Holden Commodore VTII V8

Why is my Holden on its 5th set of rear tryes in 175kms from new it has had 6 yes6 alignments!

Why is my Holden on its 5th set of rear tyres in 175kms from new it has had 6 yes6 alignments!

Because the rear suspension geometryis rubbish.a camber correction kit can be some help but they are a poor design.

ask scotty, holdens are perfect so he claims in other threads.

Had a quick google, and found BorgWarner drivetrain group is owned by borgwarner inc. Can not find any other parent companies.

I'm sure Borg Warner is owned by Dana

Hi guys. Now I dont want to get into the whole "Ford vs Holden" thing, as I dont care if its a Ford or a Holden. They are the same to me, but I am thinking of buying one of these. Its a 6 speed manual, 5.7L. Are they reliable! Overly thirsty ect ect! What are their good and bad points! Thanks!

Hey there I have a vt v7 5.7 ss auto.
There not bad on fuel considering. On a trip I get about 11 lieters per 100km. Bit thirsty round town tho. They dont have to many problems. Ive had to rekit the power steering pump but thats all. Ive seen more problems with the vx models. Clutch replacement can be expensive on them so I hear. But otherwise a good car nice to travel in. I wont be getting rid of mine anytime soon.

Hi there. I have a holden commodore v6 and I absolutely adore my car. She's a bit thirsty around town but on long distance I can fill her up in Christchurch and get all the way to Wellington and the gauge is just under halfway (just did this trip recently). I have had no major issues with her either. Only required new tyres, wipers the usual wear and tear things. They have no cambelt so they don't need replacing. I have spoken to numerous mechanics and they all say the same thing they own holden commodores because they don't want to work on cars all day at work and then go home and work on their own vehicles. Happy decision making

commodores tend to have more leg room than the coons

These things were common for piston slap, excess oil consumption when new. Most would have been fixed under warranty I'd guess. When I was at school (2005) I had a job cleaning cars at the Holden dealer. the amount of VTs and VXs I drove that had that rattle when cold was scary!
Nice cars but they don;t sound as good as the Aussie iron 304!

I just bought exactly this 2 months ago. Mine is in immaculate condition and only done 127000kms. They are very good cars.

They drive very very well. Will get up and boogy and cover the 0-100 in under 6 seconds without trying. The clutch is nice to use. The engine is very predictable as every v8 is so makes driving a breeze around town. One issue i have is with the gearbox, they used a tremec t56 box and its a bit notchy. Once you get used to having a notchy gearbox though its not really a bad thing.

Fuel consumption i have seen so far is not very good around town (approx 16L per 100km), but very good on open road (9.8L per 100km, on a trip from napier - wellington - napier recently). If you get these engines dyno tuned I have heard its not uncommon to get fuel savings of upto 20% on open road and around 5-10% around town which would bring the figures down uite considerably.

Things to look out for are piston slap on a cold start up and excess oil consumption as already said. The piston slap is not an issue more of an annoyance. Oil consumption is the same again, while holden addressed it, you can have a ls1 have done 300,000kms without having the oil consumption dealt with and not expect any out of the ordinary problems, just the regular checking and topping up of oil.

On the topic of oil they are picky with what oils they like. Of course the expensive stuff is the best. Mobil 1 or castrol edge. Looking at around $80-$110 for 5L of these oils. But have also heard that some run fine with castrol magnatec which i will be trying next. If you use an oil the engine doesnt agree with your valvetrain (lifters) will start to get noisy, but as soon as you change to the good oils again the noise WILL disappear.

They have a nice suspension set up and it is responsive but not bumpy at all means. So long as you find one thats looked after they will be very quiet no creaks or squeaks and feel they have a good build quality.

They have 300hp but to be honest it could do with more, thats where a dyno tune comes in. With a full exhaust system and some sort of aftermarket air filter system your looking at 400hp at the flywheel, and also better fuel economy as said. If you need more power once you get to the 400hp figure, you can look at changing diff gears to 3.7 or 3.9 to really wake it up. Stock gears are 3.46. At 100kph in 6th gear you are only doing 1500rpm. So with say 3.9 gears I think it works out to around 1900rpm at 100 which is not that bad.

I am very pleased with my car and you will be too if you buy one.

I have been told only 2% of all the vt series 2 SS's built were in manual. So perhaps look at that as an investment that it wont depreciate as quickly as the autos. Everyone knows the manual v8s hold their value more.

#5 you are so correct on the gen2 motors if you are going to test drive this model make sure you start the car that your interested in, when the motor is stone cold!
later commodores dont have this problem my VE SS is all good
by the why they the V8s are cheap to run if you are lightfooted.
I get about 9L/100kms on a average open road trip ( im not lightfooted LOL ) and about 14-15 L around town.

Im hopefully looking to get fuel figures around yours when i get my vt ls1 dyno tuned in a month or two.

I havnt done it on mine as my throttle body is 80mm ( factory been told ) but i understand that if you put a " falcon" throttle body that is either 75 or 80mm ,( i cant remember ) on to a VT V8 you will get great fuel economy! Maybe there is someone on here that knows more about it, but the ozzy commodore forums comment on it a bit.

Nah bugger that Im not putting a ford part on my 350 chev. The fuel economy isnt an issue to me, just would like to see slightly better economy with the dyno tune. Im going to be happy if i get the same fuel economy as i have now but with 400hp.

well skyline guy hate to tell you this but we use F**D diffs the V8 diffs are built by Borg warner, owned by ford.
YEA im not happy either

I thought BW was owned by Dana.Can anyone clear that up! cheers

How did you find the car after the tune! Ive got genie headers and full big bore twin 3 inch system. Looking to put in a k&n panel filter and get the tune done. I feel the car could really do with the tune as 220kw isnt enough for me.

Im hoping the $700 odd dollars for a good dyno tune will really turn it into a beast of a car to drive.

For the money you want to spend, have a look at what sort of V8 BMWyou can get, there are often some pleasant surprises available unless you want to do the heavy duty performance car thing.

Not a bad idea considering E39 M5s seem to be going for around 30 grand. 10 times a car a Commodore will ever be but at the end of the day they aren't really in the same class. I had a 540 and it didn't set the world on fire, nice cruiser but considering they go for a similar price I'd prefer a 6spd LS1, especially when you look at the aftermarket potential of the SBC.

Yeah the SBC is a much more economical engine to get more power from if that is your thing.

The BMWs seem a more integrated car in standard trim from a driver's point of view,Particularly in terms of how well the steering and brakes work together with the rest of the car.
The Commodores certainly have the boogie in the engine department though. I've driven a mates LS2 which is a fairly serious weapon.
Are you looking at some form of competition! Drags! Track days!

Might go straight to a OTR and get a mafless tune done at the same time. Get that extra few KWs. The car came with the system. No CATs. Its a nice sounding system so Im not going to touch it.

The BA/F performance Falcons use a Dana M86 LSD :P and i also know that the VX Commodores with LSD share the diff with the Falcon XR8 of the same year can't find any manufacture info on that diff though.

VX uses a BW80