92 replies to this topic

[yel327]

I found that Saffron car in the Press Fleet records. It was the only SLR 5000 available for the release, and it is an initial production car that seems to be allocated to Engineering. It is even still called XU2 in one of the early lists (prior to this being changed to SLR5000 in August 1973.

[arrimar]

Is the saffron test car behind this truck load?

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[S pack]

The same Saffron LH SL/R 5000 the NSW Police had perhaps???

[arrimar]

No aerial on the NSW car's front guard but the VIC car does.

[S pack]

No aerial on the NSW car's front guard but the VIC car does.

Good point, I should have had another look at the magazine cover pic before posting.

[yel327]

I also believe someone at Holden would have read the test and past on the word to whoever was responsible to slow down the test cars. Before the 72 Bathurst car scare I don't think that they would have worried as much. I also believe this is the fastest factory standard tested accelerating Pre EFI Holden. Brock driving a VH SS group 3 ran a 14.9 as well with snap gear changes but the road testers driving the same car only got 15.65. Maybe a stroked Brock but if you count them then You would have to count the HO L34 running lower gearing and I don't doubt that the L34 would smash the Brock, cheers Aaron.

 

 

Certainly. The Supercar scare wasn't GMH's main driver for hobbling the higher perfromance cars, but it certainly was at the front of their minds. The fact they purposely deleted XU2 option code from LH shows you how nervous they were. The driver was GM's Corporate ban on factory involvement in racing. The cars they built (in plain sight) for competition were hidden as best as they could, with the odd oops happening like this LH appears to be. They only got the XU1 approved as they showed how effective a rally car it was, which appears to have been all good as that wasn't racing? 

 

The fastest factory tested GMH cars pre VK Group A were the HG GTS350's tested by Mel Nicholds and later Peter Robinson. Mel didn't get to do the full acceleration figures as when he got the car back to do this it had been "fixed", but he did some important tests and made some statements that Peter Robinson laughed at, until he tested a HG GTS350 mid 1971. Then he apologised to Mel, but Peter wasn't testing the full suite of figures, just proving what Mel had said that as a point-point car the HG GTS350 had no peers, that it could effortlessly cruise at 2 miles per minute. This is why AMC magazine tested the low mile car, to show what Mel had partially revealed by completing the tests not done due to the de-tuning of the car. The AMC magazine tests mirrored what Mel had done with the car initially and filled in the missing tests. If you are talking fastest acceleration up to 60mph then yes, you can see that this early Torana was a rocket off the mark, it was as quick to 60mph as the PhaseIII as tested by Wheels. They didn't do 0-100mph tests or trap speed which is a shame as this would easily reveal the car struggling with the PhaseIII or the GTS350 going past it somehwere around 80-90mph. The 0-60mph of 6.4s is very quick. The magazine article does make note of it struggling past 6000 due to lifters and restrictive exhaust, however this will be the small (retarded) 253 camshaft's limitation in conjunction with the exhaust. I wouldn't be surprised either if it had some tweaks being an Engineering assigned car and at least been in optimal tune. The article talks about the Holden getting a higher flow exhaust than the Torana and it being good for 15hp. The tailpipes on a dual exhaust Holden were 2", with the mufflers only 1 7/8". Just changing the mufflers out for 2" mufflers was worth near to 10hp at the wheels on a HQ, so imagine this Torana with 2" mufflers and tailpipes! So you can see why I hold the HJ engined later LH or early LX 5.0L cars in such great esteem, take this test car and add another 24hp to it - nothing much would beat you from the lights, until you snotted an aussie 4spd or a banjo of course! Change the exhaust and watch out! The reality is though many, many owners of any of these SLR5000's and SS 5.0L only had 2.78 rear axles, and they flared them and fitted 14" HK-HG mag wheels with taller tyres. So suddenly instead of 2.78 rear ends they effectively had 2.5:1 or thereabouts, thus most never really knew how quick their cars were. Until of course they busted a few banjos and fitted a 9" with 3.25 or 3.5 gears. Most only ended up with 3.08 banjo centres though out of 4.2L cars, which with the 14" wheels only took them back to about the original 2.78 overall ratio.

 

It depends on which HDT engine you are talking about. They did offer a HO engine and a stroker. I have power figures for both of them. There were still L34 block and piston kits available from GMH in the early 80's (still available from Group C use up until the end of 1979) and I think HDT just used those for the HO engine in VH, and then there wa sthe stroker engines too. As you say those these are not production Holdens, they are not even really a Holden.

