Most Kiwis would look at the Holden Colorado and consider it to be a pretty big, pretty capable vehicle. But, there's always room to ramp things up.
Clearly, this mindset was somewhat present when Holden New Zealand and their partners at the Auckland-based Retro Vehicle Enhancement got together to cook up their next joint project. This enormous monster of a thing, the Holden Colorado ROX concept, is the result.
Revealed yesterday at a local launch, the ROX will represent a centre-piece for Holden New Zealand's stand at this month's Fieldays event at Mystery Creek (June 12-15). And the changes that have been implemented to the ute are ... err ... extensive.
The self-titled 'super-truck' rolls on gargantuan 35in Blackbear mud-terrain tyres, each of which requiring huge specially made flares in order to be accommodated into the Colorado's comparatively small footprint. If that wasn't enough, there's also been a six-inch body lift.
A carbon fibre high-rise bonnet helps with weight reduction (?), with a snorkel, light-bar, winch, and bespoke steel bumpers front and rear helping complete the ROX's Baja look.
A 500mm tray extender, roof basket, side-exit exhaust, new wheels, and custom-made sports seats in the front and rear are among the bevy of other changes.
“The Colorado ROX was the type of project we’ve been waiting to be let loose on – all we needed was a willing partner who was prepared to share our vision and push boundaries along the way," said Retro Vehicle Enhancement Managing Director David Stanners.
“We engaged suppliers from as far away as Poland, America and Taiwan so it’s been a truly international effort, made all the more challenging as we created a huge majority of components from scratch which meant extensive one-off CAD engineering.
“The quality of workmanship is world-class and I’m incredibly proud of my team as the finished product is above and beyond what we hoped to achieve.”
Sadly, as the headline states, this is merely a concept. After being showcased at Fieldays, Holden will use the Colorado ROX concept as a talking point throughout the country.
It will spend the next 12 to 18 months driving all over New Zealand as part of a road show; traversing the nation's Holden dealerships while simultaneously stopping in at various marquee events as an activation tool.
All the while, the ROX will tow a fully laden event trailer, which is said to put its 3.5-tonne towing capacity to the test.
"Our driving desire was to take our most capable vehicle, the Colorado, and beef it up to become the greatest awe-inspiring, eye-catching piece of machinery ever devised by Holden New Zealand,” said Holden Managing Director Marc Ebolo.
“We know many of our customers have grand visions of what they’d like to do to personalise their own vehicles after driving them out of the dealership, so we wanted to showcase just how far you could take a Colorado."
