Holden marks milestones

HOLDEN last week celebrated two local milestones – the 50th anniversary of its famed Lang Lang proving ground and production of the last VZ-series Commodore.

It was the end of an important era for Holden when the last of the VZ line – which dates back to the VT of 1997 - was driven off the Elizabeth, South Australia production line last Thursday.

The white VZ wagon left the factory one year after the billion-dollar VE Commodore was introduced.

In the past decade, Holden built more than 1.2 million examples of the VT (1997-2000) and its later VX (2000-2002), VY (2002-2004) and VZ (2004-2007) derivatives, including Monaro and Pontiac GTO export versions that established Holden’s status as a provider of rear-wheel drive large cars for world markets.

GM Holden manufacturing director Rod Keane said that finally ending production of the old model would simply production because for the past year it has been running down a separate line alongside the VE and long-wheelbase WM models.

“This has made our manufacturing life complex but thanks to the flexibility of both our people and our technology, we have succeeded in transitioning the plant to a single car line,” said Mr Keane.

“With the growing domestic and export success of the new VE and WM models, from October onwards we will see the plant operating at the maximum line rate of 620 cars a day.

Left: VT and VB Commodore at Holden's Lang Lang proving ground.



“With VZ we demonstrated our expertise at building rear wheel drive vehicles (and) we are building on that success. From the middle of next year, we expect that half of all the cars we build at Elizabeth will be exported – under five GM brand names including Pontiac, Chevrolet, Vauxhall, Daewoo and, of course, Holden.”

The Lang Lang anniversary was celebrated by current and former employees last weekend (although the actual anniversary was 13 August).

Lang Lang was the first test and development facility built in Australia, where every new Holden since the FC has been put through its paces before being released.

It has since been recognised as a valuable asset for General Motors overall and is now GM’s lead test facility for the Asia-Pacific region.

The 877-hectare site 95km south-east of Melbourne, on the road to Phillip Island, was bought by Holden in 1956 and commenced operations a year later. In the early days 38 employees worked there compared with 270 today.

Although the perfectly round 4.7km high-speed bowl – where test drivers are known to race around for long periods without even touching the steering wheel – is the proving ground’s best-known feature, it also contains about 40km of dirt and bitumen roads of varying quality, as well as a hillclimb and skidpan.

Lang Lang is also the home of Holden’s crash barrier testing (including airbags) and an emissions laboratory.