Genie extractors sorting the exhaust. The motor was built for regular street use, so rather than going all out in the quest for power, it makes a lazy 350 horses while returning a handy 25mpg on the highway.

With the big Clevo sorted, the bonnet needed the scoop and Phil was lucky enough to track down a bloke with an original mould so the fibreglass reproduction is factory. The ute’s GS bonnet came standard with the flutes, and the scoop’s not just for show — it covers a big hole that helps with airflow.

The ute runs the BorgWarner single rail ’box and the standard Cobra-spec BorgWarner 8¾in LSD with 2.77 gears. There’s a nine-inch (as per Option 97) waiting in the wings, but the BW’s doing fine at present.

The tough stance comes thanks to the combination of fettled suspension and Globe alloys. The front retained six-cylinder springs, lowering the front slightly thanks to the Clevo’s mass. The rear leaves were reset for a three-inch drop, neatly tucking the 15×7 rims under the rear guards with only an inner guard lip roll required. Further back, the rear’s set off by the rectangular GT exhaust tips.

As Phil notes, Cobras must have Globes. “To put any other wheels on it would have been a waste. It looks old-school too. The white lettering on the outside of the tyres was all the go in the mid-70s, it’s in keeping with the era.”

A hard tonneau was next on the list. Phil says his first attempt wasn’t quite right but he ruled out buying one as they were too tall for his liking. So he had a another go, pouring hundreds of man-hours in to get it perfect. Finishing the lid’s design involved projecting an enlarged image of the cobra design, then masking and painting it rather than simply applying a big decal.

Underneath that, the tray received a tidy-up with a storage compartment up front and the standard angled rear cabin wall converted to vertical, making extra space behind the seats for a big amp, speakers and a DVD player. The all-black interior scored re-trimmed black seats in a material as close as Phil could find to the Option 97 pews, new carpet, lining and door chrome, plus details such as Fairlane and LTD cabin lighting. Other small touches included deleting the passenger door lock and aerial for a smoother look, and adding the chrome strip to the upper door sections.

Since Ford never made one, it’s impossible to say definitively, but this XC Cobra ute’s got to be just about perfect now. The reaction amongst the car community has been all good, as demonstrated when Phil entered a Ford show ’n’ shine.

“As I drove in, I could see the Cobra car club parked over the other side. I thought they’d probably bag the idea because it’s not original but a couple of the guys came over, checked it out and said: ‘Come and park over with us, this is awesome!’ They gave it the thumbs up.

“At the end of the day, it’s art work,” explains Phil. “It’s an expression of your own imagination. You can paint onto canvas, or do something like this.”

PHIL LACEY
1976 XC UTE