I didn't work like that. Dealers were trained using a GMH training course to sell from stock. They didn't want you to order a car, they wanted to sell you firstly what they had in their own stock. Secondly sell you what was built but not yet allocated to a dealer. Thirdly, sell you off the production schedule. Lastly, place a retail order. Probably 90% of people who went to a dealer thinking they were placing an order were just being sold a car that either existed (as in belonged to Sales) or was in the schedule to be built (belonged to Production). The dealer would have asked what you wanted, as in do you want a 6cyl or a V8? What colour? Will see what we can get. I went through this exact process with my VY SS ute. I went in to order a white manual with black leather trim. They tried to sell me a red auto with standard trim really cheap as it was on the yard. Then tried cars other dealers or off the schedule. Then reluctantly placed a Retail order as it wasn't a car Holden built as a stock order. It took 5 months to get, and they were even less happy with the sale as it was a National Fleet order so it was at a big discount.

Its not just the 173 or 202 that made them "bad" by today's standards, as a driver's car. It is the rear axle ratio that came with them, at least on a Holden other than a tonner. 253 was 3.08 manual, 2.78 auto. 308 was 3.36 manual, 2.78 auto. Those rear axle ratios are fine for cruising and highway speeds although the 308 manual car with its 3.36 rear axle did tend to rev a bit much at highway speeds, although by the time I owned then in the 80's we used to run taller tyres like 245/60/14 which gave you a few more % taller tyre compared to say an E70H14. The 6cyl were not far off valve bouncing with the standard 3.55 with a manual doing 110km/h, they were not much fun. Something like a cab-chassis with a good cyl and Trimatic were OK if you changed the rear axle to 3.08. They weren't exactly fast but they were comfortable at highway speeds and the torque converter covered a lot for the taller rear axle in low speed work like reversing. I did have a 5.0L manual car with a 3.08 rear axle but it was horrible for towing or trying to reverse, best changed out for an auto.

I always used to buy 5.0L/308 Premier or Statesman as everyday drivers and wreck them once rego ran out. So I had a lot of Devilles and Premiers. I tended to steer away from commercials or Holden/Belmont/Kingswood as they were often manual if fitted with a 308. I used to use them as tow cars, and favoured HJ's as they had the best engines and an unbreakable gearbox. The best of the manuals as tow cars were 253 3spd column shift as they always had a 3.08 rear axle (unless they were a cab-chassis) and reverse was good whereas M20 fitted cars were useless as reverse with a 3.08 rear axle was way too high geared and you just burned up clutches, not to mention the 4spd were far more breakage prone than a 3spd. The absolute best high speed cars or towing cars were those fitted with a 350 or 400 or 454 or similar with TH400 and a 2.78 or 2.6 rear axle. I had a HJ Kingswood ute like that, was a great long distance car, got written off in a head on though with a Renault.

The Holden 6 wasn't a poor man's car. The bread and butter Holden was a 186 and later 202 Kingwood sedan, they were the volume cars built for sale that suited the Australian buyers. Someone with a bit more $ forked out for a Premier but normally a 6cyl. For those that thought like we do but didn't want a coupe, they shelled for the top spec Holden (V8 Premier) or the sporty Holden (GTS sedan). They would have optioned a 308/5.0L or even bought a GTS350 sedan, however the (for want of a better word) smarter ones knew how expensive a GTS was to insure so they bought the V8 Kingswood or V8 Premier or optioned V8's in HJ-HZ. That is exactly what the original buyer of my HJ Premier did, he ticked every option he could other than dual exhaust and cloth inserts. It actually cost more than a 5.0L auto GTS however he would have recouped the cost with the first insurance premium.

As for your statement of 6cly 110KM/H My dad had a HQ 173 manual and he would drive at 80MPH cruse speed doing 4hr drive I watched siting in the back behind him looking. and it would do 100MPH flat no valve bounce at all with 3.55 diff and my mums HR 186 auto 3.36 diff would do 97 MPH I seen this maybe a 100's times and her HJ 202 auto I do not know 150KM/H for sure but the stupid speedo in them would bounce about to much due to the stupid long setup speedo, just like the HK was the same, I could not truly tell because the bumps in the road made it inaccurate over from around 100mph. not to mention the Falcon speedos up to XY were spastic they would bounce about wildly way out of control like 40MPH or more because of the bumps.

Stock Red motor valve springs start to shimmy over 4700RPM say and they will valve bounce at 5000RPM.

My Falcon XG Longreach ute that I ordered with LSD was built at the latest 7 days before I got it and it was built in Vic it was made in the same month proven by the Comp plate.

