Road-testing the 1980 Holden Commodore | RetroFocus
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- Опубликовано: 23 фев 2019
- In this episode of 'Torque' from July 1980, Peter Wherrett road-tests the Holden Commodore.
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Clear, concise and above all, realistic commentary. Lacking in today's world.
Back when you could buy a house,
Pay for a holiday with cash.
Policing was not a taxed revenue
raising corporation government owned.
When you could walk down the street
find a job that was permanent full time
What a sad wreck we have become now.
Agreed.
Back when Australian child mortality rate was 13 per 1000 (3.5 in 2017)
GDP per capita was $10,988 USD ($55,693 in 2017)
Life expectancy was 74.3 years (82.5 in 2017)
Back when homicide rates were 22% higher
I really hate how much longer we live and all the extra money we make.
The access to information and data we have now is just terrible!!
@@rocky0utcrop459 We might be earning more but what about the increase in prices for living now days?
@@DeathBaseTURBO More good news! GDP per capita adjusted for PPP (Purchasing power parity) was at $24.4k in 1980, which now sits at $46.4K!! Australia is a fantastic place to live!
@Sam Turner - absolute nonsense, Australians are more in debt, higher real unemployment, and more people living week to week than ever in modern times. Australians have less disposable cash than ever, and your GDP figures are nonsense out of context.
Medicines and surgery advance, that's why mortality rate goes down and life expectancy is up (I just had 'standard open heart surgery last month, my heart was stopped for an hour while they operated, and 3 days later I was walking a bit), but the fact is the CSIRO and medical science in general are less funded than ever.
The only people who say Australia is a great place to live are the people that have never lived in another country, you're ignorant and brainwashed, as I was for my first 40 years there.
Enjoy going to work tomorrow because YOU HAVE TO, or else.
Peter Wherrett really was a great presenter - clear, concise and knowledgable.
Did you know he lived his last years as a woman and then died of prostate cancer?
Weird eh?
Grant Snell ...it’s pretty well known. Not so weird either.
he was a closet gay
@@ronanrogers4127 Yeah sorry, I hadnt heard that before and was a bit taken aback.
Great presenter with consideration to flies interrupting the shit out of gm engine critique.
The good old days. My VB wagon had over 600 k on the clock when i sold it in 2002. Cheers for the great vid.
Cheers for uploading these great old videos 👍 This was my first car 😊
Me too!
Me three! But I had the 4 cylinder version, its was terrible...
Me too....wishing I still had it
Me too. I had the VB 2.85L. Great 1st car.
I had the 4 cylinder too... Auto :(
I remember how proud it made me feel to have the VC. Thank you abc for the memories...
Loving these videos, thank you. Presenters today could learn more than a thing or two from Peter.
Except his woeful dress sense
I wish there were a similarly intelligent articulate human who could assess and test motor vehicles today in the same impeccable manner as Peter . Sadly this is not the case but more on that later......
I wish that to.their should be a!
There are too many to list mate, but mainly on RUclips
Remember driving my dads car when I was 18 it was so smooth and comfortable at the time.
Yeah this is how you review cars. Not biased by the stats. Just purely driving the car.
1979 was the year of the VB Commodore family sedan. I bought one for $10,250.00 but there was an 8 weeks wait for its build. Real estate sales was my profession, & the average price of Brisbane houses was $18,000 at that time. The brakes always locked up on heavy braking. It wasn’t the missus that cost so much, it was a new car.
Great show back in the day, and some great road tests as well. Thanks for uploading.
this guy is just the best!
I had a 4.2 litre version of the VC SL and I loved it to bits...drove it into the ground in fact LOL
Milk crate grill design, so Australian so epic
....to keep the Galahs out....
My favourite grill was the honeycomb XB grill.
My favourite is the XB Falcon, looks tough😅.
Its a German car...
a rebadged Opel Senator/Rekord.
So refreshing to see honest car reviews..even though cars reviewed have been recycled many times over..you never see negative reviews from so-called professionals. We know the reason for that..thanks.
2:11 that 1980's sense of humor still funny 39 years later
Are u sure it's at 2:11? Because he wasn't making a joke there.
