Null's ultimate Dream Car Thread - A CV8 Monaro in Austria

[Null.Performance]

Hello fellow petrol heads,

I am Null, fellow Australian car enthusiast from Austria. A few months ago, a 'life-long' dream of mine became reality, when I traveled to the UK to purchase a stunning example of my ultimate dream car - the Holden Monaro CV8.

Please allow me to start this thread with a little look back in time. How come an average guy from central Europe falls in love with Australian cars, you might ask?
Well, my love for Australian cars started back in 2005 when I first played Need for Speed Underground 2. Contrary to most car guys and girls I know, it wasn't the JDM or Euro cars that I fell in love with. It was the Pontiac GTO, the Monaro's american cousin, that got me.

Ever since that time, I dreamt of owning one of these Australian made beauties. As the years went by, most of the wild dreams and aspirations I had as a kid gave way to reality, but the Monaro still kept it's place in my heart. I can't remember exactly when I found out that a few hundred Monaros were sold in the UK as Vauxhalls. But I quickly realized that importing a Monaro from the UK would be much cheaper (for lack of tariffs, taxes and for ease of legalizing), and generally less troublesome than an overseas import from Australia or the US.

When Brexit referendum happened in 2016, I hit a sudden road block. I had not saved up enough money to purchase, import, legalize and maintain a good example yet, and definitely would not be able to afford the added tariffs and taxes if I were to purchase a Monaro after the UK had left the EU. But as Brexit got pushed back further and further, I tried to save up as much as I possibly could and regularly checked all the usual platforms for tidy and unmodified examples.
I knew it had to be either a Red Hot or Devil Yellow CV8, since Turismo Blue and Blazing Orange cars never made it to the UK.

Fast forward to October 2019, this Red Hot 2006 CV8 Monaro popped up on Ebay Motors UK. From the pictures, it appeared to be in exceptional condition. And the detailed description backed that up. But initial excitement soon mixed with fear - Could this be too good to be true? A low mileage, well preserved, completely unmodified CV8 for a reasonable asking price? I was mainly concerned about the underbody of the car (rust).
The seller (Andrew) and I had a very long phone call the next day and what can I say, from that moment I knew I was about to purchase a car from a genuine petrol head. Turns out, he has had the car for 10 years straight and it was the best car he ever had. He was so impressed with it, he even bought a red VXR8 Bathurst Edition as a more practical daily driver
We continued to talk and write emails a lot during the next few days, and while I tried to get A LOT of stuff sorted on my end (organizing transport for the car to Austria, ordering GBP currency from my local bank etc.), Andrew did his part and even got the car up onto a lift so he could provide me with pictures the current state of the cars underbody. What more could you possibly ask for when buying a car?

When the big day finally came in November 2019, I boarded a plane to London Heathrow Airport and set off on a 2 hour drive towards Somerset. I spent the night in a lovely Inn, had my first ever full English breakfast and then it was time to meet Andrew and his CV8 in person. I will never forget the moment I pulled into the driveway of his lovely old cottage and there she was in all of her glory. Andrew had vacuumed and detailed the interior, washed the exterior and put on a fresh coat of wax the day before to make sure the car looked 'presentable', as he called it. What can I say, it looked so perfect on this foggy morning, if he told me it had ran of the production line yesterday, I would have believed him. All the stress of the last couple of weeks instantly faded away to pure bliss. Keep in mind, I had never seen a real Monaro up to this date - only thousands of pictures and videos of them on the internet!

Andrew showed me around the car and explained EVERYTHING to me. Inside, outside, under the bonnet. We went through binders full of receipts, documents, service records and MOT certificates so I could get to know the cars history, and embarked on a very long test drive where once again he tried to show me what the car is like in different driving scenarios, and what it is capable of. Not like a teacher, not like a car salesman, but rather like a genuine petrol head would. You could really tell he loved this car to bits, and while I won't go into details as to why he had to sell it, I can tell you seeing his baby go left him with a heavy heart. But he assured me he was glad to sell it to someone like me who will enjoy and take care of it just as much as he did.

