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The 1962 Ford Falcon didn’t get the V8 many buyers were hoping for, but it got something almost as interesting: a mid-year facelift, a Thunderbird-inspired roofline on the new Sports Futura, and Ford’s first four-speed manual transmission, a floor-shifted gearbox built in Dagenham, England. See the Gateway Classic photos above and get the full story on what made this often-overlooked Falcon such a pivotal step toward the V8 era just around the corner.
This twin-turbo Ford Falcon, nicknamed the Dirty Bird, runs a stroked 449 cubic inch small-block through a pair of 88mm turbochargers to claim roughly 2,600 horsepower, all while competing on 275-millimeter drag radials at North Star Dragway. Nearly seven million viewers have watched the small-block Ford hold its own in a class often dominated by LS-swapped builds. Watch to see the run that turned this Falcon into a following of its own.