“By the same token, it doesn’t achieve very much, so perhaps we should go and do something more important”. Love it - exactly how I feel watching this video :D
had years of fun in a VB , VK and a VN
My mum bought me that digital watch he was wearing, one of the early LCDs, lasted me decades.
I'm still wearing my LCD Seiko that I got for my birthday, 4 years after this video.
This was my first car in 1987... I just loved it ! Boy did I want that VH SS.
My holy grail was a VH SLE with 253 and manual trans. Always regretted not doing one. Reckon I would still have it now..... cars these days are boring, efficient appliances!
@@petersnushall7293 I have a mate with a VH SLE 253... Low K's Auto...Aren't they just beautiful cars in and out !
Peter Wherrett was brilliant. My Dad had a new VB with 253 and 4 speed, it was a good car and handled well on Chain of Ponds. I was on my P's and was lucky to be allowed to borrow it sometimes. It struggled pulling the caravan, to be fair the van was twin axle. Our 308 manual HX did it easy. Before Holden released the VB everyone got a letter with a catalogue, it had a red on red SL/E in it and all us kids were talking about it. I have a HX 308 and a VL turbo now and to me this is my era. 90's on seems modern to me even though my trusty VT can have classic reg!i
He thinks this is a under powered, wished he would have tested a 4 cylinder Commodore
I had the VK with 5.0 litre engine. Okay, so it used more fuel but it was a joy to drive.
Purchased a vh v8 sle (top 30) in 1981. Still have the car today. Speaks volumes for their quality and endurance.
The fact that there is actually none on the road anymore shows how poor these Opels were. A babied one owner is not a representation of the model as a whole. They were junk.
@@Flying_GC Mate it was/is anything but babied. The NT is my base and this car toured our part of the world at very significant average speeds (no speed limits in its day) for hundreds of thousands of klms. My business was in agriculture, a lot of the driving was off the blacktop where bulldust would flow over the bonnet like water with zero dust penetration - cabin or boot. It did it tough trust me. Klms travelled is nudging the million with one engine rebuild 100,000 klms ago. Exceptional l would say!
6yrs later they just bought a datsun engine
these clips are great
this guy is needed in 2020
My Dad was a Motoring Writer also , He was friendly with this guy , Dad used to bring home new cars all the time , my mates were envious 🤔⁉️I wish I had some of those cars now 👍💰💰
I agree Tim, my Dad worked for Philip Morris as NSW State Promotions Manager and was always bringing home SLR and L34 Toranas, Commodore Irmschers, anything that GMH has that was interesting, including full MHDT mock-up A9-Xs that he would drop us off at school in. Most of the kids thought my dad was Peter Brock. Great times.
Why Holden came out with a 4 cylinder version of the Commadore is beyond me.
A function of the fuel crisis, the belief was smaller engines were the go.
What about 1 + 1? Is that also beyond you?
Yeah, the fuel crisis was the reason. 4 cylinder cars were very popular at the time due to high fuel prices and GMH thought they could cash in. Problem was they couldn't get their hands on a decent engine, and basically chopped two cylinders off their archaic six. Total dog.
these were sold in the europe my friend said they were not received well comparing to their local cars.
Those Starfire fours weren't much good. Really it was a Holden 2850 six cylinder engine with two cylinders lopped off it. It was a joke.
The 1978 Commodore was a copy of an Opal called Rekord and it was about 90% similar regrettably it wasn’t until about 2006 when they developed the “billion dollar baby” called the VE
Now that Commodore in actual fact fully locally designed and built and not long after that they went broke very sad indeed
But even going back to 1948 with the FX people bang on about that being an aussie car it was an American Chevrolet from General Motors that was very slightly tweaked
Having said all of that the 1978 and early 80s Commodores every time I see one I’m so surprised how small they are when I was a kid they felt like giant machines but they’re really mid-sized
Those blue motors were marginally better than the previous red motor. Not as good as the crossflow six that powered the Falcon. Shame we don't have good old fashioned decent and fair motoring journalists like Peter wherret anymore. He made a lot of sense and gave both criticisms and credits where they were due. His assessments were fair and unbiased. What a great car journalist he was.
Both inferior to the Chrysler slant six.