Early December, the car was delivered to me and went straight into the underground parking garage and into winter hibernation. Unusually warm weather allowed me to take it out for a quick drive on December 20th, which is coincidentally my birthday. My brother accompanied me in the passenger seat and helped me navigate traffic. I took it up the nearest mountain road and it was absolutely fantastic, breathtaking, exhilarating. What an amazing machine! It just drives so smoothly, is rock solid and stable even in tight corners - I'm still kind of lost for words, and so was my brother. He's a huge fan of Japanese cars, but even he was deeply impressed by the Monaro's abilities. It was everything I ever imagined it to be and so much more! We stopped by a scenic location along the route to take a few pictures - I'll share some of them below.

The car has been in winter storage ever since and I am currently working on getting a few small things sorted and legalizing it.
Since I plan on keeping this car for life, I have a lot of stuff planned for the near future to get it even closer to as-new-condition and improve it's longevity.
I promise to keep you guys updated in this thread!

Edited by Null.Performance on Thursday 19th March 20:53

Edited by Null.Performance on Monday 30th March 17:00

[Null.Performance]

Picture of the cars rear end:

[Null.Performance]

And a picture showing my Monaro in it's new habitat
As far as I know it is the only Monaro in Austria, and most likely the only Holden vehicle as well.

Edited by Null.Performance on Thursday 19th March 20:42

[Null.Performance]

RipGMH said:

Brilliant story, can feel the emotion and excitement! You a very brave man buying a car without first seeing one and I am glad it has lived up to your hopes.

Funnily enough, I’m an Australian in the UK and had to wait until getting here until I bought mine, which I plan to ship back to Australia with me.

Hey, thanks a lot! Glad you enjoyed my little write-up
With Monaro and especially HSV GTO prices going completely through the roof recently, shipping your VXR back to Australia will probably end up being a very wise financial decision in the long term!

[Null.Performance]

mfp4073 said:

well I have to say that's a great story, I'm glad everything worked out for you. You have a great car and it looks lovely in those photographs.
Keep us updated with your ownership and if you need any advice on these cars don't hesitate to ask. You can also try the owners club on Facebook as most owners are on there.

John

Thanks a lot John!
So far the forums have been a great source of information for me. But I still have a lot to learn about these cars and will surely have to start a few new 'help-me-please-threads' sooner or later

[Null.Performance]

SturdyHSV said:

Brilliant story, and interesting to hear you found the Monaro via NFSU2, a lot of us fell for them through Top Gear episodes, but no idea if it's perhaps as popular in Austria?
As above you can really hear the passion in your words, and on that note also your English is exceptional!
The pictures are fantastic, I can imagine the car is a lot of fun on such lovely roads!
It sounds like you're planning on keeping the car quite original, if you ever catch the modding bug plan a holiday in England and you're welcome to try mine out (and probably others) to get an idea of how they can be... 'tweaked'

Hey Sturdy, thank you for your kind words
Top Gear is pretty popular here as well! Everybody who is into cars has seen at least one episode. We used to get all the episodes as soon as they were translated/subtitled and/or voiced by voice actors.

Oh I would love to get to know other Monaro owners and learn about their cars, their stories, their experience! As we speak there's only one Monaro in Austria (mine) so the chances of coming across another are pretty slim. If I were to come across one locally, I'd completely loose my mind, most likely
Currently looks like I wont be able to make another trip to England in the near future, but once I eventually do, I'll gladly take your offer.
Maybe some of you guys want to experience a few breathtaking alpine roads sometime? I'll gladly show you around!

