Strangely enough, it was her husband Jason's car: he bought it when he was just 16 and learned to drive it while on his L-plates. 

When he and Mrs Hugget started dating, they drove the XR around for a couple of years before they were engaged in 1996.

The Fairmont was taken off the road and stripped back, with plans to restore and sell it to raise some funds for their wedding.

Like many of the best laid plans, that blueprint fell through, and when Mrs Hugget fell pregnant with the first of five children the car got pushed to the back of the shed where it sat in primer until about 2004.

It copped a coat of paint in the original colour – Sultan Maroon – but once again life got in the way, and the process of setting up their own business plus enjoying family life soon zapped time out of the car project.

It was in 2015 that they finally got back to the XR project and they had it back on the road in 2017.

By this stage it had dawned on Mr Hugget that he'd never held up his end of the deal in selling the XR to pay for a fancy wedding, so given the car had stayed with them for so long he decided the next best thing to do was to give his wife the keys.

So Mrs Hugget is now the proud owner of her '67 Fairmont.

“It's running a 302 Windsor V8 with a four-speed top-loader gearbox” Mr Hugget said.

The XR was the first Australian built Ford to feature a V8 powerplant and would originally have run a 289-cubic inch V8.

They've complemented the package with a set of Convo Pro mag wheels with big 295 rubber under the rear to further toughen the raked stance.

“I'm finally getting used to driving it”, Mrs Hugget said, “and we joined the Central West Car Club this year to meet people with a similar passion and to learn a few more things about old cars”.

Aside from giving the XR a bit more TLC and driving it more often there's no future plans for it.

“After all this time it's not going anywhere,” Mrs Hugget explained.

“The kids will end up inheriting it one day.”

For more information about the Central West Car Club, head to www.centralwestcarclub.com or follow them on Facebook.