@@TheEwanMC yeah good point. However Chrysler got rid of the slant six in favour of the hemi six with the introduction of the VG series valiant in 1970. Hemi sixes were great too. The six pack hemi six on the VH Valiant Charger and Pacer sedan was an absolute screamer. Also the six pack engine was offered as an option on VJ Valiant Charger and mainstream valiant sedan models. Electronic ignition was offered on hemi six with the introduction of the VJ Model. First Australian car maker to do so. It was offered on V8s as well. The hemi six in my mind would be the best non crossflow engine ever made.
@@BlairSauer yes, I recall Chrysler marketing their ELB (Electronic Lean Burn) which was one of the first first onboard auto computer controllers.
@@TheEwanMC Yeah that was on the last gen valiant, the CM which was released in 1978.
@@TheEwanMCslant six was gone by the time crossflow came out though….
I remember the Holden VB commercial when they had it in drive then reserve completely burring the rear tyres, lol:) Basically doing roll backs non stop, that's the commercial for the VB, now not sure if it was aV8 or 6, think it was a six?
It was a 6. They were testing the transmission & drive train for vulnerability. Trimatic proved more reliable than the falcon auto.
I loved the handling of the early commodores (in good condition obviously) just the right balance between firm and comfortable
And importantly, no need for power steering!
You'll always hear some ignoramus say, "it's just a rebadged Opel!" Holden began with the Rekord body with a Senator nose (so it would have room for the inline 6 cylinders) They immediately did away with Opel's recirculating ball and nut steering (similar setup to what the Kingswoods had) so they could drop V8s in them with no issues. They ran this prototype around Lang Lang "just to see how much work needed to be done." The short answer: a lot! in 1500 km, the grille fell out of that first prototype. Withing 4000 km, the car had to be scrapped. A later prototype snapped in two at the firewall. It was at this stage the Holden engineers got really serious. They added internal braces, changed the composition of interior fabrics, upgraded the suspension and the brakes, barely a single component on it was unchanged from the Opel specifications. Yes the outer skin has a lot in common with its German cousin, but that's about where the similarities end
@Willie Peter That's because Holden literally will flog a prototype until it breaks, they want to know how low the breaking point is. A rebadged Opel would never survive what they put their own through
@@Mechknight73 well said.
Great car the Holden Commodore. My dad had the VC model running for over 10 years
Could you imagine today's reviewers driving like this? They would've spun out and rolled at the first corner, too busy looking for Apple Carplay.
Yeah, or during tapping the dashboard how hard the plastic is...
Anyone else enjoy watching the background houses and cars?
Holden.
Hope our luck don't end now H O L D E N
My mum have a VC commodore back in the day with the 1.9 4 banger star fire motor 3 speed auto it was gutless.
It's amazing how good that old snotbox can look these days with some tasteful mods, and I never realized how much this Peter looked like Brocky.
Peter Wherrett is wrong about the engine being 20 years old. Yes, you could say it is even older than that, as its design dates back to Holden's "grey" motor" of 1948, but the VC Commodore marked the first appearance of the new "blue" motor, which featured many changes to the earlier "red" motor (which first appeared in 1963) which was what the previous VB Commodore had. The blue featured a 12-port head (up from the 9-port design with siamesed ports that the red had), counterbalanced crank, heavy duty conrods, a new 2-barrel carburettor, twin-branch exhaust manifold, etc. Yes, still an OHV non-crossflow design and sharing the same basic dimensions, but a much smoother motor (although still far from a BMW straight-6 etc) than the old red.
I've been reading your comments, you know your stuff about Holdens.
He said 25 years old. IN ITS CURRENT FORM. EVEN OLDER BLAH BLAH… so yes he did say it was even older than 25 years.
