Horse 2734 - Supercars Gen-3 Should Go Forward To The Past

As a motorsport fan in Australia, I have effectively lived through five periods of top level touring car racing in this country. Before 1980 Group C regulations were kind of moving away from production cars. From 1980-84 we had our own kind of unique formula. From 1985-1992 Group A regulations were run, before a turbo revolution and the arrival of the R32 Skyline made a mockery of the rules. We had a Group 3A set of V8 Supercars. And then finally, we've had Car Of The Future regulations which have meant that the last vestiges of what was once a production car series, has been abandoned entirely; in favour of bespoke racing machines.
That's roughly the story of the last 45 plus years in Australian top level touring car racing.
Consequently what we have today, is a series where one car bears no resemblance at all to the road car because it has had to have been stretched to fit over a control chassis; and the other which is from a company which not only no longer trades in this country but where the company that built the road car was sold off and out of the group. Neither of them use engines found in the road cars; so the whole series makes the old adage of "race on Sunday, sell on Monday" a perfectly complete nonsense.

Let me just throw a really idiotic idea into the world and see where it lands. I think that it is time for the Supercars to abandon the premise that they are related to anything on the road.

NASCAR had a similar problem back in the 1980s when there were precisely zero cars left with the 5.8L V8 in the showrooms. The great behemoths of the 1970s had disappeared from the auto companies lineups as a result of the 1970s oil crisis and the 7L monsters were no more. The cars which were left in the so-called 'malaise era' were what were considered to be compact cars only a decade before; the rules were then changed so that the minimum wheelbase would be 110 inches.
The thing was that the regular cars which people were buying, shrunk faster than anticipated and that meant that the new minimum length that the regulations demanded, was also met by exactly zero cars. The aero wars of the 1980s was sparked by car makers stretching cars every which way until the things on the racetrack bore no resemblance at all to the road cars.
NASCAR had enough of races being won by manipulating the rulebook and they mandated having a standardised car, onto which the manufacturers could change the look of the noses and tails of. That has pretty well much been the same kind of idea for three successive generations of car.

In Australia, we've reached a similar set of problems. The Supercars firstly had the problem that precisely zero road cars in the showrooms had a 5L V8 any more. They then faced the problem that the VE Commodore was too big to fit the regulations and so they allowed Holden to cut and warp the car. When the ZB Commodore it was also allowed to be warped to conform to the regulations. When the S550 Mustang came along though, DJR Penske who were the chief fabricators of the car, didn't even pretend to take a road car and warp it but rather, they built a bespoke bit of kit that sort of looks like the S550 Mustang (not really).
I think that the Mustang actually shows the way forward because without Holden existing any more; Ford having no car that conforms to the size dimensions, and nobody else really interested in playing, then the Mustang's solution of being a bespoke bit of kit, is really the last sensible option if the series is to retain its character. If not, then it simply just dissolves into being some weird GT3 thing (although that would also be a sensible option).

If having a bespoke bit of kit is the way to go, then that really opens the door for people to go buckwild with proposals and mine is about as buckwild as they come. Here it goes...

Supercars should build their own bespoke Commodores and Falcons (or whatever they choose to brand them as).

I do of course realise that the intellectual property for these cars is already owned by General Motors and Ford respectively but given that Ford aren't going to produce a 1983 XE Falcon ever again and General Motors aren't going to produce a 1984 VK Commodore ever again, then I do not think that it would be that much of a wrangle to buy the likeness rights to something which has been out of production for more than 35 years.
As all the cars are built upon a standard chassis, have a standard gearbox, standard differential, and have a standard electrical wiring loom, then building a set of standard carbon fibre panels to fit over the top, isn't too much to ask. It is basically taking the existing process and changing the cosmetic shape.
Like the current cars it means mushing around the panels but we already know that a Falcon will fit over a Falcon and the Commodore can be enlarged slightly.

Or rather, if we abandon the premise that Supercars actually need to be branded with the logos of a manufacturer, the manufacturers would be free to come and go as they like, and the teams themselves could decide how to brand the cars.
If this sounds like a dumb proposal, may I remind you that Formula One currently has teams branded as Red Bull and Haas and in the past has had teams such as Benetton and Footwork. The general public doesn't really care if a manufacturer is running or supporting a team or not; though manufacturer support might translate into sales for them.
By having a completely neutral car, the teams could swap out the grills and light clusters to their heart's content and we'd not be any better or worse off for it. NASCAR has already done this kind of thing in the past and currently does so I. the present. While you can buy a V8 Mustang and a V8 Camaro, neither Ford or Chevrolet will sell you a 5.8L V8 Mustang or Camaro. Toyota choose to make their cars look like a Camry in the top series and a Supra in the division immediately lower but there has never been a V8 Camry or Supra for the road. That fiction is 100% completely fine.

In Australia if they really wanted to, they could have a Falcon and Commodore and call them whatever they wanted to and I really don't think that the general public would mind if they were branded as a Henry or a Lion. That way, the old rivalries could square off and new ones could be written.
Also, having a completely neutral car, would lower the development costs. Teams in Super GT for example, can buy an off the shelf unbranded 4.5L V8 for the GT300 class and an off the shelf 'mother chassis' and this has meant than 20 different marques have appeared over the years which have in reality all been plug and play bits of kit.
The one thing that 2020 has proven is that motorsport fans are happy to watch the spectacle, even if the cars are completely fraudulent. Earlier in the pandemic, we had people running iRacing on computer rigs at home and while it wasn't exactly the same, it was still kind of fun.

The thing that has been constantly proven through what amounts to five distinct era of top level touring car racing in this country is that provided there is machinery to run and the top level teams run in it, the fans are roughly fine with it. The teams themselves are fine with switching marques if it meets with success. Alan Moffat ran a Mustang, various Falcons, RX-7, Commodores, Sierra. Peter Brock drove Toranas, Commodores, an M3, a Sierra, and Commodores again. Jamie Whincup has been in a Commodore, Falcons, and back to Commodores. Scott Maclaughlin campaigned a Volvo before the Falcon and Mustang.

If the category actually abandoned the premise that the cars on the track bare any relationship at all to what is on the road, then they have an almost unique opportunity to make the next generation of cars look like literally anything. Pick cars from the 1950s, how about the coupes from the 1970s, I personally like the three-box cars with flared guards and kicker style duck tails from the early 1980s. Pick anything.
What would be really unfortunate is that with no manufacturers wanting to play, that the whole thing collapses; which it is in real danger of doing.