The grandpappy of the HSV Grange, the HDT Magnum, is one of the rarest Australian-made Holdens, with around 114 said to have been produced. One has just popped up for sale on Carsales, with 176,000km on the clock.
Hailing from an era when Peter Brock’s HDT was the default go-to destination for hot Holdens, this Magnum was built in 1984, at the end of the WB Statesman donor car’s run, which could trace its lineage back to the 1971 HQ.
Designer Leo Pruneau’s attempts at bringing the WB into the 1980s involved fairly extensive sheetmetal redesign, inspired by Cadillac, but the chrome bumpers betrayed its origins rooted in 1970s Yankee style. HDT’s Magnum did away with that, with clean body-coloured bumpers and door handles, 16-inch dinnerplate Momo alloys wrapped in Pirelli P7s, black grille and stripes, cool ‘Magnum’ badging and a rear blackout panel to imbue it with a European sports sedan flair.
Inside, a Momo tiller and blue interior theme with velour seats make it feel more like it belonged in 1980s digital age than a boaty boulevardier, but it’s the changes under the skin that make the Magnum unique.
Holden’s 5.0-litre V8 was tuned to Group 3 specifications, meaning power jumped from a meagre 126kW to 188kW, with 429Nm of torque. Connected to a Trimatic three-speed with a transmission cooler, it could be had with a short 3.08:1 differential ratio and a limited-slip differential for rapid launches. To help it corner, it featured Bilstein dampers, fatter stabiliser bars, lower springs and revised geometry.
A 0-100km/h time of 9.4 seconds isn’t exactly setting the world on fire, but respectable for the time and likely a lot quicker than the original 308 V8 Statesman.
This particular example was test driven by Brocky himself, which might explain why it is almost double the price of another example we found on Carsales. This one is up for $98,000, compared with $59,000.
It has featured on the cover of Unique cars and has been the recipient of many awards at car shows.