Peter says, I think, "a manufactured Australian car" and completely forgets to mention where it actually came from. The VB was a modified Opel Rekord (GM Germany) with a longer nose grafted on from the Opel Senator to accommodate the 6 cyl (the Rekord was a 4cyl) and strengthened front suspension and body mounting. Although they forgot to strengthen the back area and with the V8 and towbar fitted, more than one owner found what happened towing a heavy load - the rear actually almost broke off, until they patched it up with heavy steel bars. Do a Google search for Opel Rekord and see how almost identical it is to the VB. Holden couldn't or wouldn't design a world class platform so they basically stole one from another European GM subsidiary , changed a few things and put in their archaic 30 year old tractor engine and clunky 4 speed. Notice they couldn't even come up with their own names: Commodore and Senator, both stolen names. The 5.0 litre SL/E version was probably one of the best all rounder cars available in Australia at the time and for many years. As long as you could handle the relatively small cabin space and the very 70s colour saturation schemes of the luxury models (eg ALL red or ALL green interiors).
please upload more of these
About time ABC realised it can entertain people on the internet.....
Can they??!!!! ..... wow !! who'd have known were where you all this time!!!!
Classic I miss the 80s
Was just thinking about the amount of work that GMH Elizabeth provided for supporting industry like myself over the years. ( Transport operator). The amount of freight I moved in to that plant over 30 odd years . Overhead. Conveyor equipment for the product line for an engineering company, granulated plastic for bumper bars, door and window sills from Silcraft at Golden Grove, heavy gauge wire to Bridgestone Edwardstown for making steering wheels just off the top of my head.
I never saw a South Australian Police Ford Falcon of any description ever! Funny that...They refused to use them! All SA Police used were Holdens and Valiants! I think WA Police used Fords but SA Coppers were religiously committed to GM and Chrysler!
@@craigmc3614 Holden plants located in that state.
My first Commodore was a VB after owning only Toranas, should have stayed with me Toranas!
Handling, roadholding and ride aside the VC Commodore in 1980 was a car that really was powered by an outdated agricultural underpowered and thirsty six that directly dated back to the 149/179 Red engined EH Holden released in August 1963. Simply not good enough for a car of this calibre.
Holden should have bought Chryslers 4.0 and 4.3 Hemi ELB sixes once Chrysler Mitsubishi dropped the CM Valiant in 1981 and used them in these Conmodores .
Peter Wherrett' s analytical and objective approach was fantastic and it was well described in the doco......other men wouldn't have perhaps been so gentlemanly like In their description of the engines.
True ,the hemi was the best 6 cylinder made .The holden and ford 6 is an old design. I'd just buy a valiant, cheap in those days because of the stupid Ford verse Holden crap .
My dad completely cooked a red motor where the orange colour on the engine changed to a darker red . Fixed the hose and filled the radiator and ran for years with no problems.
quite enjoyable.
That's what Australia looked like 41 years ago.
We got a version of this in the UK at the time, called the Vauxhall Senator. Came with the 2.8 straight six, and was a nice car for its time. It looked just the same, although it was made by GM Opel in Germany.
The story of the commodore is that GM wanted every brand to have the same car world wide. Holden chose the Opel Rekord for their family car however the front end wasn't large enough to accommodate the Holden straight 6 so Holden came up with the Commodore which was a Rekord with the Senator front end.
These videos are awesome cheers iv never seen this show funny seeing these cars newish lol .
He is right the 6 cylinder motor was a fuel gusler , but it was a good car all round handled like it was on rails, most stable car on the road, safe as a church, well as safe as the nut behind the steering wheel.
@Chris Alexy I have been in a vk 5litre doing 220kph plus and it was very stable, a lot more stable than others that couldn't even go that fast.
they had a great front end arrangement, the McPherson strut and the type of caster rod they used worked well.
a lot of European cars had those big fat rubber bushes on the control arms that got soft and started to make the front ends wonder, really puts you of them, but both the commodores and later model Falcons had good front end designs and its an important issue when you have large distances to travel like we do.
@Kristof Alexy you obviously have no clue if you think the early Commodore was just a rebadged Opel Rekord. As for comparing the handling of the early Commodores to a Ford Falcon, the AU Falcon wasn't released until 1998, 18 years AFTER the VC was released (and 20 years after the VB). You should be comparing it to the XD Falcon, which although it was designed and released after the VB Commodore still featured a leaf spring rear suspension (which Holden abandoned with the HQ back in 1971) and was an absolute boat which the Commodore ran rings around n regards to handling.
