Zeta News 2.0: New VF Commodore and Chevrolet SS

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05XR8
We could blame Chevrolet for not making the Commodore available all these years. As well as Ford for not reintroducing the Falcon. It will indeed be a sad day this October, when the Falcon dies and next year when Commodore is no more.
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Technically they made a Holden available since 2003 so Ford is the one that has some explaining to do.
 
LMSCorvetteGT2
Technically they made a Holden available since 2003 so Ford is the one that has some explaining to do.
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Especially when the XR4Ti and Scorpio came out. That would have been the right time to reintroduce the Falcon. The Thunderbird was still around and the Taurus was hunting the Accord and Camry crowd.

Having a sport sedan to sit below the Crown Vic and Marquis, would have fit lovely with Mustang enthusiasts.
 
05XR8
Especially when the XR4Ti and Scorpio came out. That would have been the right time to reintroduce the Falcon. The Thunderbird was still around and the Taurus was hunting the Accord and Camry crowd.

Having a sport sedan to sit below the Crown Vic and Marquis, would have fit lovely with Mustang enthusiasts.
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I mean I don't think it would have done awesome, the SS is special and the GTO sold because of a nameplate it wasn't even close to replicating. Same goes for the G8, being less then it could have been. All in all it's great that GM have had a sport sedan blue collar car, but I feel the market really wasn't there and that's why Ford didn't bother.
 
LMSCorvetteGT2
I mean I don't think it would have done awesome, the SS is special and the GTO sold because of a nameplate it wasn't even close to replicating. Same goes for the G8, being less then it could have been. All in all it's great that GM have had a sport sedan blue collar car, but I feel the market really wasn't there and that's why Ford didn't bother.
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Gotcha. However, GM did try with the Cadillac Caterax. The one after the Cimmaron, I think. ;) The BMW E39 and 500E didn't help their cause by being so good either.
There was this though:
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HSV VT Clubsport. Had GM marketed this as a hot Cadillac, who knows?
 
GM didn't really try with the Catera, though. They put so little effort into putting together an appealing car for the American market that Holden had already designed a drivetrain package for the car that would have been cheaper, more reliable and more suited to American drivers; in addition to the sporty models that Holden already had knocking around that could have been easily sourced years ahead of the CTS-V; and Cadillac still imported the German model with its essentially bespoke engine and transmission made out of tissues. The advertisements they put together claiming it was a sports sedan by directly attacking the actually sporty sedan Cadillac already made was just icing on the cake.



There's also the elephant in the room:

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http://www.goauto.com.au/mellor/mellor.nsf/story2/31B291B9847021CBCA257FFD0028D70C
GM HOLDEN is planning to stockpile thousands of Melbourne-made V6 Commodore engines before closing its engine plant late this year, thus tiding it over for the final nine months or so of Commodore production at Elizabeth, South Australia.

The demise of the 13-year-old Fisherman’s Bend engine factory will bring down the curtain on 68 years of Holden manufacturing at the iconic Victorian site where it built its first Holden-badged car in 1948.

Although a firm date for the Holden Engine Operations plant closure has not been confirmed by Holden, it is expected to come after Holden quits Cruze small car production at Elizabeth in October.

The V6 engines to be stockpiled will meet the latest Euro 5 emissions regulations that come into force in Australia on November 1 this year.

However, Holden has been given special dispensation by the federal government to defer introduction of the Euro 5-compliant V6 until early 2017.

The company says it wants the latest engine to coincide with the introduction of the 2017 model-year Commodore that is likely to be the subject of a concerted send-off campaign by GM’s Australian arm.

GoAuto expects the MY17 Commodore to go into production directly after the annual summer shut-down at Elizabeth, running until the fourth quarter of 2017 when Holden will close local production entirely, more or less simultaneously with Toyota Australia.

Holden has already stopped production of LPG gas and E85 ethanol-compatible engines in the latest VF II Commodore that was introduced in October last year.

Its US-made 6.2-litre V8 engines in vehicles such as the Commodore SS, Calais V and Caprice V are already Euro-5 compliant.

