Holden LJ V8 Torana
Reviewed by Unique Cars and Parts
Our Rating: 5
Introduction
The first commercially available V8 mid-sizer from the General was the
LH Torana. It came to be in no small part due to the racing program, and efforts of
Harry Firth. The LJ GTR may have been a giant killer for a time, but progress was rapidly advancing back then, and soon there really was no way to keep up with the ever growing number of horses lurking under a
Ford GT’s bonnet.
The V8 Torana put GMH at the crossroads in marketing policy - in relation to motor sport participation and political safety implications. Until 1972 the company had been able to disguise its indirect motor sport participation by building its top-line GT road cars up to race specification. The GTR XU1 had a magnificent competition record, but after two defeats at Bathurst it was clear the cars stood no chance there in their then current form.
The LJ V8 Torana Did Exist – In Prototype Form
Holden Dealer Team Competitions Manager Harry Firth and fellow pro-Holden racing supporters campaigned heavily for a V8 Torana. Firth is widely regarded as being the first to install an Australian V8 powerplant in one of the 1971 Series Production racing cars. This car was very much a prototype of what the team wanted to see take on Bathurst. That 1971 LJ Torana V8 became a regular daily-commuter by Holden Dealer Team driver
Peter Brock in the streets of Melbourne.
The car was also entered for the Easter Bathurst meeting. Firth correctly predicted it would provide a good pointer to the performance of a possible Bathurst Torana V8 entry. But he has struck the usual brick wall of GM policy resistance. At the time the company did not “officially” recognise motor sport and did not participate in it. However through the Holden Dealer Team it had adopted a successful "Third Party" involvement in the sport.
This avoided an open confrontation with Detroit on the International "no sport" edict, and the US head office was happy to turn a blind eye to the Australian division while it did not overtly appear to be directly involved in competition - yet profited handsomely from it on a sales level. And the local sales team - headed by Sales Director John Bagshaw - was known to favour the then current motor sport participation in its indirect format. But the big question remained - how could a V8 Torana possibly fit into the GM sales philosophy?
The XU1 was easy to justify. Though unashamedly designed and built for motor racing, it was still only a logical GT extension of the regular six cylinder range - which accounted for the majority of Torana sales anyway. It used the same power-plant with a few basically bolt-on goodies and some suspension tweaks. It was politically ''cool" because it was a high-insurance-rate, limited volume GT edition that could be passed off either as a super road car (for Detroit purposes) or a competition car (for local safety purposes).
A V8 Torana, on the other hand, would be a "hot" property - politically as well as on the track. The Australian market was rapidly approaching the stage where a light medium V8 would be well-accepted – and there were rumours that GM were considering fitment of both the
253 V8 and
308 V8 to the as then unveiled
LH Torana lineup. But installing the power-plant in 1972 for pure racing purposes could have proven to be an unwise gun-jumper.
Balanced against that, people like Sales Director Bagshaw realised that a V8 sporty car now could provide valuable market appraisal for the introduction of a regular V8 model in the future - and this could be the vital factor that persuades GM to go V8. But GM still has to carry the responsibility. Despite a mass of useful test and development work by HDT Comps Manager Harry Firth, actual design and engineering work needed to be carried out by GM's own Engineering Department - headed by George Roberts.
A Bolt-On Job
Installing the V8 into the LJ Torana body was, apparently, not overly complicated. Firth's engine swap was reportedly almost a bolt-in job, with no structural modifications. It was mated to the 1972 XU1 close-ratio gearbox and "semi-tall" 3.08 diff ratio - higher than the conventional 3.36 but not quite a Bathurst ratio of 2.78. The trial unit was apparently a confirmed under-steerer, so the HDT engineers, and Holden who were no doubt paying close attention, knew that a revised front suspension geometry would take care of the issue.
Two Torana’s that we know for sure were fitted with the Chev V8 were the Pat Peck/Ron Gillard/Warren Gracie sports closed racing Torana, and the well-known full-house Bob Jane Repco Torana. Reports at the time suggest there were up to six other Torana V8s running the road and on tracks by the middle of 1972, and another dozen or so by the end of that year. The Pat Peck Torana engine transplant was done by Pat Peck's husband Darcy Peck and involved shifting the mill 9 in. back and recessing the firewall. This 283 Chev V8 of roughly the same proportions as the 253/308 was fitted with two four-barrel carbs on an Offenhauser "log" with cam and extractors.
That made the Pat Peck V8 Torana good enough for 43 second laps around Warwick Farm's short circuit at its first tryout - pretty close to Mustang Improved Production records at that time. The crew apparently reported that understeer was virtually eliminated with revised spring rates and front-end geometry and the only installation problems were associated with clearance on the extractors. For a V8 Torana to make it to the mount would necessitate a larger fuel tank in the boot, and a few other modifications too, including a better brake setup even though there was not all that much more weight sitting up front.
At the time FoMoCo were working on the Phase IV GT. Touted improvements included 15in. by 7in. mag wheels manufactured by Aunger in Adelaide for light weight, strength and vastly improved brake cooling. Ford made other mods in the braking department and Howard Marsden completely revised the engine modifications for much more power (the Phase Four would run nearly 160 mph on the flat compared with the previous cars which topped out at around 140 mph).
And Ford's Cortina Six was being looked at for class-competition at Bathurst too. Ford were hoping to tune-up the car for class competition at Bathurst and possibly regular series production use, but the engines were not producing enough horses.