Was my first car with a 253 in it then put a 308 in it loved it
VH was my favourite commodore. I still love driving my LS3 VF, but damn, I wish I'd never parted with my old VH
@charlie I've chopped plenty of them myself when I was involved in speedway, plus I've chopped up plenty of falcons. I'm a mechanic, so know both falcons and commodores extremely well, and would still take a commodore over a Falcon.
Yes mate, I hear you. I have a VeSS but rallied a VH SS back in the day. Cried when it was sold and realised what I had done.
Very blunt, on point and looking back now he has really pointed out the things I didn’t want to hear about the cars that I collect. Regardless of what he did in is personal life his views and knowledge about the automotive industry are very important and maybe if the big 3 had of listened in the 1970s we would still have them.
I knew someone who had one of these, brand new with a 4 cylinder Starfire (Misfire) engine and 3 speed Traumatic transmission.
Thank you for uploading, I love watching these episodes of Torque! Good cars the early Commodores but unfortunate they had a poor crash rating.
you can blame Opel for that.
Tell me about it.My VC Commodore SL/E came off second best with a telegraph pole.The car was written off.There was not one straight panel on the car after the crash.The police said I was lucky to be alive.Though I did buy the next model (VH SL/X) after that accident and managed to keep that one straight.Love watching these old car tests with Peter Wherrett.
Sad but true...
EVERY car from that era fails modern crash standards
Crumpledores!
...Peter was a brilliant presenter and master of the car review... he led the way for intelligent and honest criticism and will be remembered s a leading light in an industry full of BS.
nice work bud
The car manufacturers should have listened. More to Peter and took his advice serious the commode would be a great car equal to BMW M3 coupe
Not Commodore, but Holden were close to brining back the Torana about 12-13 years ago however the GCF stopped it from happening but if it hadn’t Holden would of built the Torana which would of compared very much so to an M3. It would of had the V8 from the Commodore and also a V6 twin turbo both of which would of been very comparable in power, the weight distribution would of been 51-49 or even the perfect 50-50 which the E90 3 series had. I currently own a 2011 E90 323i and over the years I’ve owned nearly every Commodore with my last being a WN Caprice which let me tell you on the inside was nearly as good as my 2011 323i however the cheap plastics just brought it down a bit. In short, the VE/VF really were the poor mans BMW but could of had the potential to be one or beat them at a cheaper price.
Anybody who knows anything about cars knows BMWs, Mercedes, and Volkswagen´s are pieces of shit, unreliable and are for people with self-esteem issue's.
Same. I had a VB with the same size "173" Red motor, with the 4 speed manual from late 1989 til 1994..
Agree it had no power & wouldn't rev past 4500rpm.. But damn they were reliable
2.8l equals 186
Too many useless gadgets today.
@@lppools That is incorrect.
The 173 is 2.83L. While the 186 is 3.05L
Any online conversion will show that
The 2850 173Ci engine was very sluggish, okay for the smaller Torana but not a Commodore, I ended up putting a Mild Stage 2 3.3L in my VH now that went well indeed 👍
My 18 year old e39 5 series is reliable. I need more than that from a car lol
Late 80s my dad had the 308 cop car model in nz, brand spanking new😍.. I'd steal the keys and start it👌
A very desirable car indeed.
My first car was a '79 VB 3.3L commodore with the red engine. My brother bought the '80 VC 2.8L commodore. Driving his VC felt like driving a go-kart compared to the VB. Severely under-powered.
I had a VC for a while, handled beautiful and the old 202 was smooth.
More Please.
What about the 3.3 litre 6 cyl? That thing really went. I think it was called the 'blue motor' as opposed to the previous 'red' motor which was used in the HZ Kingswood SL as well. I can still remember my dad in his VC out accelerating an XD at the traffic lights to go from a duel lane to a single lane where there was some roadworks and we were running late to pick my mum up and we went right past the XD (and he was really trying) good old VC Commodore!
The XD was a lot heavier though.
This is the 'blue' motor. The model Commodore they are testing here is the base model (the 'L') which came with the smaller 2.85L engine; the 3.3L was an optional extra, or standard equipment on the better-equipped SL (amd SL/E)
they detuned the old torana and hz 3.3's for these.66kw or 71kw if what I read from road tests from that era on the VB.I knew a guy who had one of the early ones when he and I were working as pizza delivery guys in 2006.the uc and hz holdens made do with 81 or 88kw units.