I know all too well how easy these cars are to modify. People turn em into race cars, drift cars, drag cars, street legal beasts - you name it, and somebody has probably done it already. However, it took me so long to find a tidy and unmodified example, it just does not feel right to start modifying the hell out of it.
I also have to refrain modifying it for legal reasons: Since the Monaro was never sold and thus never certified for road use in Austria, I can only get it legalized via a complicated process called "Einzelgenehmigung". Not sure if there's a correct translation for that very German word, but I'll do my best to explain:
In essence, government appointed technicians will thoroughly inspect and test the car before it will hopefully be declared safe and roadworthy. After a lot of paperwork, that is.
And everything I do to the car that alters its original condition, before or after it gets approved, will send me through a similar process again. With uncertain ending! You could try and be a sneaky mf and mod your import anyway, but once you get caught by police, the fines are hefty and can easily lead to a loss of license or your car of the road until you fix it. Not something I want to experience.
Please don't get me wrong - you can modify your run of the mill Golf, Bimmer or Focus here legally, and pretty easily, so a lot of people do it. All you have to do is (simplified)provide the government technicians with engineering certificates (TÜV or similar) for the parts you put onto the car, prove you had them fitted in a licensed garage, let them inspect the car and do a bit of paperwork. In fact, I have done that before with my daily driver and first car, a Volvo V50, and it was pretty easy and relatively cheap. I still have that car, btw!

Last but not least, I really enjoy the way the car is right now. I always feared these cars would either be soft as hell and handle like a boat around corners, or be stiff as hell. I have the original press kit of my generation Monaro, and they were marketed as muscle cars, which never were the most sophisticated pieces of engineering and driving dynamics, up until recently at least.
Turns out, I (or they??) was/were completely wrong??? I feel like my Monaro is perfectly balanced, hitting the sweet spot between a powerful B-road-ripper and a comfortable long distance hauler. I'd even go as far as calling it a grand tourer - the most appealing type of car to me, that combines the best of both worlds.

My Monaro still has the original exhaust, which is super rare, I guess. And exactly as I want it to be. Rather subtle and restrained at idle, and at low rpms when cruising, but all hell breaks loose once you step on the gas above 3000 rpm. Perfect for what I plan to do with it most of the time - road trips.
I have seen countless videos of Monaros or VXR8s with crazy engine builds and exhaust setups. There are a lot of setups out there that make our cars sound absolutely brutal. The Walkinshaw exhaust on Supercharged VXR8s makes them some of best sounding cars in the world, but would get me into trouble with police really quickly. And that end up defecting my car for an long period of time - a horrible thought as i am having heavy Monaro withdrawal symptoms already
Just my personal opinion though. I really enjoy yours and all the other crazy builds out there, it feels so special owning a car that you could almost do anything with if you really wanted to!

Edited by Null.Performance on Friday 20th March 14:14

[Null.Performance]

V8fan said:

If the OP is not a native English speaker, his language grasp is excellent. Excellent right up, with very good grammar!

I wasn't aware that any Turismo blue cars would be grey imports though. I'm sure I've seen Monaros with the proper UK number plate fittings / sizes in blue?

Hey V8fan,

thank you for your kind words! I have the original press kit for my generation Monaro, and neither Turismo Blue nor Blazing Orange are mentioned as available paint color choices. A few pre-facelift Monaros were indeed sold with a rich deep blue paint called Impulse Blue. Only available in the UK in 2004 thought.

Have a look at this comparison I quickly threw together: Turismo Blue on the left, Impulse Blue on the right:

[Null.Performance]

RipGMH said:

OP, as you said your interested in learning about people stories I thought you’d like this thread:

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

Thank you for sharing. I read the whole thread and could not stop smiling!

[Null.Performance]

I am really grateful to have found a local garage willing to work on the Monaro and help me with the things I am unable to do myself! It's run by two chaps in their late 30s who were once travelling all across North America as race car mechanics, so they definitely know their way around an LS engine and drive train. As you can see It's a really small garage which barely fits two lifts, but hey have customers bring in their GT-Rs and an Englishman currently living here who brings in his vintage rhd Lotus Super 7, so I guess that speaks for them!

