1200rwhp Barra-powered FG Falcon wins Horsepower Heroes at Summernats 34

For the second time in recent years, a Barra-powered car has taken home the top prize at the Summernats dyno competition, with Henry Winter’s 2009 FG XR6 Turbo Falcon claiming both the Boosted Six-Cylinder and Overall win in the 2022 Haltech Horsepower Heroes comp.

The FG pushed out a best of 1257rwhp on 34psi in the MPW Dyno Cell on Sunday to secure the silverware.

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The win came as a surprise to Canberra-based Henry, who was just hoping to put on a show for the crowd with his stonking Falcon. “I really didn’t expect to win, but I’m so over the moon that we did,” he said.

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The FG was built and tuned by ESP Racing in Queanbeyan. The Barra retains the original stroke and crank, but uses a grout-filled block and a whole bunch of forged Atomic fruit, including beefy Stage 5 cams. Boost comes from a BorgWarner S480 turbo.

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For brains, the car uses a Haltech 2500 Elite with every sensor possible crammed into the FG, and all the power gets to the ground via a ’Glide and Falcon IRS.

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Despite the car’s stellar dyno performance, Henry can see plenty of room for improvement. “We ran out of injector, and the standard FG inlet manifold restricted us as well, so that’ll be something we can change going forward,” he said. “We’ll also make some modifications to the rear end, and then I’m planning to take it racing and hopefully run an eight.”

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Adam Rogash from MPW Performance & Race Fab

Adam Rogash and the crew from MPW were once again running the dyno cell, with Adam stoked to be back at the ’Nats. “We’ve had some good cars come through this weekend, and I really take my hat off to the organisers for finding a way to make the event happen,” he said.

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Bennys Cresta made a weekend best of 1134rwhp during its mammoth 45psi Boost Demon run

Other big hitters included Ben Neal from Benny’s Custom Works, who took home the Boost Demon award with his Barra-powered Toyota Cresta for the most boost seen in any car across the weekend. He pumped a whopping 45psi through the Barra to do so, showing how bulletproof his race-proven package is.

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Rick's VH Commodore on the cruise route at SN34

Class winners included Rick Toms’ turbo LQ9 VH Commodore, which pushed out 849hp in qualifying on Saturday before securing the Boosted V8 class in Sunday’s final. “The car has done over 900hp with this combo before, but I’m still happy with the class win,” he said.

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MCFRY on the pad during the Burnout Masters qualifying on Saturday at SN34. Photo: Simon Davison

Nelson Granger’s MCFRY HJ Holden not only made it into the Burnout Masters final on Sunday, but also took out top place in the Aspirated V8 class on the dyno with a magnificent 801rwhp from the big-block Chev.

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The Aspirated Six-Cylinder honours landed with Jon Gow and his 1985 Barra-swapped XF Falcon. The standard BA Barra mill used nothing more than extractors to make a peak figure of 228rwhp, which was enough to win the class.

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The rotary boys were grouped in with the four-pot classes, with Shane Corish taking the Aspirated Four-Cylinder top honours with his 1974 Mazda 929 wagon. The chrome-bumpered machine uses a modern Renesis 1.3-litre four-port rotary mill from a Mazda RX-8, using a Haltech Elite 2500. The dorito donk made a respectable 170rwhp.

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The Boosted Four-Cylinder class saw a spicy mix of force-fed four-pots making some seriously big power, with a repeat offender coming out top trumps. Anthony La Malfa’s Datsun 1600 won this class in Horsepower Heroes way back in 2002, and used the same turbo FJ20 block it had back then to take out the class 20 years later.

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Back then, the car made 314rwhp with the fuel and boost restrictions that were once used in Horsepower Heroes, but two decades later it doubled that figure with a whopping 660hp on Friday. “It then only did 628rwhp on Sunday on the same 36psi of boost, but it has made over 700rwhp before,” said Anthony.

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Tim McEwan’s yellow HQ sedan came runner-up in the Aspirated Eight-Cylinder class, the carby and E85-fed 447ci big-block Chev making a best of 567rwhp in Sunday’s final.

For those who missed out seeing the dyno action, we have good news! The MPW crew will be running their dyno cell at MotorEx on 30 April-1 May, with some heavy hitters already flagged to make some big numbers.

RESULTS

HALTECH HORSEPOWER HERO/OVERALL WINNER

Henry Winter – 2009 Ford Falcon XR6 Turbo

BOOSTED EIGHT-CYLINDER

1. Rick Toms – VH Commodore

2. Mal Schoch – FG-X Falcon

ASPIRATED EIGHT-CYLINDER

1. Nelson Granger – HJ Holden

2. Tim McEwan – HQ Holden

BOOSTED SIX-CYLINDER

1. Henry Winter – FG Falcon

2. Ben Neal – Toyota Cresta

ASPIRATED SIX-CYLINDER

1. Jon Gow – XF Falcon

2. Rick Yates – Holden Torana

BOOSTED FOUR-CYLINDER

1. Anthony La Malfa – Datsun 1600

2. Jonathan Gibson – Datsun 1200

ASPIRATED FOUR-CYLINDER

1. Shane Corish – Mazda 929 wagon

2. Travis Starz – Porsche 944

REV MONSTER (Highest RPM)

Brendan Sweet – Toyota Corolla AE82

BOOST DEMON (Highest Boost)

Ben Neal – Toyota Cresta

TORQUE TITAN (Highest Torque)

David Waddington – Ford Falcon XE ESP

OUTSTANDING ENGINEERING – Presented by MPW

Jonathan Gibson – Datsun 1200 ute