I had a VC. First car I ever had where you could set the speed of the intermittent wiper operation, important in Melbourne 😀. And no power steering and no ABS.
Around the 8:30 mark he states that this commodore has the making of really good cars . I drive a vf calais 6.2 ltr 6 speed and he was right .
Not fully Australian, German Opel Rekord design and as such some time on the European in the seventies. I imagine they made it somewhat tougher to deal with the Australian roads. The standard engine in Europe was the 2 liter 4 cyl.
My first car a red manual vc ohhh the memories
I had the six 2.8,3.3 V8 4.2 and 5.0 litre in the VB Commodores.I miss them so much.
He didn't mention the lane keeping assist, the traction control or the bluetooth connectivity.
I drove a VB 253 in Adelaide, ah yes those were the days
Look at the body roll on the straight 😂
While not so marvellous today, compared to a HQ it was a big improvement!
I have owned VZ and VE commodore V6 utes and they both had notchy, clunky, slow shifting manual transmissions. It looks like Holden never fixed that problem although the engines, suspension and handling were pretty good.
This man was so ahead of his time! He called the nissan rb30 and 3.8 buick before it ever happened! They stayed with the 3.3 until the VL where for the 1st time, all commodores got a 3.0ltr electronic fuel injected nissan 6! The 3.8V6 was even better! And when turbocharged the 3.8 will beat most cars! The 250 crossflow 6 the fords had was much better than the 3.3 and 2.8 the commodore had
I don't know why this appeared in my recommended videos, but I'm glad that it did. But what is the red targa top he's driving during the intro?! It's driving me nuts!
Fiat X1/9
@@pauldewar626 I now know that due to research I've done. But thank you nonetheless for responding.
A West German Opel with a Holden badge
ROGER EVANS I thought it was a design from Yugoslavia.
@@kdegraa who told you that?
An Aussie built car but styled from European cars. It basically Side product with Holden HZ. HZ Holden was like the main aussie car and Torana and commodore and Gemini were like side products.
FAR from being an Opel. Yes, it was based on the Rekord but these literally fell apart in testing (they could not handle the tougher Australian conditions) and Holden had to do a LOT of work strengthening the chassis etc, and there is no interchangeability of mechanical parts or panels - basically completely different cars which only look similar.
Holden engines, steering and suspension
Our family had the auto version of that Commodore. It was quite a good car no problems with it like the manual version Peter is testing here.
This was my 2nd car.but an auto.did make a modification to it.took out the economy gauge an put in a taco.which was standard in the sle commodore.my first car was a hz Holden ute ..308 v8.now I got a Vt commodore.as Barret said they need to change the engine.v6.they just get better.
The same 13-17 L/100 from a 2.8L enging today would be out performed by a diesel... yet we could afford to drive more back then.
I used to love my old Commodore. Traded in an old EH to get it from an old Kevin Dennis dealership in Richmond.
I had the VB commodore sedan red 1979 one 202 Auto
Check the skinny tyres. The clunky steel wheels. And an ancient engine with a carburettor !
Kula Cnt correct.
anyone else watching this in 2021?
the engineers had to take their hands off the steering wheel to play with their equipment, so to speak.
But GM did revise the red motor they painted it blue and then black in the vk series with injection in the berlina and calais.
wow.... 13/17L per 100 even back then.
My 2018 motorcycle does 10.5 L/ 100km, and my Mazda 2 daily, 9.8L per hundred.
We barely advanced in 40 years.
My 81 Z750 got 20km/l. I wasn't a fast rider that's why I'm able to write this😅.
How simple was life back then...... was only 1 year old.... 😂
Interesting to hear even back in 1980 the 185 engine was feeling underdone even with the blue motor update. The 202 with the 3 speed trimatic wasn't any better, both barely had enough power to run what was meant to be a family car. Funnily enough the black EFI motor was a quantum leap ahead of the old carbureted versions from reports at the time, interesting it only saw the light of day in VK Berlinas and Calais for about 2 years only!