We arranged a post purchase / post transport check up so any hidden defects could be spotted and fixed before I enter the process of legalizing the car. Other than a few things that we agreed to tackle as preventative maintenance, they confirmed that the car is indeed in very good condition. I am glad to have confirmation from an independent source now that I have indeed bought a decent Monaro

There's a bit of play in the steering rack and the drop link rubbers are starting to show cracks, and that's it. Said parts plus tie rod ends were ordered from Pedders UK, where Roger and Phil were kind enough to organize overseas delivery for me. I am also going to replace the power steering cooler with a universal one from Mishimoto once we are in there, as that appears to be a really common issue with our cars.

Edited by Null.Performance on Monday 30th March 15:58

[Null.Performance]

If there is one thing 'wrong' with the timeless and elegant design of the CV8 Monaro, it has to be the badge on the front grille, in my honest opinion. It is too large in relation to the grille and too flashy for my taste, due to it being mostly chrome. So i knew i had to get something more subtle and ordered a black 95 mm Holden badge from Australia. While I was at it, I also ordered a genuine 69 mm Holden boot badge. Have a look at them:

[Null.Performance]

Of course, I had to do a quick mock-up to get an idea of what the front end would look like with a black badge before i placed my order

[Null.Performance]

Progress is being made!
The headlights were sent to a specialist in northern Germany to be converted to LHD light pattern. Cost me an arm and a leg...
The bumper received the following treatment in the meantime:
- Deep clean
- Fixed some damage to the clips that must have occurred during transport
- Removed Vauxhall badge and added black Holden badge
- Slim license plate frame to fit Austrian number plates
- Rock chip touch up

[Null.Performance]

irocfan said:

any reason you didn't use the GTO headlights (I assume that they'd fit and be very cheap)?

Very good question. I spent days browsing through various forums to find out what my options are.
From what I found out, the GTO headlights have different wiring and connectors. I am still not 100% sure on that though, since there is some conflicting information out there. In the end, I decided to go the safe route and had the headlights that are on the car converted to LHD, probably not the cheapest but certainly the most hassle-free option.

[Null.Performance]

Mickeym said:

Nice car! And what a story. Congratulations on buying your dream car.

I'm wondering if you considered importing a Monaro from the Middle East? It might have been a little more expensive with the importing taxes. But you would have a LHD car, since you are in LHD country.

Prices there are also very cheap. So might have made up a bit for the taxes?

Hey Mickey,

thank you for you kind words.
No, I never considered importing a LHD Monaro from the Middle East. Of course, the idea of a LHD Chevy Lumina Coupe or Pontiac GTO (from the US) was somewhat tempting, but the taxes would absolutely kill me and the legalizing process could potentially take forever.
Compared to the Australian and UK CV8 Monaros, the American GTO simply is a less attractive looking car and the Middle East is a part of the world that I have no plans to ever visit. I decided to go the RHD route and spent years looking for the perfect example, as I considered a steering wheel on the wrong side to be a small compromise to make when purchasing my ultimate dream car - something I will only be able to do once in my life

[Null.Performance]

berliner said:

Hi,
nice car and very nice pictures of the Monaro in front of the mountains.
Do you have pictures from the inside?

regards from germany

Hey Berliner,

fantastic to see another Monaro in Continental Europe! Do you know how this car ended up in Switzerland in the first place? Curious to learn more about your experience legalizing and taxing an Australian made car, imported from Switzerland into Germany.
I must say I have no idea how many petrol heads were crazy enough to bring either an American Pontiac GTO, Aussie or UK Monaro, or simply any Holden vehicle to continental Europe, but there can't be a lot? I only know of one German guy on pistonheads (Schneesturm) who has imported a white 2015 Vauxhall VXR8 GTS into Germany. I believe he also had an older VRX8 before. We should definitely organize an Australian car meet somewhere in Central Europe in the future

I unfortunately only have a few rather crappy cellphone pics of my cars interior, here is one of them:



I will definitely take some better pictures for you in the furure. I am thinking about taking it for a quick spin on the large parking lot next to my underground parking garage soon. Unfortunately, I am currently not allowed to drive my Monaro on Austrian roads because it is not legalized / taxed / insured yet.
I fired it up yesterday for the first time in what felt like an eternity after putting in a brand new battery. Now the urge to just take it out and go for a drive is REALLY strong again. I know I am not allowed to do so - I will probably risk it though if the corona virus lockdown in Austria won't be lifted in the next 6-8 weeks, so I won't go crazy.

