It’s almost Gemini Season. I’m no astrologer but this is apparently a period of tremendous energy, motion and change, sometimes unpredictable. That likely doesn’t describe this Gemini owner’s experience with their little yellow car though it accurately characterizes Holden’s travails in the 1980s.
There’s not much more I can say about the RB-series Holden Gemini than what I said in my exhaustive piece on it, its Isuzu-badged twin overseas, and the Chevrolet/Geo Spectrum. Although they were generally pretty reliable, RB Geminis seem to be almost extinct. There’s no enthusiast following for them like there was its rear-wheel-drive predecessor and it was a disappointing seller for Holden. Unlike the RWD Geminis repainted in lurid colors and hooned to hell, this top-spec SL/E was probably purchased by an older and more conservative buyer. It was around the 1980s when hatchbacks really took off in the small car segment. It seemed younger, more style-conscious folk preferred hatchbacks while small sedans became the choice of older buyers.
Pardon the terrible interior photo. Amidst the glare, however, you can see the cloth seats have held up well. The SL/E sat atop the mid-range SL/X and fleet-only SL models. All came with a choice of five-speed manual or three-speed auto and a standard AM/FM stereo and split-fold rear seat. The SL/E added electric mirrors, two extra speakers (for a total of four), tilt-adjustable steering column and remote trunk and fuel filler door releases. Power steering was an option. It sounds rather monastic today but this was pretty well-equipped for a small car in mid-1980s Australia.
Here’s a better picture from the brochure.
Australia only switched to unleaded fuel in 1986 and a lot of cars took a huge hit in power. The carbureted Isuzu 1.5 four – the only engine available in the RB Gemini – managed to avoid that, producing the same 69 hp at 5000 rpm and 86 ft-lbs at 3400 rpm before and after the change.
Though the featured Gemini has probably provided many years of stable and reliable motoring to its owner, the RB-series Gemini itself was a symptom of the sickness plaguing Holden. Launched in May 1985 in Australia – so the Gemini may well be a Gemini! – the RB was the first front-wheel-drive Gemini series. It was also the last Holden Gemini.
Compared to the last series of its RWD predecessor, the TG, production was down significantly – 16,263 vs. 24,675. While the sedan-only RB shared showroom space with the hatch-only Astra, a rebadged Nissan Pulsar, so too did the TG. Sure, the RB didn’t have wagon or panel van versions like its predecessor but it was still a sales disappointment – even when combined with the Astra, Holden’s total volume in this segment in 1986 was about a third that of Ford or Toyota. This was bad news for a company that was heavily in the red at this point and shedding market share. Fortunately, a restructuring and cash injection from GM HQ helped put Holden on a more stable footing by the end of the decade.
The venerable Gemini nameplate, however, was given the boot. Being merely a local assembly operation, it couldn’t meet the high level of local content required to help Holden reach an 85% target and the Button Plan was forcing Aussie car manufacturers to consolidate their products. Besides, it was pretty silly marketing two separate, unrelated model lines in the same segment. A new generation of the rebadged Nissan Pulsar – the Astra, now powered with Holden engines – replaced the Gemini in 1987.
The movement of the stars and the positioning of the planets wasn’t going to guide Holden in the right direction in the 1980s. Instead, it was the downward movement of sales and the cluttered and confusing positioning of its range. The first FWD Gemini was merely average and made virtually no impact in Australia, even less of an impact in North America, and Europe didn’t even bother with it. This was the beginning of the end of Isuzu passenger car production and if Isuzu didn’t see it yet, they should’ve checked their horoscope.
Related Reading:
CC Outtake: 1989 Geo Spectrum – The Blue Band of the Spectrum
“Reliability is back in style”? So Holden is admitting that their previous cars were pieces of crap? Who the heck approved that tagline…
GM has used the “Yeah, we built crap before, but we’re DIFFERENT now” storyline for decades, particularly in the US.
Like Charlie Brown with Lucy and the football, people keep falling for it.
Fun fact – the Vega was originally supposed to be called Gemini….
We owned a Chev Spectrum for about a year. It was leaking oil and rattling badly so we traded it towards a Honda Civic hatch.
There were so many similar cars on the road by this time, it was hard for me to believe there was room for it in the US. Nothing really amazing about it gave it an edge. Isuzu made Chevy LUV trucks and it was just another Japanese manufacturer coming ashore at a time when we were getting a half dozen new makes from Japan and South Korea.
So, I did what it seemed common back then – I ignored it.
So thank you for writing these cars up.
a kid at my highschool had an imark with handling by lotus in the late 90. These used to be fairly common, mostly in Chevrolet guise, but they all seemed to disappear by the mid 2000s.
These cars were never popular in OZ and I can only recall seeing one in NZ since Ive been back, Isuzus badged as Holdens had been tried in NZ before the RWD Gemini sold moderately well but was up against its stablemate from Vauxhall the rebadge os the Aska as a Camira had the previous Camiras rep to combat and lost,
Isuzu trucks had a good rep they first appeared with Bedford badges but have gained their own reputation under their own name and continue to sell well.
Nice find and biography William. It reminds me of a Dodge Shadow/Plymouth Sundance, only constructed from Lego.
Jeez, your I-Marks were just as ugly as our I-Marks! The only Isuzu I ever liked was the Impulse
I’ll trot out my usual (annual?) defense of the I-Mark in opposition to Ed’s poor experience with his family’s badge engineered Spectrum that I’l blame on general GM malaise and corporate antipathy rather than any inherent shortcoming of Isuzu’s engineering. My ’86 was great, if a bit underpowered (you Ozzies didn’t lose any power going to unleaded because there wasn’t any power to begin with).
In top spec, my hatchback I suppose was was decently comfortable with almost none of the penalty box trappings that the Geo version represented/delivered without being over the top in any way. A thick and tweedy cloth that may have been the same as the Gemini’s, the dark tinted taillights that were a very early adaptation of the trend, attractive alloys, and a good color (metallic blue) with good looking (to me) cladding around the bottom added up to a decently stylish ride along with the little spoiler that, if I’m honest, promised much more than it delivered in the way of “sport”. Still, the price was right, it didn’t let me down and I still have good feelings towards Isuzu.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-1986-isuzu-i-mark-thats-no-lie
After trading mine in on a GTI in 1992 it appears that it was still rolling around California as late as 2000 when it failed two emissions checks in a row and then there’s an entry for 2001 without either a pass or fail, perhaps it was given up or something and crushed. Or it found its way out of state/country after driving without registration tags for six months…It must have had at least 120k or 130k miles when I sold it so to go for another nine years after that isn’t terrible at all.
Never knew GM had any tie-up with Nissan, ever. Wow, this same basic car was badged as a Nissan, a Holden, and an Alfa….