The humble Holden Gemini turns 50 this year. Here’s a look back at our bumper feature story from 2015, when we celebrated its then 40-year history.

First published in the July 2015 issue of Street Machine

Not quite an import, but never accepted as a truly Aussie Holden, the Gemini has nonetheless left an indelible mark on this country’s automotive landscape. They’ve been bought, sold, fixed, broken, modified, scrapped, raced and hooned by generations of Aussies. Quite a few Street Machine feature cars have been built from them, including a Summernats Grand Champion, with plenty more seeing action on drag strips, race tracks and burnout pads around the country.

Although they never came with a six or eight from the factory, Geminis are more Aussie than you may think, having been built at Holden’s Acacia Ridge factory in Brisbane, using a high proportion of local content. 226,319 of the suckers were built there in total. The Gemini nabbed the Wheels Car Of The Year award in its first year and quickly becoming the biggest-selling four-cylinder car in the country.

Before the Gemini arrived on the scene, Holden’s large cars were ruling the sales charts but its HB and TA Toranas were ill-equipped to handle the increasingly sophisticated competition from the Japanese, not to mention Ford’s Escort.

Geminis were the last small cars in Oz with chrome bumpers and rear-wheel drive

The Gemini was a whole new ball game. It was one of dozens of cars built around the world as part of GM’s T-car program, including the Opel Kadett C in Germany, the Isuzu Gemini in Japan, the Vauxhall Chevette in the UK, the Chevrolet Chevette in the US and many more. Though these cars shared a platform, they not only had different names but also different sheet metal and, in some cases, different powerplants.

Anyone who has lifted the bonnet of a Gemini would have noticed ‘Isuzu’ emblazoned on the rocker cover, but we nearly got a very different machine. Late in 1971, veteran Holden engineer Jack Rawnsley was dispatched to Opel to develop a T-car version best suited to Australia, using a mixture of Opel and Vauxhall bits while including a high degree of local Aussie content.

Our T-car was to retain the Kadett C’s sheet metal, but be powered by Vauxhall’s ancient 1256cc OHV four-cylinder engine. The range was to mirror that of the LJ Torana, with a two-door sedan and four-door sedan only.

The project was so advanced that in June 1973, a Vauxhall-powered test mule, running Opel-designed suspension and disguised in superseded Kadett B sheet metal, began endurance testing at Holden’s Lang Lang Proving Ground.

But GM’s purchase of 34.2 per cent of Isuzu Motors caused our T-car project to shift gears. A car built on the T platform was deemed the perfect replacement for the decade-old Isuzu Bellett, and with Japan a lot closer than Great Britain, it made sense for Holden and Isuzu’s T-car projects to align.

Not being fully controlled by GM meant Isuzu’s stylists and engineers were given free rein to take liberties with the Opel Kadett C design, although the freedom was a double-edged sword; the Germans disallowed Isuzu’s staff to use cameras in Opel’s design studio, forcing the Japanese to employ a skilled artist to draw the cars in perfect detail!

Isuzu chose to develop a four-door sedan and two-door coupe; thus, the Australian version followed suit.

Isuzu completely redesigned the interior, including different seats and door trims plus a sporty three-gauge dashboard layout. Minor revisions were made to the bumpers, front and rear sheet metal and tail-lights.

The Holden Gemini was upgraded twice more with the original sheet metal, as the TC (1977) and TD (1978), the latter introducing a short-lived SL/E luxury variant as well as wagon and van body styles, with rear panels sourced from Vauxhall’s Ellesmere Port plant in Cheshire, UK.

The Gemini received a major redesign in 1979 with the TE, again in close association with Holden. Panels were squared off to create an illusion of width across the front and increase cargo capacity in the rear. Engine options expanded to include an 1817cc diesel. Isuzu also revised their coupe version, but sadly Holden elected to drop the two-door. The wagon and van variants released with the TD model carried on.

As the 70s closed, most manufacturers, Opel included, replaced their small rear-wheel-drive cars with front-wheel-drive hatchbacks, leaving Isuzu and Holden to battle on against more modern and space-efficient rivals well into the 1980s.

The Aussie Gemini was updated twice more before production ceased in 1985; the TF (1982) included an entirely new dashboard that liberated some much-needed interior space, while the final model, the TG (1983), included the only local ‘sports’ variant, the Gemini ZZ/Z. There was also the Sandpiper (TC) and Sandpiper II (TE), but they were more of a style pack than anything sporty.

Production of Isuzu’s T-platform Gemini ceased in 1984, while the Holden version followed in 1985. Both were superseded by the RB-model Gemini, based on GM’s front-wheel-drive R platform. Local versions were assembled from imported CKD kits at Holden’s Elizabeth plant in South Australia.

Across 10 years, six models and four body styles, the T-series Gemini was there as a second car, a race car, a fleet model, a courier van, a sports car and a super-economical oil-burner. It could do many things, and cheaply. Geminis were plentiful, attainable and reliable, with many rusting long before their Isuzu donks ran out of puff. They were fun to drive and could be made to drive hard, but they could also be made to look a million bucks – the last small car in Oz with chrome bumpers and rear-wheel drive. And for all those things, the Gemini will be remembered.

Special Gems:

Street Machine feature cars over the years:

Got cubes?
Leroy Hancox’s TE sedan

Leroy Hancox’s TE sedan (SM, Mar ’02) sported 355 cubes of Chevy power. Amazingly, the 11-sec beast was engineered and street-registered.

Force fed
Bruce Smith’s TD wagon

Dare to be different! Bruce Smith bolted a modified B&M blower to the two-litre donk in his show-spec TD wagon (Apr/May ’92). Yeehah!

The best
Drago Ostric’s wagon

Drago Ostric’s wagon (Apr ’02) is perhaps the wildest Gemini ever built: custom tubular front-end, lift-off front clip, suicide doors, sumptuous custom leather interior, big audio and flawless Spies Hecker paint. It won People’s Choice at Summernats 15 and Grand Champ two years later.

Age of Otron
Sean O’Donovan’s TD wagon

Sean O’Donovan’s futuristic TD wagon (Oct/Nov ’91 ) had a computer named Otron that talked to the driver with a synthesised voice.

Don’t feed after dark
Todd D’Elboux’s TE sedan

Todd D’Elboux’s TE sedan (Jun ’89), nicknamed Gizmo, was so good that it won Top Street Machine overall at Summernats that year. Phwoar.

CELEBRATING 40!

From Perth to Hobart, Gemini owners around Australia gathered on 15 March, 2015 to celebrate the birth of their favourite little car, including 52 at the site of the old Holden plant at Acacia Ridge. Here’s a few of our faves.

1. BIGGEM is a tidy TD wagon – pasted to a HiLux chassis and running an Ecotec V6!

2. Plenty of rare tin attended the WA meet, including this genuine JDM Isuzu Gemini ZZ/R, subtly updated with LS V8 power!

3. Andrew Parker’s TG has been retrofitted with an early-model front clip. Oh, and a 900hp twin-turbo V8.

4. Arthur Bouronikos’s coupe is a tough unit, packing a monster G180 turbo and running in the mid-10s.

5. Rodney Dove’s super-rare S3 CDT turbo at the Port Melbourne meet.