Originally Posted by
p38brickus
Thanks Disco Man for posting, it brings back memories of my youth.
I owned 4 XU-1's.
The first one was a Yellow Dolly LC. It was second hand but not very old. It was before the LJ came out. I went to Mallala races one day and there was a dark blue racing Torana there with flared guards. I loved it so I had mine done. I had 8 X 13's with a decent offset and 195 x 13 tyres stretched over the rims. It looked hot. The rims were 3 piece specially made by Pfitzner Engineering. The carbies were replaced with triple Webers at one stage, they sounded good fluttering away but were buggers to keep in tune. Went to Bathurst with my then girlfriend in 1972 when Brocky won. (or was it 73?) After the race the car was treated like royalty, people stopping traffic so we could get out of the car park and as we drove down the track, people were waving and calling out "Torana" with thumbs up. We stopped for fuel somewhere and there were lots of cars there having been to Bathurst. One lad was looking around the cars and pointing at them in turn. He said, "I passed that one, I passed that one, I passed that one." but then he looked at the Torana and said "But I couldn't pass that one." I don't remember what he was driving. My girlfriend said she opened the door and was going to step out and almost stood on a guy's head! He was checking out the underside of the car! I put a 308 V8 in that car. It wasn't much of a sleeper because it looked tough standing still.
One day I was in Adelaide and I went past the Holden dealer down near the markets. In the showroom was a red (tangerine or mandarin, can't remember the difference) LJ XU-1. It was second hand.....It was beautiful, I had to have it! I put 7 X 13 deep dished Magnum mags on it and drove it til the flywheel bolts came loose (common fault I believe). Engine out, V8 in. It had a 2" single exhaust and looked stock. It had a 3.55 diff. It was quick but had no top end speed. I dragged a 750 Kawasaki 3 cylinder bike one night at the lights, he couldn't believe it! I took the front swaybar off and fitted one to the rear. It handled like a go-cart, nothing could get near it yet it was easy to drive.
We put the LJ engine in my mate's LC GTR, the GTR engine in my yellow LC and I then sold it.
I had a white LJ with the Globe mags and more bog in the back quarter than in a crash shop and an ugly metallic green LJ too. Both had original JP engines, but were not special like the first two.
In 1974 we were all trying to find out as much info of this enigma L34 as we could. Information was very scarce. I bought a yellow one from Colleton Motors down at Reynella, drove it 200 meters to my mate's tyre business and fitted 8 X 14 deep dished Magnums. I kept the original wheels as well. That engine was scary on the over-run until you got used to it. Engines in those days shouldn't sound like that, not brand new anyway. I remember the engine number on that car was HZ13000. I had the front and rear bumpers dechromed and powder-coated flat black. I also fitted Ford GT triangular scoops on the bonnet, this was considered sacrilege in those days. I was hassled by a certain Police Sergeant about the width of the wheels for some time and eventually put the standard rims back on it.
Then came the A9X and I had to have one of those as well. I had an order in for a GTR-X at some time too but of course they never happened unfortunately. There was a Holden dealer in Melbourne sprouting that they had contacts with HRT and were fitting the flares etc to the A9X so they would get the first of them......I fell for the BS. I drove to Melbourne in the L34 but they wouldn't give me anywhere near enough for it and the waiting list for the A9X was smoke and mirrors stuff. I remember it was a long weekend and we went for a drive on the Monday and happened to pass Bill Patterson's at Ringwood. There in all it's glory was an A9X hatchback, funny but I can't remember the colour. I couldn't wait to ring them quickly enough on the Tuesday morning. I spoke to Ray Biffen (he was a Melbourne footballer at the time). He said THEY were doing the flares, electric fans etc on the A9X's not the other mob because of their contacts with HRT and Brocky. He was honest, he said he couldn't give me enough for the L34 but if I wanted to place an order, he'd hold one for me. They had orange and a Tangarine or Mandarin hatchback(again I can't remember the colour between the XU-1 and A9X colours). I said to Ray to "scratch my name on the red one!" I went home to Adelaide, promptly sold the L34 to a car dealer on Port Road for good money. Funnily he wanted bigger wheels for it so I sold him the Magnums as well. I rang Ray Biffen, he said did I want to fly to Melbourne and drive it home or put it on a truck. Silly question! They paid for me to fly over, had a 3 day permit organised and I drove it home with lipstick on my earlobes (the 70's version of a permagrin) I had the rims widened to 8" with Pirelli CN36's, just the outer rim was chromed so they looked standard. The old sergeant never noticed and left me alone. That car had a 2.6 diff. I towed a ski-boat at the time and it was very difficult to pull out of a boat ramp with the boat on, mega clutch slip. It did have other advantages though. One day we were going up to Walker's Flat skiing. My mate had a HQ Statesman and was towing the boat. His girlfriend was driving. I came off of Cook's Hill and saw a glint in the distance, I knew it was them. I put the pedal to the metal, pulled out to pass them about a km before I reached them and went past them with the speedo needle off the gauge. My mate was turning around at the time talking to someone in the right rear seat. He said he saw a red flash and by the time his head whipped back to the front he couldn't tell what it was that went passed........but he knew it was me. Because I had difficulty on the boat ramps, I sold the car and bought........wait for it.........a Datsun 260Z! Silly you say, but not as silly as my mate who sold his Phase 3 for one of those EL GT's. OUCH!!
Sorry about my ramblings but I loved my Toranas at the time. A young lady said to me at the time "What makes a car great?", I said, "If it goes handles and stops, it's great." Now if you asked me I'd say "Auto, air and power steering." Agh, the tyranny of old age!
