Ford Falcon RTV UTE

The humble ute is as much an Aussie icon as meat pies and kangaroos, and Ford believes it built the first. Way back in the early 1930s the wife of a farmer wrote an angry letter to the Blue Oval boys demanding that they produce a vehicle suitable for her husband “to carry her to church on Sundays and the pigs to market on Mondays”.

Ford designer Lew Brandt responded with the 1934 Ford coupe utility, and we wonder if that poor, henpecked farmer ever bought one - and did he ever take the pigs to church by mistake?

Since that time the mighty ute’s gone through substantial changes and has been picked up in various guises all over the world. Today more than a million utes sell in the USA each year, and one in five Falcons or Commodores sold is a ute.

The latest utility to emerge from the Broadmeadows plant is the RTV, which stands for Rugged Terrain Vehicle. It’s a high-riding version of the Falcon ute, with a few major mechanical differences.

First off, and most noticeable, is the jacked-up suspension. Ford’s raised the body an extra 67mm off the ground at the front and 80mm at the rear to help it clear obstacles on building sites or bush tracks. We’re talking 215mm of ground clearance, which also improves approach and departure angles.

Ford’s also stretched the axles by 30mm front and back to improve stability, but it’s the addition of a locking rear diff that’ll most improve this ute’s abilities. Lock the diff below 40kmh via a dash-mounted switch and you’ve effectively got a solid rear axle. Why is this good? Here’s a quick recap. Typical rear-drive passenger cars send engine torque down the path of least resistance, so while you’ve got good grip under both rear wheels, you get forward movement. If one of those wheels loses grip and starts to spin, it wastes all the engine torque and you don’t get anywhere.

With a locking differential, engine torque is sent to both rear wheels equally, so even if only one wheel’s got grip the ute moves forward. This is good news for towing because it ensures maximum tractive effort regardless of the surface beneath.

And indeed it did come in handy trying to drag a mate’s 5.02 Streaker up his wet concrete driveway early one drizzly Melbourne morning. Made the difference between a day out fishing and one spent in front of the tube.

The RTV ute we had on test came with a 5.4lt V8 under the bonnet, and was hooked up to a four-speed sequential automatic gearbox. Onroad performance is nothing short of awesome, especially when you get that big V8 singing and all 470Nm of torque is pounding the pavement into submission.

Ford also slots the Falcon’s 4.0lt six-cylinder engine under the RTV’s bonnet, and its 182kW/380Nm is still plenty potent and more economical with the petrol. For the record, the RTV V8 drank around 18.2lt of fuel for every 100km.

Standard kit on the RTV includes electric windows and mirrors, a CD player and remote central locking. Our test car started life at $37,895 and came with air conditioning ($2250), cruise control ($595) and a 2300kg tow pack ($1250). Be aware, though, that the heavy-duty tow pack is not available with manual gearbox models.