Holden Commodore VF
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Even
though every market has very particular preferences when it comes to
cars, some result even more interesting to observe than the others.
Australia and Brazil, for example, have very different cars but coincide
in some aspects, such as creating their own categories (and turning
them very successful) and receiving almost as many foreign projects as
having domestic ones being exported. So before this sedan appears as
North American Chevrolet’s new s-size, how about knowing what its
homeland has just revealed?
Just
like Ford with Falcon, GM’s Australian division has been selling
Commodore with great numbers for many years. Holden has taken
inspiration some times from Chevrolet and others from Opel, but always
resulting at an excellent car which could easily be sold anywhere else –
the last two generations, for example, went to Brazil as Chevrolet Omega.
But if the Europeans are used to reduce the cars’ updates only to
half-life facelifts and new generations, and North Americans receive
several tiny updates between the bigger changes, the Australians extend a
car lifecycle by creating some partial restylings each two or three
years; the third Commodore, alone, had three of them in about ten years.
The current phase debuted in 2006, but the bigger time lapse until its
first update is probably explained by the very big initial budget spent
on attending the public’s very high expectations. The codename VF, comes
as a more important facelift because it might be the only one: GM is
planning to create a whole new Commodore for 2016 underpinned by a whole
new global platform. However, since this will take a long time to
happen, for now it’s possible to to appreciate what is certainly this
car’s best moment ever. The excellent first impression was guaranteed by
starting with Calais, which is this car’s upmarket version. That’s
Holden’s way of showing everything its sedan is capable of.
The
external pictures start to show that Holden managed to refresh this
sedan making it so attractive that could easily be mistaken for a new
generation. The overall impression is that it abandoned the 2000s style
trends in favor of a more European inspiration, giving away the sharp
cuts and creases in exchange of smoother volumes and much more classy
elements. In fact, there’s no wonder why this car has been exported as
Opel Omega’s equivalent: VF really resembles Insignia, not a direct
competitor but as a bigger brother, because it’s more opulent. But the
many similarities are there, specially related to the implicit
sportiness given by the irregularly-shaped lights and the very discreet
creases. Entering the car reveals a whole new cabin, with seats, doors
and console matched in a very elegant two-toned decoration. But the even
better news are located at the items list: like every true luxury
version, Calais can bring heads-up display, GM MyLink infotainment
system, parallel and 90-degree parking assistance, electric steering and
several safety systems, to prevent front and rear collisions at low
speed, involuntary lane changing and to improve external visibility.
Engine data wasn’t revealed so far, but it’s expected that Commodore’s
biggest changes will be efficiency improvements, ra