Edited by Null.Performance on Monday 30th March 19:03

[Null.Performance]

berliner said:

Hi,
Pedders Germany still has a red maloo and there is also a VZ Ute in the Netherlands. Many will not come together for a meeting ;-)
How long it will take for your car to be legalized?

There is a guy in Belgium with a VE SSV Redline Ute (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8bDMU7ow00)
And I have seen 3 Pontiac GTOs come up for sale in Germany in recent years: a black 5.7 Auto, a black 6.0 with the full SAP Package and a red 6.0, both automatics. So there must be quite a few more.

And if we can get some of the UK guys and gals to come down, it could be a decent sized turnout

I initially wanted to get the car road legal by mid April, when winter would finally be gone. An then Corona happened
Austria is currently on indefinite lockdown, and during this time the Zulassungsstellen as well as all the governments own Kfz-Prüfstellen are operating in emergency mode with very limited staff and will only deal with 'critical cases'. Most likely I will have to wait for things to get back to normal again before I can get my Monaro legalized...

[Null.Performance]

Mickeym said:

Just one question. When you say the legalizing process could potentially take forever, is this in the particular case of the Monaro and GTO? Because I worked with somebody from Vienna once and he imported a couple of Corvettes from the US and said it was very straight forward. He complained about the taxes. But the process he said it was not difficult.
He always complained about how expensive cars with a lot of power are to insure in Austria and that you can't really modify the cars much. Do you have to get some exotic car type of insurance for it there? Since it was never made there.

Huh, that's a lot of questions, I'll do my best to answer:
- Legalization process:
My Monaro is a car that was previously legalized in another EU country by it's importer (UK; Vauxhall) so that means it will most likely be a not too difficult and straight forward process for me as well.

- Taxes:
Road tax is determined by horsepower, fuel economy, emissions, value and age of the car. No matter if exotic Lambo, imported Monaro or run of the mill Golf.
On top of that, we do have what's called the 'Normverbrauchsabgabe'. A fee the first buyer of a new car has to pay to the government. The more eco-friendly your car is, the lesser the fee. Somewhat similar to the american gas guzzler tax.
Now, you are correct, the Monaro was never imported / sold through a dealer in Austria, so I am it's first registered owner in Austria. Since it's a 14 year old car, the fee is much smaller than if it were a brand new car. Still, it's more than 2000 pounds on to of the price of the car that I have to pay the government just to be able to get it on the road. And because I am not satisfied with what the Austrian used car market has to offer, I guess. It's kind of a fked up thing to be honest and it has always bothered me. But I knew all along I would have to pay this Normverbrauchsabgabe, and paying taxes is simply part of life, so I will stop complaining now

- Insurance:
I thought I'd need special exotic car insurance for my Monaro; and thus inquired a few insurance companies specializing in classic and high end cars. But they all turned me down, saying my car would not meet their criteria for exotic / classic/ one-off cars or whatever. Yall kidding me???
Turns out, I can insure it just like a run of the mill car with my current insurance company - Which is a good thing because cheaper!
Insurance premiums are (again) determined by horsepower, fuel economy, emissions, value and age of the car. And your driving and accident record. My record is clean, btw
So yeah, a Corvette or any other high powered and polluting car will be quite expensive to insure.

- Plates:
There's a really cool thing called 'Wechselkennzeichen' in Austria. This allows me to use one set of license plates for up to three cars and split insurance costs between them!
I do have a daily driver next to the Monaro, so I will definitely grab me a set of Wechselkennzeichens!

