'Thats why we are here man, together, cause when you are out there, riding with the Grave Diggers, what can stop us man, what can stop us...
​we own the world'.

Grave Diggers - Serious Soldiers.
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Sandy wrote Stone during the Vietnam War after meeting returned soldiers, many of whom were riding bikes. He modelled the Grave Diggers, which he stated, means "Serious Diggers" on the Vietnam and Korean veterans.
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Grave -  refers to a situation, danger or expression that is exceptionally serious or critical, often implying a high level of danger or importance. Diggers - Australian and New Zealand military slang term for infantry soldiers originating around 1916-1917 on the Western Front. The term 'Digger' is deeply tied to the concept of egalitarian mateship - a sense that all ranks are equal in the face of hardship.
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Meet The Long Arm Stars.
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THE LONG ARM, the newest of Australian police series, is due to premiere on the 0-10 network this week. Production is based at Melbourne's Channel ATV-0, but the series is being filmed in nearly all States. The series has a regular cast of five. Robert Bruning plays Inspector Dallast Buchanan. Bruning, frequently a villain in Homicide and Division 4, is a West Australian. He is married with a daughter, Ariane (15) and son, Simon (14). Bruning started acting in amateur theatre in Sydney as a young man but after marriage he turned to steadier jobs in car sales and insurance. The stage revival of Summer of the Seventeenth Doll in 1966 tempted him back to the stage. Among his guest TV roles was that of a down and out test cricketer in a Division 4 episode. Bill Hunter plays Det. Sgt. Les Lee. Hunter, 30, is another villain turned hero. For four years in the 1960's he had acting roles in England, including parts in Dr Who and other series. Since returning to Australia he has appeared in many TV drama shows. He is married with one son. Sandy Harbutt, who plays Det. Const. Kim Riverton, is a Sydney actor who has worked in many Sydney TV shows, the movie Colour Me Dead (in which he was a mad gunman) and a variety of stage shows. He is 28. Lyndal Moor, like Harbutt, is a former student of Fiddler On The Roof star Hayes Gordon's theatre school. She will play a 19-year-old in the series but actually is 25. Lyn-dal, a former top Sydney model, is making a complete switch to acting following film roles in Colour Me Dead and Squeeze a Flower and TV guest roles in Sydney TV. Barbara Mason, who plays a widow (and Lyndal Moor's mother), Mrs Towns, is a TV newcomer. A former English repertory actress, she married a bank official and gave up the stage. Since her stepson (24) and daughter (17) have grown up she has ventured into TV. Producer of the series is Ron Beck, a former Sydney radio producer who has worked in America. He has written three of the first four episodes. Ron Randell, Ray Barrett (The Trouble Shooters) and Patrick Wymark of The Power Game, are expected to appear in the series. TV Times April 1970.
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The Long Arm Motorcycling Cop.
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WHEN The Long Arm's baby-faced detective, Sandy Harbutt, wants to get away from it, he heads for the hills on his motorcycle. In show business, where reputations are often measured by the length of one's car, Harbutt opts out. He doesn't own a car. He bought his bike, an ex-SW police machine, and caught the motor-cycling bug long before he knew he was to be a policeman in a TV series. Says Sandy (real name Alexander) Harbutt: "I've owned fast cars, but I like my motor cycle. a good way to be alone and the best way I know avoid the hurly-burly. "It's rather like flying, just you and the elements. I like to get out in the country with the trees whistling by. "At Christmas I rode from Sydney to Melbourne. It's less tiring than driving because you don't the feeling of being enclosed, as you do in a car. It's hard on the back, though. I went touring in the NSW country, too. If I had gone in a car,, I'd have had to interrupt my trip but on the cycle I just rode around places like Glenrowan and Gundagai." Another good thing about the motorcycle is, according to Harbutt, "that you don't get lumbered with a carload of people to take home after a party." And how does that go down with the girls?  "That's no problem to a married man," says Harbutt, who is married to actress Helen Morse (who is in line for lead female part in the doctor series Pat Malone GP, if it gets under way)."Most women are afraid of motor cycles and I suppose you can't blame them as, being on the back, they haven't much control over their destinies," Harbutt admits. "Helen trusts me and will ride pillion, but I must admit I'm thinking of getting her a car." About four years ago, Harbutt was involved in a serious car accident in Sydney, badly injuring his face and losing a kneecap. But he denies this is behind his opting for a motorcycle rather than a car. Love of speed is not behind it either. "On a motor cycle you can get all the thrills of speed at 30 miles per hour. You'd have to drive at a crazy speed to get the same in a car," he says. Harbutt was born in NSW.  For years he was a director of TV commercials by day and a spare-time actor by night. TV Times, 15 July 1970.

