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By MURRAY HUBBARD
At around 60 years of age you would think they'd let an old girl like this FX Holden rust in peace.
But no, she's out there for all the world to see, perhaps Australia's most observed 48-215 Holden. She appears to be tickled pink about that. The classic Holden pokes it's nose out of the first floor of an office building on a wreckers yard near the Burleigh Heads turn-off on the Gold Coast's Pacific Highway, a road used by tens of thousands of cars and trucks every day of the year.
She may have not been driven for decades, but she's still working, drawing attention to Will Smith's car wrecking yard every minute of every day, seven days a week. Sure, she's looking a little jaded. There's some rust appearing here and there. And with Queensland's recent drought-breaking rain, her bonnet is gathering a little moss. No doubt the old girl would have preferred to stay in her previous job. That was as the star attraction at Olivia's Malt Shop in Surfers Paradise. This, we assume, was similar to Al's Diner that shot the Fonz to fame in `Happy Days.' The shop was just south of Surfers' on the beach side of the Gold Coast Highway. Today, the site is probably a 95 storey high rise. No doubt this pink FX would have a few stories of its own to tell.
Holden celebrated 60 years of producing cars last year, with the first production 48-215 rolling off the assembly line at Melbourne's Fisherman's Bend in November. But, in secret, Holden ran off 10 cars in April 1948 to `clear the line' in readiness for November production. Full production back then was 112 cars a month. When the big day arrived 1200 men and women, including Prime Minister Ben Chifley stood around an ivory coloured FX. The car appeared from behind silver curtains to the music of a 10 piece orchestra and it was greeted with enthusiastic applause.
It was the first production-run Holden. Australia's own six-cylinder mass production car. The car's timing could not have been better. Having assisted in winning WW2, Australian national pride was at an all time high. We were growing up as a nation. We now had our `own' car. Yes, it was helped along the way by Holden's parent company, GM in the United States, but this was an Australian car. Built here for our conditions. Some cars were not built for our roads and temperatures.
Even English maker Morris built an `Empire' car which was brought here, failed miserably, and were literally taken back to Mother England. The American built cars suited our conditions a lot more so the US influence on the FX was more than body styling. The Holden story starts with 17 year old James Alexander Holden who arrived in South Australia from Staffordshire, England in 1852. In 1856 he started a shop in King William Street, Adelaide as a leather worker and saddle maker. It was from this humble beginning that led 92 years later to the auspicious gathering in 1948 for the launch of the FX.
By 1885 James Holden's company was repairing and eventually building horse-drawn carriages and coaches. This was a familiar start for many car company's, along with the many that started in bicycles.
In 1924 GM took an interest in Holden and struck a contract for the company to build vehicle bodies for GM only. So the rolling chassis and engines were brought in from the US and Canada and the bodies were built and fitted here to the GM line, including the most famous of all, Chevrolet. Engineers starting designing `Project 2000' --- the `first Aussie car' in 1943 and in 1944 the first prototype was completed using Willys mechanicals.
In 1945 design work started on the Australian project in the US, and Project 2000 continued, becoming Project 2200. The following year Holden engineers were sent to Detroit, Michigan with their ideas, styling models and drawings and they linked with their US counterparts. They produced three hand made working prototypes, virtually identical to the car intended for production, and in late 1946 the cars were shipped to Fisherman's Bend, along with the the Aussie team and 22 US technicians.
The car was powered by a 2.15 litre six, the much vaunted and reliable `grey' motor boasting 45kW of power, with a three on the tree manual gear shifter. It weighed under a ton, could do 80 miles per hour (128 kmh) and return 30 miles to the gallon (10.6 litres/100 km).
These were excellent returns in this era. The price was $1466. In all there were 120,402 FXs built. Perhaps the most visual of these still remaining is the old pink girl with her split windscreen and distinctive grille, under the glitzy `Gold Coast' sign, reminding motorists of how it all began. It is worth noting this car has something missing: no front or rear indicators. The FX, or 48-215, was made that way, as was the FX face lift, the FJ Holden, which may go some way to explaining the Aussie habit of switching lanes without indicating. Instead drivers stuck their arm out the window, which was not too bad when turning right. Left turns were a different story and many a driver got his passenger to do the indicating. Too bad if you were driving solo.
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