The Holden HQ was the first major redesign for Holden in Australia since its original release in 1948 was launched on 15 July 1971, replacing the long-standing HG series.
The HQ was the last Holden to carry all-Holden parts, most of which were manufactured in various Australian locations and Holden plants, reinforcing its ‘All-Australian’ and ‘All-Holden’ status. Apart from a larger version of their inline six-cylinder engine, carried over from Holden’s HG range, the rest of the vehicle was built from the ground up.
The Holden HQ came in several model ranges. The mainstream passenger vehicle consisted of four door sedan’s and five door station wagon models in various trim levels.
This included the Holden Belmont, Kingswood, and Premier and luxury models, Statesman and Statesman Deville. The sexier Monaro range consisted of two door coupe’s and included GTS and LS versions with varying options and extras.
There was also a commercial vehicle range which included Belmont and Kingswood coupe utilities, panel vans and cab chassis truck models. The One Tonner was new for Holden at the time but the most iconic HQ commercial vehicles in the range were the Sandman versions of their utilities and panel vans which incorporated sporting elements from the Monaro GTS and were immortalised by stunning paint work and decal.
Underpinning the success of the Holden HQ was the introduction of one platform that was used to create the various ranges of sedans, coupes, station wagons and commercial vehicles. The resulting economies of scales enabled Holden to manufacture nearly 500,000 sedans in the space of 13 years.
While the Holden HQ failed to break the stranglehold of the Ford Falcon’s grip on Australian motorsports in the early to mid 1970s, by the late 1980s the Holden HQ was used as a one-make motor racing category, with officially sanctioned racing events and competitions in every Australian state and New Zealand.
The HQ motor racing category proved very popular leading to a run on HQ spare parts creating a shortage for HQ owners.
Thankfully that is not the case now as Transgold stocks a range of suspension, transmission and engine mounting parts for the Holden HQ covering models from 1971 to 1984.
