Viva and Brabham Torana: Times change, fortunately. And so do standards. Back in 1964 GMH heralded a high performance two door of an entirely new design, but if you've got a little grey gathering around the temples and the odd wrinkle, then you will all ready have guessed that the car in question was the little Vauxhall Viva. As GMH's first foray in to the lucrative small car market sector, this was probably just as well. Volkswagen could still get away with a funny shape and a boxer engine up the bum and BMC sold plenty of Minis, with the 1100 coming on stream just before the Viva, but Aussies loved the straight forward design of Holdens. Not that the Viva was a HoIden, even in name. GMH had to take what it could get. A smaIl car was needed. There was a new small Vauxhall. So that was the shot for Oz. Little did we dream back in those days that the Viva marked the start of a long fast road that would finally climb all the way to the mountain conquering Torana A9X. Because of its historical importance we will spend a few paragraphs remembering the Viva.

Basically it was a little two door sedan with no claims to fame beyond lively acceleration by the standards of its time. Zero to 50 mph in 13.3 seconds and a slicker than average floor gearshift manipulating four forward gears. And the gear change earned lots of brownie points: " a stubby, snap action floor shift positioned within natural reach." This meant that you didn't have to be a monkey to drive a Viva. The handling, even by 1964 standards, was pretty crap. " The Viva suspension," says the GMH hype, "after rigid tests in Europe, Canada, and Lang Lang has been designed to give an inherent anti roll characteristic. At least the Viva was reasonably cheap to run and maintain. Fuel economy was good and repair costs cheap, even if that Vauxhal 1057 cm³ engine didn't earn itself a spectacular reputation for durability.

In Britain the original Viva was replaced late in 1966 by a much smarter looking model complete with highly fashionable Coke-bottle hip. On May 21, 1967 this car went on sale in Australia as the Holden Torana. Sure it had detail styling changes, but in essence the first small Holden was still a vauxhall. For most Aussies this was a pretty interesting sort of event. Many probably neither knew nor would have cared that the Torana was really a Viva. Simply, this was the first " Holden " to have four cylinders and a compact two-door body. It was the first " Holden " to depart far from the traditional family sedan formula. But nobody dreamt that Torana would eventually become Holden's top of the mountain range performance hot shot. Times sure were changing.

But it was only the beginning. The Torana was in fact a significantly better car than the boxy old Viva it super seeded. GMH was careful to drop all mention of Vivas. Torana was a Holden. The engine had been enlarged to 1159 cm3 and developed 56 bhp (gross). So performance was livelier, even if the Torana didn't manage to live up to its name (aboriginal for " to fly " ).The engine incorporated positive crankcase ventilation, It was also quieter in this application, thanks to superior sound deadening and a double silencer system. The gearbox, however, was a real little whiner and you couldn't travel at all quickly in a Torana without being reminded of its presence. The gearshift itself was undoubtedly one of the best on the market in 1967, possibly the best. It was stubby, light to use and with delightfully short throws. The feel was positive and sporting and it even looked right. Keen drivers enjoyed this Holden Torana because this time around the General's small car could justify claims made about its handling prowess. The precise rack and pinion steering required just 3.4 twirls from lock to lock on a 32 foot circle. And the front three leaf transverse spring of the Viva had been ditched in favour of coils. So the ride was better too. It's interesting at this point to return to the old Viva press release: " the front independent suspension is a normal short and long arm layout but it incorporates one transverse three leaf spring in place of the usual pair of coil springs. They never did explain why !gesturing at its front suspension, shaking his head and asking,

The first Torana was available in three models, all of them two-doors. The price leader was the stripped and ever so plain Torana. Next up the list was the equivalent (in terms of equipment) to the old Holden HR special of the day. This car was the most popular model, the S. It even scored a chrome strip down its flanks. The top line car was quite interesting for 1967, the SL (yes, it really did stand for Super Luxury), complete with thick carpet, cigarette lighter, a fake wood dashboard and a heater-demister (big news on a Holden in those days). Of course all Toranas had bucket seats, but the trim varied from model to model and the "Wyvern grain and Sadlon " vinyls used in the SL were of impressive quality, even if they got just as hot and sticky as any other plastic seats. Buyers who wanted something even further up market could pay a little extra for " Castillon weave." Early in 1968 four-door versions of Torana were launched in a bid to broaden the car's appeal. This was a uniquely Australian development and the front doors were only five inches shorter than those of the two-door models. With a l6 cubic foot boot, this was quite a neat little sedan obviously short on rear leg room but generally more spacious than its Japanese rivals such as Corolla and Datsun 1000.