The red, known as the black motor by the time of VK, was at the end of its life cycle. Having said that the injected 202 produced 20nm more torque than the Nissan 6 that replaced it.
Btw, he was testing the 173 (2850) not 185.
Very smooth running motor.
There’s your real car at 6:56 the old HK👍
the gear linkages on the old Aussie 4 speed were pretty agricultural.
The old m20 m21s weren’t that bad if used as they should be. Peter was used to Bmw and Mercedes. None of those cars were as reliable OR easy to work the interior trim fell to pieces the leather cooked itself in Australian sun and the spare parts prices were a joke. The Aussie six would run on rubbish oil and rusty water and still keep going and if you needed parts they were chump change.
The economy gauge on zero... lol
As a kid, my favourite thing to do in Dad's VB wagon was watch that needle bounce up and down as we drove along
At 150km/h, probably flat out, hardly surprising.
Yep I’d say she was flat to the boards at 150km/h. An engine well past it’s time.
Yep that 173 would have been wide open at 150kmh
A 3.55:1 differential ratio, and direct 1:1 top gear. The 2.85 would have been right at the limit. Not until the VK series, that a 5th over gear was added, to the 3.3 ltr that is? The 2.85 had been dropped from the line up.
That GM 2.8 six was put in everything here in the states. It was also put in the jeep Cherokee before AMC developed the bulletproof 4.0 straight six…the base 4 cylinder had more power and was fuel injected and didn’t have head gasket issues 🤣
We had these as Opel Rekord. An upscale car
It was the Vauxhall/Opel Senator not Opel Rekord.
The Opel Rekord was the same as the Vauxhall Carlton.
The Holden was much stronger, the European versions couldn't handle Australian conditions and had to be re-engineered. But they needed a car to start with and it was a good choice. I own the final version of this body series (the VL) and it came with a Nissan RB30 Turbo engine, it is a great car.
@@oz2strokeman116
Stronger in what way? you mean it had a bigger engine, which is more economical over long distances nothing more.
Coz I think you'll find European conditions adversely affect cars more than Australian conditions, as we use salt on the roads in winter which rusts the chassis of all cars.
All cars last a lot longer in Australian conditions.
@@whynotagain3639 nope, this model was Opel Commodore in Europe as well, they usually had 2.5 inline 6 carburated or direct injection, Senator was a bit longer, higher trim, they usually came with 2.5, 2.8 or 3.0 inline 6, same as coupe version called Monza 👍
Rekord was mainly powered with 1.9 or 2.0 carburated or injected, later version had diesel option as well.
@@drazj
Not in the UK, it was the Vauxhall Viceroy
Aah, the good old GM V-Car. I wonder much GM Holden had to beef up those cars for the torturous roads in Australia, because the European versions were thin-gauge lightweighted flimsy things typical of their era, with flexy body structures and horrible crash performance. These all originated as the Opel Commodore in Germany (Vauxhall Viceroy in the UK), derived from the Opel Rekord/Vauxhall Carlton V-Car platform. The main difference was a longer front end (to package 6-cyl. engines) and beefier 5-bolt wheels. Along with the Holden and Opel Commodore (sold as a Vauxhall Viceroy in the UK) there were even more variants with new sheetmetal from the B-pillar aft sold as the luxury models Opel Senator and Vauxhall Royale, both also available as a snazzy coupé, the Opel Monza. Even Daewoo got their versions, so did South Africa...a true world car!
VB-VK my favourite Commodore sedans.
Yes I still love these models too.But I love VB-VL models.I would kill for a good one now.Just awesome and simple cars that handled well for there time.
@100% reality My first car was the VB 253 (red) V8 auto. A great car. Next door neighbour worked for GMH so the V8 auto was tuned to perfection. Swapped the standard carb. for a double barrel Webber. Made a huge difference in throttle response. Also, put 'sport' strut inserts in front, ++ handling !
@100% reality The neighbour 'tweaked' my trans to perfection. Solid shifts instead of the soft/fluffy stock shifts. I found the Webber suited my needs, so stuck with it. 253 purred like a kitten !
9:06 I think the fly enters his skull
Sadly, that fly is now deceased.
Just wondering why the original theme music wasn’t used? A licensing issue?