My VY SS was the same month build as well that I ordered it June but got it in July a couple of days after I ordered it I think.

As far as the HZ GTS goes I would rather order a 5.0L Premier 4speed with optional GTS instruments 3.08 LSD and just get the dual exhaust on it myself, not to mention toss the std camshaft, block the EGR from entering the intake manifold totally and put stronger valve springs in it without lifting the heads. for as start, because I could not live with how gutless they were.

I didn't say a Holden 6 with a manual and 3.55 rear axle couldn't do 110, just it was revving way to high, more like 3500rpm - the valve bounce thing was a tongue in cheek statement! Of course they'll do more, but it was VERY rare for any standard Holden 6cyl car to exceed 100mph, it just didn't happen. Only cars that did it were 186S HK-HG, LC-LJ GTR, XU1 of course and some of the 3300 LJ could do it. Forget it for the rest in that era. GMH Engineering data shows a 3.55 rear axle with ER70H14 tyres doing 20.1mph per 1000rpm. 4700rpm is 94.5mph, poor old 173 or 202 was never going to do that. Their peak torque was at 2000rpm and the peak power at 4400rpm, and that was ideal conditions - stick them in a car with exhaust and an air cleaner, driving a mechanical fan - forget it!

That is exactly what I meant, you never "ordered" your VY SS. If you got it the same month you ordered it, it was already built or at least scheduled to be built. All the dealer did was picked it off the schedule or plant stock list and then got it allocated to that dealership. The timeframe I mentioned was about right, I ordered mine in December 2002 and it was delivered in May 2003. It was a proper Retail Order, not a sale off the schedule.

I'm with you, I would have ordered a HJ Premier or Deville, optioned it similarly. Back then you would have struggled to get a decent proven dual exhaust, they'd probably have been made for you to fit. Most of the aftermarket stuff sold back then was just OEM stuff made by the same company that made them for GMH, all they normally did was fitted proper 2" mufflers rather than the stepdown 1 7/8" that seem to have been factory fitted. I even bought a set of OEM dual tailpipes for my HJ Premier a few years back, made by Lukey I think - they look identical to the original pipes I have hanging in the shed, like they were made on the same machine.

Yes its impressive, but it also isn't a standard car, and its a very light car with small frontal area with a blueprinted engine and Conrod is slightly downhill! Des West had his GTS327 in practice 1968 on Conrod clocking over 130mph with 185R14 tyres with a 3.36 rear axle - it was a blueprinted engine pulling 6500rpm. The same car when tested by RCN as a standard road car (prior to being blueprinted for Bathurst) maxxed out at 128.5mph at 6000rpm.
I doubt very much a road going S4 would pull 100mph on a flat road, might go close though as an LJ 3300 could do it and they are similarly sized, EH just a fraction bigger.

The difference between the Des West 327 & any S4, is that the Des West car was custom blueprinted prior to the race, but all S4s were factory blueprinted. In other words they raced them as they left the factory door. IMHO they were "standard cars".

Dr Terry

Not necessarily, I doubt all cars were totally standard (like the Cortinas for example). The EH S4/S5 racing program was a factory race car program that was abandoned leaving privateers to race the cars. They definitely had certain performance improvements to be able to do 102-104mph, even if it was just very good in-house engine blueprinting.

I'd still be betting there was some cheating going on with those 1963 race S5's. You'd think they would have picked some better valve springs maybe?

A 4BBL 327 with a Quadrajet on it would rev to 6500rpm easily. How long it'd last is anyone's guess. But the engines blueprinted for series production certainly did. From memory it was Des West, Nick Petrilli and one of the HDRT cars that had a 3.36 rear axle. Petrilli crashed in practice. The West and Petrilli cars were the fastest in practice initially, they were revving them to 6500rpm rather than shifting earlier like the 3.08 forced them to do. Des West was quite clear on this, said he ran it to 6500rpm all day and was never headed. If you see footage and photos of the first part of the race (2 hours or so until the first pit stop) you see Des West disappear off into the distance chased by the HDRT car with a 3.36 rear axle. Bob Watson was quoted many times saying that the West car pulled away like it had a bigger engine - it was the perfect match of the 3.36 to the high revving 327.

I think you are talking about the LT1 valve springs, off the 1970-71 Z/28 engine. It was a 360hp (370hp in Corvette), solid cam, big 4BBL engine. It was that engine that the HT Old Man Emu was touted to get, with a Muncie, 12 bolt and oil cooled brakes.

I think it was the valve rotators in the blue engines that cause valve recession?