HSV diesel deadline set

HSV boss Phil Harding has said his company will confirm its diesel plans by Easter 2009. Speaking to the Carsales Network, the hot Holden arm's Managing Director said pointedly his company would "put up or shut up" on diesels by the Q2 holiday deadline.

Harding confirmed HSV was continuing to investigate diesel powertrain options for its Commodore-based models -- along with LPG variants (see separate story) -- at a meeting in Melbourne yesterday.

He singled out diesel as a potent factor in growing HSV's export markets

"There are reasons why we're investigating different alternative fuel strategies... Diesel started because when we launched VXR8 in the UK, I got a lot of questions about where was the diesel version. Certainly the cars that you're 'battling' with on the roads are diesels," Harding explained.

"Diesel in Europe is a little more advanced than here. You don't fill the car up round the corner at the truck pump. You don't end up smelling of diesel when you get back in the car.

"You look around at what Mercedes and BMW do and they come out with some great product at the top-end of the diesel market... So if HSV was going to do a diesel it would do a decent diesel that attempted to replicate the expectation of what a performance car would be like.

"With that in mind we've had a look at two diesel engines. In the business case for that -- it's not approved yet, it's still ongoing -- we think that it is crucial [we have a diesel option] if we're ever going to export in larger numbers."

Harding confirmed HSV had been evaluating the 2.9-litre VM Motori-sourced V6 diesel that General Motors will offer in European versions of the Cadillac CTS. He also stated another six-cylinder turbodiesel of European origin had been tested.

Though he would not confirm the origin of the engine, last year the Carsales Network confirmed HSV had been running a BMW turbodiesel VE mule.

Though unlikely, Harding has consistently stated that HSV's diesel plans could potentially see the carmaker fit a non-GM affiliated powerplant. Indeed, he quotes the example of Opel's move in the late 1990s to fit a 2.5-litre BMW turbodiesel six to the Omega executive sedan.

While the HSV boss would not talk export targets, he offered up the example of sales of 300C as an example of the potential impact diesel could have on HSV's fortunes in European markets. According to the HSV boss, in the same period Chrysler sold five petrol 300Cs in Italy, it also sold 1200 turbodiesel versions.

"I'm not saying we're about to sell 1200 diesel HSVs into Italy," Harding qualified. "But it's indicative of the effect."

On the local front, Holden itself seems to have gone quiet on diesel variants of Commodore, preferring to play its displacement on demand (AFM), E85 and LPG cards.

Could 'outsourcing' local diesel customers to HSV and delivering the performance offshoot a leg up in the export stakes therefore deliver a result bigger than the sum total of its parts? It seems we'll have to wait and ask the Easter Bunny...