Now this has quite alot of misinformation in this thread now im going to straighten this all out....Holden went into body building in the 1920s...they built bodys for GM ,Dodge ,Fiat ,chrysler ,Studebaker ,Overland ,Hupmobile ,Essex ,Dort and Durant (why wont it letit scroll back up?) But the most widely known cars they built of this time was the 1929 GMA Chevrolet Holden body....the most popular and most australian content THEY BUILT...
BUT even before this was all heppening ford was contracting body builder to make their Model T fords the car had been selling here since 1908! But the body builder lost all their contracts in 1925 when the Ford motor company of australia was established...the cars where useing canadain built parts and where advertising made in the british empier....the car was also dubbed the squatters joy by most locals....But later in the year the cars where fully assemsbled,tuned for conditions and had a lot of parts locally made and where known as the Geelong model T ford....
Also holdens first car which is often called australians own is a laugh and a half....its an ex Oldsmobile design which was canned....it was designed and tested in america....the grey engine (and therefore all holden 6 cylenders up till the VK) was a variation of a chevrolet engine and all the cast's for components where also made in america...we at least did change the cosmetics (the square head lights and nostil Grille's wernt very becomming of the car) but as i said we made the cosmetics and refined it and other then the intial starting it we built them all in this country....so rember this story next time you try and argue which is more australian
holden as australian as mom and apple pie
Also on another note on a similar tone holden doesnt have a good track record with building there own cars the 48-215 (FX) for starters,The torana better known in other countrys as a Vauxhall Viva to other countrys...at first it was just a holden badge...the only big change they made was when they dropped their 6 in it....but it later took on its own life and is truely the australian holden (along with one other model) the camira was an international J car...the Gemini is an Isuzu....the Commadore was origonally a Opel design and still draws alot from its opel counterpart.....
as i mentioned before the later model toranas where as australian as they came but by 65 holden somewhat(they still drew a bit of america getting some testing done there) with the HD which shared little in common with nearly all of GM's Branches (the EH still relied heavily off american styling and some equipment)....its followed the trends but didnt follow the look of american cars hardly at all (it grew in size...which was the trend
) But showing how slowly we move out of trends and into something diffrent the HD sales slowed down...people saying the car looked too unusual...and the media didnt like the sharp edged gaurds as they called them saying they where a danger to pedestrians....Incidently this is they year ford was on the rocks and done the reliability trial of the XPs which where much improved for our conditions then even the substansially refubished XM series...so 65 was a time of big change in our motoring industry
And ona fianl note the fastest lapping car of 65 at bathurst was not the lotus cortinas but Studebaker cruisers (just like my fathers)...why they didnt win Big car+500 mile race+Drum brakes all round= 15 minute pit stops to rebuild the brakes...something the team had down to an art form.....but still took too long
they came 5th