 

I'll see what else I can find about LUK-356. I have all its options listed for the window tag for the Press, I may have its PSN as well.
 

Edited by yel327, 19 August 2019 - 10:06 AM.

[yel327]

LUK-356 is:

 

J416792, car number 6 in the LH Public Relations Press Test Fleet. Scheduled for completion on 18th February 1974.

 

J416792 was Saffron with Doeskin & Black vinyl trim, L31. Optioned with A22, U63, QDU, L31 and M21. It does not list GU4 as option but it does say it was 308, 4speed and 3.08 rear axle so when this car was scheduled it may well have been determined that SLR5000 was to get 3.08 but it was changed to 2.78 for volume production. 

 

The evaluation date was March 3rd 1974 at Lang Lang which is where that May 1974 Modern Motor test would have been done.

 

What is interesting is the Production Option Availability documents. There is no optional rear axle shown for L31 engine, only 2.78 LSD regardless of whether M21 or M40. L34 is shown with 2.78 LSD as STD with 3.08 LSD as PERF option. There are two applicable revision notes:

 

March 14 1974 - L31, L34 revised.

May 31 1974 - GU4 no longer available with L31, L32 & M40. GU7 no longer available with L32 & M20. GV7 axle removed.

 

The LH Features Manual also shows a revision on the 3.08 rear axle column in July 1974.

 

My guess is they were seen to be too quick with L31 and 3.08, even with the HQ engines in them. So that would mean an LH SLR5000 with 3.08 rear axle is a pretty rare beast as 90%+ of them built would be stock order and thus have a 2.78 rear axle. There would probably be less than a dozen made outside of L34 optioned SLR5000's with a GU4 rear axle. 

[yel327]

If you read the above again there was no 3.08 ratio available with L31 after about May 1974, and LX POA and Features manual say the same thing. The only place you find mention of L31 and GU4 is with the final 5.0L LX's ie those with the A9X package applied. So unless it got through as a special order somehow they won't exist. Still a quick car though even with the 2.78 rear axle, and it is why I always include them in the same sentence as GTS350M, VK Group A and L34. I've driven dead stock manual HJ GTS with dual exhaust, with the 3.36 rear axle and ER70 tyres these were fairly quick cars. Shed near to 200kg and even with the taller gearing and loss of hp due to the tiny exhaust the 250hp L31 powered LH and LX were very fast cars. 

 

Makes you realise how quick the V8 XU1 would have been for all the reasons you mention plus less weight and smaller frontal area again.

[yel327]

I snagged an original copy of October 1971 Wheels today on Ebay, this is the PhaseIII test by Mel Nichols. Will try and put up a scan of it, but I think this site still won't co-operate with Explorer so images not possible. There is a site with the jist of it on it but I cannot even post links due to the incompatibility with Explorer.

[Shiney005]

Yel, you wouldn't happen to have a copy of the "LH Torana Dealer Ordering Procedure" by any chance? Page 14 in particular?? [email protected] if you can help me.

 

That's a great photo you posted there Arrimar. I only had a black and white copy of it.

 

From the GMH published "Pointers" magazine October 1974.

 

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[yel327]

No Laurie, the only Torana order procedure I have is LC, and I only got it by accident as it was in the HG order procedure folder when I got it. I've never bothered grabbing Torana stuff when I've seen it, just concentrated on Holden documentation. It can get expensive so I only grab stuff I'm really interested in. I also picked up a copy of that May 1974 Motor Manual last night as well. I've been trying to get original copies of all the road tests that had properly tuned cars in them.

[Shiney005]

Going by this report, I would say that this car has been "properly tuned". It does in fact state horsepower figures on a dyno, and the same car in the second photo is driven by Stewart Mcleod, so I reckon it would have been played with.

 

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[yel327]

I'd say it has had something done to it by the rear wheel hp and 1/4 mile times. My guess is it had a camshaft change, possibly a HO pack cam and carby too. The hp figures quoted would be about right to given the 106mph trap speed. Co-incidentally Redco's published power curve for the HO pack fitted L34 engine was 310hp at 5500rpm.

 

Do you know if it was a 2.78 or 3.08 rear axle car? I guess it is possibly worked out from the info given of 5200 in 3rd gear at 106mph, although the overall 3rd gear ratio will be close for both, ie 1.25 x 3.08 vs 1.38 x 2.78.

[rodomo]

Those Uniroyal Wild Cats were the ducks nuts back in the day for a streeter……………….just sayin'

[Max's SS]

Those Uniroyal Wild Cats were the ducks nuts back in the day for a streeter……………….just sayin'

 

Have to agree.....these are the tyres I always used.