These V8 engines have been taking an increasing share of Commodore sales in recent years, even as overall sales of the Australian-developed large car have declined on the back of falling fleet sales. Last year, Holden sold just 34,010 Commodore sedans, wagons and utes and Caprices in Australia – well short of the 107,515 sold in 1998 when the Commodore and its variants topped the sales charts.

From 2018, the Commodore will be replaced by an imported model, thought to be based on the next Opel-built Insignia in Germany.

More than a million V6 engines have been built for Australia and export markets at Holden’s Global V6 Engine plant since it opened with great fanfare in 2003.

The $400 million plant began building the High Feature V6 to replace a Buick-sourced 3.8-litre V6 for Commodore and also for export to GM subsidiaries such as Buick, Chevrolet, Pontiac, Opel and Saab, as well as external customers such as Alfa Romeo.

At one point, it made 34 variants of the V6 engine, ranging from the potent 2.8-litre turbo used in Opel/Vauxhall’s Insignia VRX/OPC and Saab 9-5 to an LPG-capable 3.6.

But Holden engine production at Fisherman’s Bend goes right back to the founding of “Australia’s own car” in 1948 when Holden started building GM’s 2.15-litre six cylinder ‘grey motor’ for the original 48-215 ‘FX’ Holden at the same site.

The plant stepped up to the L6 ‘red motor’ six for the EH Holden in 1963, and then the first V8 engines – the 253 and 308 – for the HT range, including the first Monaro, in 1969.

The company built 4.7 million four-cylinder Family II engines between 1981 and 2009 in one of the most successful Australian automotive export programs in history.

In all, more than 10 million Holden engines have been built at Fisherman’s Bend. Once the current engine plant closes, the manufacturing site is set to be sold off by GM, leaving only Holden’s head office and GM Australia design and engineering centre there.
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I never knew the 2.8 turbo V6 in the Opel/Vauxhall models was a Holden unit. Would go for an Insignia VXR if the tax on it wasn't so ludicrous.
 
VXR
I never knew the 2.8 turbo V6 in the Opel/Vauxhall models was a Holden unit.
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I didn't know either. It's interesting to read about things that were developed here in Australia. Things I thought were developed in North America or Eastern countries.
 
What I find a little odd is, the location of the thermostat.

For an engine developed in Australia where its application is in a front engined, rear wheel drive, and therefore a north-south configuration, to put it at the rear of the block, with access restricted like that...:odd:

It's only when you consider how many of the blocks are placed east-west in a front wheel drive on a worldwide basis that it's barely forgivable.

Would it have killed the designers to have placed the thermostat on the other end of the block ala the Aussie designed V8?

As it stands for Commodore owners, if you need to replace the thermostat, you have two choices.

1. Remove the transmission and approach the task from underneath

Or,

2. Remove the intake manifold and shred your hands & arms jamming them between block and firewall.

Either way, being able to see you're actually doing the job correctly isn't exactly easy :banghead:
 
VXR
I never knew the 2.8 turbo V6 in the Opel/Vauxhall models was a Holden unit. Would go for an Insignia VXR if the tax on it wasn't so ludicrous.
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Looks like the engine is made in Australia, while the turbos are done by what's left of Saab inside of GM. I'm pretty sure that engine, the LP9, was developed by Saab initially, but I may be wrong.
 
I wonder if the Holden VASC teams are being kept in the loop. Especially Red Bull Racing Australia.

http://www.goauto.com.au/mellor/mellor.nsf/story2/5DD0FC24E5225752CA25800900815CD6
HOLDEN has revealed there will be no time delay with the release of the imported next-generation Commodore once Australian production of the current model ceases during the last quarter of 2017.

While the company has not yet communicated which global model will be used as the imported Commodore – widely anticipated to be the new-generation Opel/Vauxhall Insignia from Europe – Holden chairman and managing director Mark Bernhard said the transition from the Australian-manufactured large car to the new one would be seamless.

“(The next Commodore) will follow on like the next generation of any normal product,” Mr Bernhard confirmed to GoAuto at the launch of the MY17 Holden Colorado in Queensland this week.