Bigger news for keen drivers was the launch of a more powerful engine option known as Series 70. Modifications to the cylinder head and a lift in compression ratio from 8.5 to 1 to 9.0 to 1 worked in combo with a higher lift camshaft to provide a claimed output of 69 Bhp, up l3 on the standard car. GMH wasn't backward in coming forward about the Series 7O's credentials. The press release reported a performance increase of " over 20 percent. " When the press were let loose in the new car, however, they were disappointed. despite the changes the supposed hot shot Torana went hardly any better than the standard car. Yet The potential certainly seemed to be present. There was a new exhaust system with twin branch exhaust manifolds and two Separate reverse flow mufflers. Perhaps the greatest single improvement over the 56 bhp models was the braking system. All series 7Os scored power assisted front discs. GMH also went over board on tyres, specifying great big low profile " 6.20 x 12s on super wide four inch rims. (If the sports version got four-inch rims, then what, you may wonder did the standard Torana have? According to other press releases, the same!).

Even more of a let down than the Series 70 was the Brahham Torana, Australia's most famous racing driver would probably never have put his autograph on this little pretender. It had more bark than bite, more stripes than sting. The Brabham variant first appeared midway through 1968, featuring a broad centre rally stripe. Within a few months it was revised, when GMH launched the '69 (round instruments) Toranas on September 24. All the changes were cosmetic. A broad and narrow stripe around the nose replaced the previous broad one and there were black paint outs under the front bumper and between the tail lights. A stripe ran the length of the car below the doors ( the Brabham, of course, came only as a two-door).There were re-styled badges on the grille, front fenders and rear panel. Motivation for Jack's little Holden came from a twin Stromberg version of the Series 70 engine with a claimed output of 79 Bhp that was up 10 on the Series 70 and a whopping 23 on standard Torana.

Those twin over sized exhaust pipes guaranteed plenty of extra noise, Unfortunately, there wasn't all that much extra grunt. If the standard engined version could just crack 80 miles per hour and the Series 70 almost 85, then the supposed hot shots still could not manage a genuine 90. In September l968 the General still hadn't got around to fitting radial tyres and the Brabham Torana and was shod with red line nylon 6.20 x l2s, just like all Series 70 versions. In keeping with the intended sporty image of the Brabham package, the interior was more pleasant than those of other Toranas The face-lifted (re-striped) '69 model scored quite an upgrade here. There was a new dished simulated wood grain sports wheel and a neat set of instruments, all of them round as on other'69 Toranas and providing evidence on engine revs, oil pressure and amps as well as the Obvious stuff like speed and water temperature.

Fuel ? lets talk about fuel, Well, the Brabham Torana used more of this than its quieter sisters. Looking back, the Brabham Torana seems a fairly ludicrous sort of sports sedan-basically a shopping trolley with strips and a noisy exhaust. But a more realistic judgement places this little machine at the very starting point of what was to become a legend. Even if it had been a quicker car than it was, the Brabham version of the four-cylinder Torana obviously couldn't last on the new car price list beyond 1969. On October the twenty-eighth of that year of horsepower, GMH announced a truly momentous development of Torana. The stylists had given the little car's nose a big stretch and the engineers had bolted a Holden red six under neath the hood. actually, there was a range of sixes and a range of six-cylinder variants of Torana. The most exciting one was called simply GTR. And with that hot shot in the line up, the time of the Brabham Torana had definitely passed.

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