[Shiney005]

Do you know if it was a 2.78 or 3.08 rear axle car? I guess it is possibly worked out from the info given of 5200 in 3rd gear at 106mph, although the overall 3rd gear ratio will be close for both, ie 1.25 x 3.08 vs 1.38 x 2.78.

If it was a 3.08 car (Chrome Yella??) it would have had the close ratio gearbox, meaning a "shorter" shift from 1st to 2nd and 2nd to 3rd.

[yel327]

that L34 is still about, in immaculate condition. They report a 40% drivetrain loss to achieve 310bhp, in reality it wouldn't be that much. A banjo diff and aussie 4spd, would be lucky to lose 30% which would lower the bhp figure. Wayne Quine raced a factory phase 2 in his road L34 with 3.08 diff, 2" pipes and open aircleaner over the 1/4 and won, he also stated that no factory phase 3 would sit in the lane next to him, yes he threw out the offers. Phase 3 was a brilliant highway car, as is the 2.78 geared L34's. 

 

It would be 40% or possibly more due to the standard Torana 1 5/8" tailpipes. In that Motor manual May 1974 article Laurie put up George Roberts is quoted as stating there is a 15hp loss between the Holden 2" tailpipes and the Torana 1 5/8" pipes.

 

Given Wayne's experience by changing the L34's tailpipes to 2" (and I assume the 1 7/8" mufflers to 2" as well) and removing the aircleaner restriction, I'm not surprised he would be pulling low to mid 14's and probably getting 100mph trap speed too. The 3.08 or 2.78 rear axle would make minimal difference over the 1/4 mile as when you match the ratios of the two different M21's used with the two different rear axle ratios the only big difference is 4th gear. See below:

 

1st: 2.32 x 3.08 = 7.15. 2.54 x 2.78 = 7.06. Pretty much the same.

2nd: 1.65 x 3.08 = 5.08. 1.83 x 2.78 = 5.08. Same.

3rd: 1.25 x 3.08 = 3.85. 1.38 x 2.78 = 3.84. Same

4th 1 x 3.08 = 3.08. 1 x 2.78 = 2.78. Different.

 

As previously mentioned though you can play that game with any of the other performance cars of the day and make them go significantly quicker with minimal mods. The big gains with the L34 are going to be cam and exhaust. The GTS327 already has the exhaust and cam, just needs fuelies which is the only difference between the 250hp 1968 327 and the 275hp 1968 327, everything else is the same bar dizzy regraph to suit the rise in compression from 9:1 to 10:1. When I am able to I'll post up a full report on Dave Bennett's GTS327, he did dyno tests on standard up to mildly modded and Peter Robinson tested the cars from standard to modified.  
 

[yel327]

If it was a 3.08 car (Chrome Yella??) it would have had the close ratio gearbox, meaning a "shorter" shift from 1st to 2nd and 2nd to 3rd.

 

As per my above post Laurie the 1-2, 2-3 shifts would be near identical between the 2.78 and 3.08 ratio cars. It is only the 3-4 that really differs.
 

[Shiney005]

1st: 2.32 x 3.08 = 7.15. 2.54 x 2.78 = 7.06. Pretty much the same.

2nd: 1.65 x 3.08 = 5.08. 1.83 x 2.78 = 5.08. Same.

3rd: 1.25 x 3.08 = 3.85. 1.38 x 2.78 = 3.84. Same

4th 1 x 3.08 = 3.08. 1 x 2.78 = 2.78. Different.

Thanks for working that out Byron. It actually makes more sense to me now just why they went to the trouble of manufacturing that cluster gear for so few cars.

[yel327]

I think it was possibly originally developed for GroupC XU1 with 3.55 rear axle? Or maybe it was originally designed for LH but possibly then a shorter input shaft done later in 1973 for XU1. It does look like XU2 was actually what was released as L34 with the SLR5000 slotted in at SOP with L34 delayed until later. Which puts the 2.32:1 M21 originally designed for XU2. See attached (I figured out how!). I'm not sure of the date of the radio news release but by the other docs I'd say May or June 1973.

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•  XU2.jpg   39.55K   7 downloads
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Edited by yel327, 22 August 2019 - 07:49 PM.

[Shiney005]

The handwritten notes in red pen makes me wonder why this directive took so long.  The official notice canning the XU2 wasn't written and sent until March 1974.  I have another bit of paper here referencing the "SL/R Formula 5000".

It is a shame we aren't neighbours. 

Have you got copies of Accelerator and Pointers magazines sent out to the dealers?

 

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