“We will have an orderly runout of the current generation of Commodore and lead us into the next generation of Commodore.”

Mr Bernhard confirmed that the imported model would be in showrooms by the end of next year, adding: “We’re not in a position at the moment to announce what that vehicle is, but that’s the assumption that it will follow on shortly after the end of production.”

Leading up to the end of manufacturing in Australia, Mr Bernhard said the company would neither follow what Ford has done in the paring down of derivatives like the ute, nor stockpile vehicles to sell well into the following year.

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Left: Holden chairman and managing director Mark Bernhard.

“The current plan is to continue to build all the derivatives all the way through,” Mr Bernhard revealed. “If customer demand changes, obviously we will need to change those plans, but at this stage, we’ll see everything through – V6, V8, and each of the derivatives.”

Along with the Commodore sedan, utility and Sportwagon, Holden builds the long-wheelbase Caprice, as well as the Cruze small car, although the latter’s production will be wound down on October 7 this year – the same day Ford Australia pulls the plug on local manufacturing.

As GoAuto has reported, the company also plans to close its Port Melbourne engine plant by the end of the year, stockpiling V6 engines for use in the final local Commodore and derivatives in 2017.

Mr Bernhard said he understands the intense interest surrounding whether the next mid-size Insignia – currently in the final stages of development and due for release in Europe in the second half of next year – turns out to be the 2018 Commodore.

However, he emphasised that Holden has just embarked on one of the busiest launch periods in its 68-year history, with two vital new models – the updated Colorado and the Cruze-replacing Astra – to be released in Australia by the end of this year as part of the 2014 announcement of 24 model launches by 2020.

“We don’t have any firm plans on when we will announce,” he told GoAuto. “We still need to work through those. At the moment we’re here to talk about Colorado, and once we get through Colorado, we will start to put our minds to other vehicles as well. We have Astra coming up at the end of this year.

“The good news is what we have a lot of new product coming out and a lot of other things to talk about, and we just need to work through each of those … When we announce each of them (we will) give each of the products a clear runway. We have a fantastic next six months with product coming out.”

While Mr Bernhard said Holden never divulges the internal volume expectations of any new model, he believes the imported Commodore will remain a viable sales proposition.

“What our sales are will be based on customers,” he said. “Our job is to have a portfolio of products that appeals to those diverse customer needs and different customer segments. The market continues to evolve, and we need to have forecasts where that needs to be, but ultimately it’s how nimble we can be in meeting that customer demand.”

VFII Commodore sales are down 3.6 per cent to the end of July this year with 15,223 sales, although it remains a dominant force in the sub-$70,000 large-car segment with a 74.1 per cent share.

In contrast, the Ford Falcon – which reaches the end of the line in two months’ time – has continued to spiral downward, falling 23.9 per cent this year to just 2819 registrations for a 13.7 per cent share.

Asked if he was tempted to import the Chevrolet Camaro pony car considering the US-built Ford Mustang’s incredible reception in Australia, with waiting lists stretching up to two years, Mr Bernhard said demand for the Commodore V8 was even stronger and that the company had already announced that a sportscar of similar appeal is well under development with input from Holden engineers.

“Ford has done a great job with Mustang,” Mr Bernhard said. “(But) we’re selling more V8s (in Commodore) than they are … so we’re pretty happy with the portfolio of product that we’ve got today.

“(GM International Operations president) Stefan Jacobi has announced that we will have a sportscar, and we continue to work on that sportscar.

“But at the moment, we need to focus on the cars that we are building, and cars that customers are certainly voting with their wallets that they want.”
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Earlier today, I saw a car I thought was the Holden Commodore VF. Like... since when did Holden sell its vehicles to the United States under the Holden badge? Turns out this guy simply had a Chevrolet SS and switched up the badging from Chevrolet badging to Holden badging. I even saw HSV badging on it also. I had to give this guy credit, though. Had me fooled! Then too, if it was a true Holden, it probably would have been right-hand drive.
 
