Monaro HQ 350
LOCAL VERSION OF A 350
Seeing it gleaming under an intense Otago sun, it’s hard to imagine that this 1972 Holden Monaro GTS 350 coupé with its faultless patina, gold colour scheme with eye-catching white flashes, and chunky big tyres was starting to look shabby 10 years ago.
When they moved the car out of its Dunedin hillside garage back then, owners Tom and Winsome Trevathan got a shock when they realized how much it had deteriorated as a result of being stored in a damp garage.
“The car had been stored for about three years and we hadn’t been aware that the garage was leaking, so it was quite a shock to see how bad it was. By the time we discovered how badly it had affected the Monaro there were quite a few rust patches,” Tom explains.
Of a total of 405 HQ GTS 350 coupés built, just 307 were fitted with a four-speed Muncie manual gearbox. Tom is one of just a few owners of this rare car, which he found in Nelson in 1977. The original owner bought it new in Australia and, as required back then, kept it there for the required two years of ownership before shipping it back to New Zealand.
“When he brought it back here, his son bought it off him. However, the son decided he would sooner have a motorbike than a car as it would be cheaper to run, so the father bought the Monaro back off him and I bought it off the father. So I’m just the third owner,” Tom tells us.
Fitted with a Chevrolet 350-cubicinch (ci) (5.7-litre) V8 motor, Muncie four-speed gearbox, and Salisbury limited-slip differential (LSD), the big two-door car made a striking impact in its day as well as serving as a family
“The car had been stored for about three years and we hadn’t been aware that the garage was leaking, so it was quite a shock to see how bad it was”
alternative to a pickup.
A keen motorcycle rider in his younger days, Tom’s son Paul picked up the bug big time for motocross.
“Paul started off in the smaller 125cc classes then graduated to the 250cc classes and joined the big boys,” Tom says. “He was quite good at it and as a family we travelled all over the country to motocross meetings with his bike on a motorcycle trailer hitched on behind. He later rode overseas for Kawasaki.”
The big car suited the family for their trips away and was the ideal car for the job. Today, the speedometer sits on just 57,000 miles (92,000km).
“That car transported our whole family — my wife Winsome, oldest daughter Tania, Paul, and younger daughters Hayley and Sophie — all around the country before Paul went overseas,” he says.
Despite not having power steering and with those big tyres making the Monaro a real handful to manoeuvre at parking speeds, Tom enjoyed driving it: “It was always used as the tow car for a lot of the South Island open-road driving. It was a fantastic open-road car; it just sits on the road. Although it had no power steering, it didn’t need it once you got out on the open road.”
Eventually, the car was little used and stored, but when its condition was eventually discovered a decision had to be made as to what to do with it.
TAKING THE PLUNGE
“We made the decision to fully restore the car to exactly as it would have been when it left the factory in 1972. Who to do it? One evening Winsome ran into Dave Bouman [Holden Enthusiasts Club of Otago] and told him about the car. Dave said he would get his brother Paul, a panel beater, to come and have a
look at it,” Tom says.
Paul said he would love to tackle it, so the Monaro was transported out to his workshop at Outram.
It was 10 years ago that they took the plunge and committed to a full noexpense-spared restoration.
“I wasn’t in a great hurry and I wanted a good job,” recalls Tom. “I told Paul that cost meant nothing, resulting in a ground-up restoration of the interior, as well as new door rubbers, seats, and interior panels. It was quite bad in some parts. It got a new right-hand front mudguard and boot lid. A lot of work was needed around the wheel arches as well as on many other parts of the car.”
Tom he helped out with jobs such as painting the inside floor before laying the new carpet. Every part was cleaned and overhauled and replaced where necessary; nothing was overlooked. Paul finished by sealing everything with fish oil.
“Holden didn’t build a lot of Monaro coupés but it built them well,” he says. “It built four-door Monaros too. Paul did a really good job of it and I’m very happy with it. He took the body back to bare metal and finished it by taking out any small dents ready to go straight into the paint booth. A friend of Paul’s painted the car. He had also painted Paul’s own cars. It looks very good.
“It is still a great car, and out on the open road it’s pretty impressive. Dave Bouman did the motor for us. With the miles the car had done it was no use just doing the body and not the motor as it was sitting a long time. We’ve done up everything so it’s all still pretty tight.”
Tom remarks that his son was quite amused when he learnt of the decision to retain the tow bar.
“Well, it wouldn’t be the same would it?” he says.
RIGHT MAN FOR THE JOB
Paul Bouman has spent more than two decades working as a panel technician, restoring some interesting cars. We first met Paul in the 1990s at Warren Smith’s Collision City panel-repair business in Dunedin. He was working on a Triumph TR3 while completing a national trades feature for New Zealand Classic Car.
The lengthy restoration of Tom’s Monaro has brought a special car back to life and pristine condition. Paul acknowledges that getting the impressive panel shut lines just right necessitated many hours of work.
“Tom’s Monaro was really quite bad when I got it. There was quite a bit of rust internally and a lot of panels needed work. It was quite hard to get some of the replacement parts for it, such as the interior electric window switches and the armrest, which are peculiar to that model and very hard to find. Mike White did
“We made the decision to fully restore the car to exactly as it would have been when it left the factory in 1972”
the paint job and, although I wasn’t quite sure about that original gold colour, once Mike added the white flashes it looked pretty good,” Paul mentions.
A new Rare Spares upholstery kit was fitted locally by A1 Upholstery and the impressive all-white interior complements the muted gold exterior and white sections. Paul made up a new factory front air dam to replace the missing original.
“I was very keen to see that this car wasn’t over-restored and I think we have achieved that,” he says.
HARD DECISION
A truck and courier driver for some 47 years, Tom has now retired. With the plan to move to another property, along with a recent knee-replacement operation, the time had come for a hard decision. Tom’s oldest daughter Tania, now living near Melbourne, would have liked it but Tom deemed it too powerful for her, and then there’s the heavy steering at low speeds.
“It would have been good for Paul to have it, but he married a Dutch girl and now lives in Amsterdam where he is crew chief for the KTM Motogp motorcycle racing team. This Christmas will be his first time home to
New Zealand in 16 years,” Tom says.
A hard decision to make but there was only one thing they could do.
“It was finished two years ago and I’ve hardly used it since. It’s kept in a secure lock-up and I cannot get to it at the weekends. With my knee, I’m not supposed to be driving so we have decided to sell the Monaro,” he explains.
Despite travelling in the car for only a short drive, our immediate impression is one of a very tight, well-sorted, and drivable classic. Beautifully finished and trimmed, this ‘General’ is going to make someone very happy.
“With my knee, I’m not supposed to be driving so we have decided to sell the Monaro”