1978 De Tomaso Pantera GTS

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De Tomaso Pantera at the Greater Milwaukee Autoshow (2023) in Milwaukee, WI.  

De Tomaso Pantera GTS-5, 1990. A very late series Pantera was also part of the Evolution of Aero section at the London Concours

De Tomaso Pantera GTS

De Tomaso Pantera GTS

De Tomaso Pantera GTS

De Tomaso Pantera GTS

De Tamaso Pantera GTS

gts

De Tomaso Pantera GT 4 1974. 📸 by René Meyer. - source Rétro Passion Automobiles.

De Tomaso Pantera GTS.

1974 De Tomaso Pantera GT 4

Kiwi Rebel. '72 De Tomaso Pantera GT.

Stuart Gary’s Superbird and the need for speed A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away I dreamed of owning a Falcon GT hardtop just like the one my childhood hero Allan Moffat raced at Bathurst. Eventually, I bought an old rust ridden 1976 XB orange Ford Fairmont GS and slowly rebuilt it into my dream car – sort of like the black Falcon Interceptor out of Mad Max. Instead of a supercharger (which was fake in the movie car anyway) my car is equipped with a genuine 1000 hp twin turbocharged 351 under the hood. I often drove this beast from Sydney to Darwin when I was working as a radio broadcaster and journalist at 8DN. It was my daily ride for the commute from the suburbs to the city when I moved to 3UZ in Melbourne. And I got a great shot of it next to Brocky’s 05 Commodore when it was on display in Newcastle while I was working for the ABC at 2NC. Mind you this was always a thirsty beast – just four miles per gallon on the old scale -- a run from Newcastle to Sydney required two tanks of fuel! The heart of the beast is a specially built engine originally put together by Bob Matic at Ford Muscle Parts and later further modified by Ian Benson at Benson's Turbos. For the technically minded, the 351 Cleveland V8 powering the beast is fully blue printed, shot peened, and micro-polished. It’s based around a four bolt Aussie block fitted with 4V O-ringed open chambered BOSS heads, twin TO4 Garrett air-research turbo chargers with 21-pound wastegates, turbo dish pistons, Carrillo alloy rods, stainless steel crank, and a windage tray sump. It uses a three-inch stainless-steel twin exhaust system. The block is cooled by a four-core radiator and there's a separate radiator for the gearbox oil. Those thousand ponies are fed through a 12 inch drag clutch and four speed top loader gearbox to a custom-made drive shaft and GTHO yoke, into a nine-inch LSD and 35 spline rear axles. The Falcon is totally street legal with an engineer’s certificate to prove it. I also own a De Tomaso Pantera, but the two cars are totally different. While the Falcon has a deep throated thunderous growl, rumbling like the approaching storm it is - the Pantera has a short loud bark. The Pantera is very fast off the line (0 to 100 in around 3 seconds) and amazingly nimble -- even twitchy through the corners. But it holds on to the road as if attached to guide rails all the way to its top speed of over 300 KPH. On the other hand, the Falcon is a very different beast. It’s much slower off the line, with those turbos taking a while to spin up to boost. But once that turbo whistle starts, you’re suddenly thrust backwards into your seat and the beast hunkers down and begins accelerating like a bat out of hell -- easily slipping beyond the old 200 MPH mark (320 KPH) as the world outside flashes past. The beast eventually tops out at just over 342 KPH – close enough to warp speed for anyone. It’s a true adrenaline pumping rush taking you to the edge and beyond. Yet, it all changed once I started taking flying lessons. Flying aircraft is a totally different world. Looking down from above, life at ground level suddenly seemed so limiting and two dimensional. I still own both cars – but seldom drive them.

1975 De Tomaso Pantera GTS