HQ Sandman Speedo's

[adam perth]

just checked my 8/74 HQ, its KM/H and MPH.

[Absinth]

KPH only HQ speedo's were made and I have an original 200kph one in my box of speedo's. I am yet to see a 220kph GTS speedo but that doesn't mean they wern't made.

This is an original 200kph standard speedo than someone has fitted a GTS speedo needle to. Mine is the same as this but has the correct standard needle.



The Sandman brochure shows a standard 120mph/200kph speedo and I have been unsure if this is correct or not...... the HQ GTS brochure shows the 140mph GTS speedo and the SS definately had the standard 120mph speedo. One would assume the Sandman would follow the SS and have a standard speedo with the GTS speedo reserved for GTS cars..... however I have seen several fairly original looking Sandmans with 220kph/140mph speedo's fitted.

But.... my old HQ Sandman van back in 1981 had a standard 200kph/120mph speedo in it... a few months after I sold it to a mate the Tacho crapped itself and the only way we could get a replacement was to buy a complete GTS dash from the wreckers for $150. While changing over the Tacho we noticed the difference in speedo's and fitted the 140mph GTS one from the dash we got from the wreckers.

There is no way to know the speedo in your 35 year old car is the original speedo.... VDO speedo's are dated so there is a possibility a correctly dated speedo is the original but all the GTS speedo's were made by Flexdrive and these aren't dated.

There is also the possibility that one or more plants did or did not fit GTS speedo's in the Sandman..... it has been proven that some plants namely Acacia Ridge did not always follow the rules.

Byron has a HQ Sandman features manual that says the GTS speedo was a feature change so if I had a HQ Sandman now I would happily fit the GTS speedo.

To answer your question Mauser... if the U21 (sports dash) option was ordered on Belmont,Kingswood,Monaro,Premier,Brougham or Statesman then you got the standard 120mph, 120mph/200kph speedo. This only applies to HK,HT,HG and HQ.

[HK1837]

Features manuals is one of the documents that is rarely wrong.

If you have a speedo with the pciking slip code on it still see what it is. The HQ XX7 production broadcast sheet I have shows QX as the code in box 110 (inner RH guage). Guages are: QW QM QK QX RD

[GNW1974]

my 4/74 HQ Sandman ute had a 200/120 speedo, I have no reason to believe it wasn't standard. I know it was that cause I took it out one fine day until it was flat out, pretty scary.

[mauser]

Thanks for answering mate.

I think as a run out model some things are different from each of the plants. Anyway, something had to be left in the bag for the GTS buyers to shell out the big bucks. lol

When it comes to randomness in building HQ's I think this story about origional cars having decals or painted on blackouts from the SS site is gold.

http://www.concourseparts.com.au/for...php?topic=71.0

"But here is something for you, a guy that he knows worked over here at Shacks Holden for years and he said that some SS's were painted and some were decals because it depended who was on the shift at the time the car came through.
Basically it sounds from what he was told that if the guy that could do the decals correctly was on the shift it got decals if he was not it was painted.
If that was the case something like that could really explain the randomness that has started to appear in the stripe/ decal side of things."



Mauser

[GNW1974]

who knows what is original and what is not, looks like anything could go and potentially be correct. As the cars were made across 4 plants could there even be variations in parts from state to state? I was an industrial rep for Wreckair Hire in the late 90's/ early 2000 in Adelaide and I had many dealings with component manufacturers (maintenance dept) and was continually in awe of the manufacturing process. Going into places like Dana and seeing complete front ends etc for Holdens was an eye opener. Export Holdens got a better A/C compressor etc.

[mauser]

Hay thats half the fun... trying to work it out and prob getting it wrong.

Mauser

[Absinth]

Features manuals is one of the documents that is rarely wrong.

If you have a speedo with the pciking slip code on it still see what it is. The HQ XX7 production broadcast sheet I have shows QX as the code in box 110 (inner RH guage). Guages are: QW QM QK QX RD

What's the fifth gauge?

RD doesn't seem right either... the one I have is part No. 2815737 Amp/Temp to be used prior to ADR 18.... in which case it can't be correct for a Sandman.

I will go through all my speedos and gauges and list what they all are.... at least the ones with the labels on them..

[HK1837]

They are listed under the production broadcast sheet boxes as something like left, centre left, centre, centre right and right. So RD would be the rightmost. Centre would be the blank (or clock or whatever else goes there on varying models). If anything is going to be correct, a production broadcast sheet has to be, that is what the vehicles are built from!

[HQ SS]

I posted about this on fastlane a fair while ago and I am to lazy to totally re write it so here is what I posted.
On the speedo side of things, from what I have seen if they are VDO speedo,s they will have a stamped in month and year date code and if you are really lucky there could be a printed on day, month and year date code.
This can be seen in these pictures.
http://s872.photobucket.com/albums/a...ent=Speedo.jpg
http://s872.photobucket.com/albums/a...ent=Speedo.jpg
As you can see these are 72 and a 74 ones, So it should still be right for mid 73 as well.
Also from what I have seen the Flexidrive speedos only have a sticker on them,no stamped date code.
So less chance of getting a date from them but they could still be there.
Also the VDO date code can be seen while the speedo is still fitted to the car.
Anyway I am curious to know something about these speedos from after the bulletin date.
This is the bulletin
http://gallery.oldholden.com/Markssh...m/aaa.jpg.html
Has anyone looked at the date code on these ones and compared them to the build date of the car at all.
The way I see it, if you have a 140MPH speedo with a production date after July 1973.
It would indicate that they were still fitted after that date.

Late edit
I have checked a few things and I see that it was not a forced change
as such that made Holden change the speedos at this time.
What they were actually doing was part of a gradual change of the whole country to the metric system.
Even the road signs look to not have been changed until July 1974.
The point of all this is that Holden did not have to have them changed over on that date they just did it.
Which means if MPH speedos were fitted they were not breaking the law at all, so not a legal problem.
In my Sep 71,March 72 and Dec 72 HQ owners manuals they say
0 to 120 mph for std
0 to 140 mph for GTS and they mention a 0-200kph speedo
So even as far back as 71 it was on the books.
The illustration of the dash,s show MPH ones.
The first mention of the dual speedos is in the June 73 Owners manual.
It says std is 0 to 125 mph and 0 to 200 kmh
GTS is 0 to 140 mph and 0 to 220 kmh
The illustration of the dash,s show the dual gauges as well.

The November 1973 one is the same as the June 73 one.
I do not have a April 1974 HQ book so if anyone has one I would be really interested to see what it says.
If you have a look for these details they are at pages 21-24.
On checking a few of my speedos I found a 5/5/73 MPH one.
From the few I have with car build dates as well the speedos
seem to have around the 2 months turn over time for the units.
So if this is the case with this one it would have been fitted just after the change over date.
Anyway as I said before the answer could be on your speedo.s themselves.
Just check the date code.
I would be curious to see what the earliest kph speedo was that anyone has.
Cheers Paul.


Later edit.
I have just checked my parts books and the may 71 M37072 book lists MPH and kmh speedo's.
as does the M37058 parts book which I would assume by the part number would be a earlier than may 71 parts book.