it was one hell of a practical 2 door ute. ford put lots of thought into it and some of the ideas in it has only just surfaced again in the form of the toyota A-BAT concept

Apparently GM Car Czar Bob Lutz has confirmed that a four-door ute concept based on Holden’s rear-wheel-drive Zeta platform [same as the VE] but wearing a GMC badge will debut at the New York Auto Show in late March. From Bob’s description, the vehicle is much like the Holden Crewman, which was a version of the Holden Ute with its wheelbase stretched to accommodate a second row of seats and two more doors (all-wheel-drive was also eventually an option).

The concept debuting in Detroit will be wearing very masculine GMC styling cues, however, and sounds as if it will be billed as a unibody pickup. This gives the GMC four-door ute a good shot at production since GM knows that demand for trucks in the future has to be satisfied with vehicles that are more fuel efficient than body-on-frame trucks.
A recent spate of unibody truck concepts like the Toyota A-BAT Concept and Ford Explorer America Concept show that automakers are very interested in switching to lighter unibody platforms for vehicles that have traditionally been truck-based.

Lutz also points out the obvious upside that if the GMC four-door ute is popular with the public, it can be sold in Australia as Holden’s replacement for the Crewman, which wasn’t updated along with the rest of the Ute lineup last year.

So Maybe the Crewamn isn’t dead afterall

As for what it will look like.. I expect it will look very similar to the Concept Car [Lutzy likes it] Yet on the front cover of a recent issue of Motor there is a CGI of a Torana A9-X Coupe which is based more on the Vectra [Insignia] which shares the Alpha platform of the TT-36

I hope that they make it here.. There’s enough room for another line at the rear of the Elizabeth facility.. It’s possible considering the Monaro is No More the plant in Canada will be making Camaros and GM are planning to close up to 4 other plants in the US.. Wait and see

As for the Torana that is more of a certainty as Rick Waggoner has finally realised the world is leaning towards smaller mor compact cars. He also realised that its better for a company to build a range of cars based on one or two platforms [Alpha and Zeta] which also share various parts

So The Torana is more likely to get the Go Ahead particularly with the New G6 due in a couple of years.. Id expect Holden are doing R&D on it at the moment. As for where it will be built as yet that hasn’t been decided

Oz – From what I have read on this website Frugal One doesn’t like cars at all.. I mean he only has negative things to say about every make and model.. which makes me wonder what the hell is he doing on this website

Didnt HOLDEN make a SS or/and a S VY Commodore Wagon?

If I was Holden, I’d just say, “here, have one”

However; if Crash tests are that important to you you might want to chat to Mikka as he is also a big fan of such tests as well as surveys; and other manipulated statistics/figures. He’d know,

i wonder how many Swiss bank acounts are being feathered with that deal????

That would be my preference over diesels any day, but until our governments get the guts to mandate hydrogen (made from sea water using solar, wind or even tidal energy)then diesel will still be a better option than than unleaded petrol!!!

7 styles of wagon thats very broad i wonder if they will scale back because surely not all 7 will be popular?