If the next 'Commodore' is a re-badged, next-gen Insignia that's looking like being a hatchback, I won't be a fan at all.
I'm not happy that they're going to call it a Commodore in the first place.
If we Aussies were getting a re-badged Cadillac CTS or XTS, I could live with it being called a Commodore (FR driveline) and I'd be a whole lot happier.
 
Pete05
If the next 'Commodore' is a re-badged, next-gen Insignia that's looking like being a hatchback, I won't be a fan at all.
I'm not happy that they're going to call it a Commodore in the first place.
If we Aussies were getting a re-badged Cadillac CTS or XTS, I could live with it being called a Commodore (FR driveline) and I'd be a whole lot happier.
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A rebadged ATS would be even better, smaller and lighter.
 
-> In my opinion, the ATS platform is perfect for a Torana revival, while a shorter, simplified CTS platform would be a perfect Commodore torch bearer!

(US) = Current model in North America | (CH) = Chinese model Not Available in US

ATS (US) = Torana Coupe/Sedan
*ATS LWB (CH) = Torana Ute
CTS (US) = Commodore/Sport Wagon/Ute
*CTS LWB (CH) = Caprice/PPV/Statesman/etc.
*Camaro = Monaro/Sandman
*Corvette = GTR-X/Efijy

(*Going overboard now...)

^ Done, I've revived the spirit of Holden again! :crazy:
 
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Holden would do good to offer a little coupe.
That Chevrolet rwd concept car. I think the name Torana has come up in the last 10 years.
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I don't know about young people though. The 86/BR-Z are okay but, if Nissan did that iDX, I think other marques would try to get in on that.
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Even here it looks dated. However, if it were affordable and with that slick interior(maybe not denim seats) with all the apps, etc. Nissan could sell these very well.
 
JohnBM01
Earlier today, I saw a car I thought was the Holden Commodore VF. Like... since when did Holden sell its vehicles to the United States under the Holden badge? Turns out this guy simply had a Chevrolet SS and switched up the badging from Chevrolet badging to Holden badging. I even saw HSV badging on it also. I had to give this guy credit, though. Had me fooled! Then too, if it was a true Holden, it probably would have been right-hand drive.
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It is a true Holden, just imported...have you not read this thread? Also there is a company that takes other "Holden" imported GM and converts them for you to original Holden set up. Badges and all, they even do utes and driver conversion AFAIK. They're based out of Colorado or Nevada, of those south west states.

Pete05
If the next 'Commodore' is a re-badged, next-gen Insignia that's looking like being a hatchback, I won't be a fan at all.
I'm not happy that they're going to call it a Commodore in the first place.
If we Aussies were getting a re-badged Cadillac CTS or XTS, I could live with it being called a Commodore (FR driveline) and I'd be a whole lot happier.
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ATS or Camaro would be more reasonable as Commodore, however, I don't see an XTS or CTS in the same light as any commodore before it. Especially if rebadged. I'd rather see that done to the Camaro
yabiggoose
Torana, ute.

Hahahaha.
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You laugh at that but not the idea of a Camaro made into a Sandman...come on
 
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LMSCorvetteGT2
It is a true Holden, just imported...have you not read this thread? Also there is a company that takes other "Holden" imported GM and converts them for you to original Holden set up. Badges and all, they even do utes and driver conversion AFAIK. They're based out of Colorado or Nevada, of those south west states.



ATS or Camaro would be more reasonable as Commodore, however, I don't see an XTS or CTS in the same light as any commodore before it. Especially if rebadged. I'd rather see that done to the Camaro


You laugh at that but no the idea of a Camaro made into a Sandman...come on
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Left Hand Utes out of Colorado 👍
 
LMSCorvetteGT2
It is a true Holden, just imported...have you not read this thread? Also there is a company that takes other "Holden" imported GM and converts them for you to original Holden set up. Badges and all, they even do utes and driver conversion AFAIK. They're based out of Colorado or Nevada, of those south west states.
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I've seen guys in the US do "trades" with Holden owners down under because we want their stuff and some of them want ours. It's not terribly hard to swap some bumper covers and badging over.
 

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