- Modifying imported or rare cars:
Pretty difficult. Once your imported car gets approved for road use via a process called 'Einzelgenehmigung', you may not alter it's approved state in any way other than maintenance. Or you will have to go through the same process again. With uncertain ending! If you can provide them with engineering certificates (e.g. TÜV) for your mods, that makes it a bit easier, but still, I personally would not do it. Because who the hell does TÜV certificates for a Monaro? You guessed it, nobody
I could try and be a sneaky mf and mod my imported car anyway, but once I get caught by police, the fines are hefty and can easily lead to a loss of license or my car off the road until I fix it. Not something I want to experience.

- Ease of importing Corvettes:
Once a certain type of car (say, C7 Corvette) has been legalized in any State of Austria, it does indeed make it a bit easier for the next guy importing a C7 Corvette. So yeah, I guess Corvettes are easier to legalize than say a Vector M8. I do see quite a lot of Corvettes here. I guess when dealers decide to import a bunch of them at once it makes it even easier for them? Not sure though

All in all, the process of importing an American GTO would involve a lot more paperwork than importing a Monaro from the UK! And I save big on taxes because EU. I hope that answered most of your questions. Please take it with a grain of salt, because I am a private individual and not a professional car dealership at the end of the day

Edited by Null.Performance on Tuesday 31st March 01:52

[Null.Performance]

Mickeym said:

So £2000 in taxes without importing duties? I don't know how much you paid for your car. But the current price for non VXR cars seem to be between £6-8K. So that's around 25-33% in taxes without importing duties. I can see why you didn't go for a Pontiac GTO. What importing duties would add on top of that, 20% more?

When importing a GTO, or any car from the US to Austria, a 20 % import sales tax + a 10 % car tariff is added. Then you have the Normverbrauchsabgabe (2000+ GBP), the legalization fees and the shipping costs. It is crazy money. I just could not justify spending that much on top of the car, not even for the most perfect GTO out there.

For 8k pounds, you can definitely get yourself a Monaro, but it will be a bit rough around the edges and definitely not low mileage (more like >65k miles). Just look at the silver CV8 currently for sale with pistonheads - Looks really nice on it's coil-over suspension and with the black badge in the grille. But at second glance, I counted at least 4 different shades of silver paint on it, at it's not solely down to parking garage lighting or the different materials (metal/plastic)...

If you are curious, I paid exactly what the seller wanted for what is now my Monaro: 11,600 GBP.
It was exactly the kind of Monaro I had dreamt about for more than a decade, and I am so glad I decided to pull the trigger on this one.
Btw - there surely are nicer examples out there than mine - Just look at some of the other peoples rides on the forum. There are amazing builds pushing crazy hp/torque figures, as well as completely original or 'lightly modded' ones still in showroom condition after more than a decade!

People that buy Monaros out of passion for them, rather than necessity or just to show off, tend to hold onto them for a really long time. That unfortunately means really clean and/or tastefully modified examples that meet all your personal criteria, what ever those might be, come up for sale rarely.
It took me years to find exactly what I was looking for. But I can guarantee you, with a bit of patience, you will find your perfect Monaro - it is definitely out there!

[Null.Performance]

bigwheel said:

Hiya. Your replies may appear to be long winded to some but are a pleasure to read. Full of very interesting information. And your grasp of the English language is formidable.
You have brought a new dimension to the forum and welcome your input.

Thank you so much Ron, your comment warms my heart. It is nice to be able to be part of such a tightly knit and helpful group of enthusiasts that share the same passion as I do

[Null.Performance]

Nickyboy said:

I regret selling mine last year (Who wants to be an adult and buy a house )

I would definitely buy another one if i had the chance in the future although it would be a weekend toy as apose to a daily driver



Thankfully it went to a motoring journalist who was going to cherish it

What a faboulus looking CV8! Is that the GTOs SAP Package rear wing?