 Stone is a 1974 Australian outlaw biker film, written, directed and produced by Sandy 'Undertaker' Harbutt. 'Take the Trip' is a reference to the effects of narcotics; however, Stone is by no means a glorification of biker gangs and their methods of survival but a fascinating insight into their way of life and their reasoning for reacting so strongly against society.  John 'Zonk' Ifkovitch describes 'Take the Trip as a philosophy of the life long journey of biker culture, being involved in Stone and being involved in biker culture and the motorcycle club scene is taking the trip and the central theme of Stone'. Sandy stated 'I wanted to make a picture that captured the code and the values and all the things that made the motorcycle culture as it was, as I was experiencing it from 1968 to about 1973, and I thought there was this honour, there was commitment to one another that wasn't happening in any other culture that I knew of and I thought that it was something that should be recorded, because it was an important part of Australian life and it was being ignored and since I thought I had an insight into it, I decided to make a picture about the lifestyle'.

Sandy's previous short career in law and advertising drove a unique path into his role in Australian Cinema. While working for McCann Erickson in Sydney he would meet copy writer Michael Robinson with whom he would later co-write Stone's script and screenplay. While directing commercials for Australian TV and cinema Sandy developed an interest in method acting, which led him to enrolling at Hayes Gordon's Ensemble Theatre. It was here that Sandy would first meet Stone's principal actor Ken Shorter. While working at the theatre Ken Shorter was offered the role as a cop in the TV series 'You Can't See Round Corners', which laid down the blueprint for his character in Stone. Sandy's and Ken's relationship was further galvanised when Ken recommended that Sandy should star in one of the episodes as a bad guy.  The fact that Ken Shorter had a previous career in the police force was an added bonus for his role in Stone.  Another seedling in the history of Stone's on screen personas lies in the annals of Australian mainstream TV when Sandy himself landed the role of a military drop out in an episode of 'Skippy The Kangaroo', with a striking resemblance to his role as the 'Undertaker' in Stone.

​​In 1970 Sandy accepted a lead role in a new TV series for the Ten Network, 'The Long Arm'. This series was an attempt by Ten to break the stranglehold of Crawford Productions of Homicide (Channel Nine) and Division Four (Channel Seven) over the production of police series on Australian television. Sandy and friend Michael Robinson, who was an advertising copywriter, decided to write a 45 minute screenplay for the show concerning a motorcycle gang. Sandy approached Michael Pate, the executive producer of 'The Long Arm' and asked Michael to read the script; he thought it was too good for the 'The Long Arm', which after 24 episodes was about to be axed. Michael suggested 'that Sandy turn it into a movie'.... Sandy stated 'I thought I could actually sit down and do something'. Michael was keen to continue with the project as a feature film; however, Michaels vision for an all American director and actors didn't impress Sandy, who was keen for the production to be completely Australian. A week later the 'The Long Arm' was cancelled. Sandy decided to persevere with the screenplay, expanding it from a one hour TV episode to a two hour experimental movie. Michael Robinson was keen to be involved and they completed the first draft over an eight week period. Sandy stated 'I felt that The Long Arm was the worst television series ever made and I was going through a very down period at that time... the only joy I had was riding my bike. I wanted other people to experience how I felt, so I wrote Stone... it's my message from those who ride to those who don't, I want to educate Mr and Mrs Average'. 

In 1972 Sandy's directorial debut finally came in the form of a full length documentary based around the opening of an Australian version of Jesus Christ Superstar, a project that would surpass his average time clock beyond that of a shampoo or automobile advertisement for network TV.  With this experience he could start to pursue a 2 year old interest to direct a full length movie. 

To develop the movies narrative, Sandy started to frequent the Forth & Clyde Hotel in Balmain, Sydney, NSW, a frequent biker hangout.  Sandy stated 'he commenced hanging out with these wild people to understand why they were on the radical edge of society'. ​​​

Sandy insisted that the entire cast were to live as part of the commune as the Grave Diggers in a mass method acting exercise. Many of the actors relented to hand in their keys post production and have kept riding ever since, stopping to fulfil other biker roles along the way. Sandy stated 'I've tried to avoid the bikie scene but it always brings me back... frankly, the bikies remain loyal to me after the film industry excluded me, I have a motorcycle and I love to ride it, internationally it is an unstoppable culture of rebellion which will never be extinguished'.
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Michael Robinson stated 'Stone was made possible by a friendship in pursuit of an adventure'... 'co-creator of the fantasy, co-pursuer of the bread and co-spirit of the production'.

BlackHawks MC
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The BlackHawks were a sanctioned Sydney Outlaw Motorcycle Club.  Sandy approached them prior to filming and sought the use of their cut-offs for the scene at the Forth & Clyde Hotel, suggesting to BlackHawk club members that 'the use of the BlackHawks patch in the movie Stone, will make the BlackHawks patch immortal'.  ​As the BlackHawks were a club with limited membership, Sandy asked a small number of other Sydney MC's to support the filming of the fight scene against the Grave Diggers by performing as BlackHawk members in the film.  

​Rebecca Gilling 'It was supposed to be a brawl, that ended up being a brawl'.

​The fight scene was supported by actors, stuntman and the following clubs: Blackhawks, Hells Angles, Lone Wolf and Grim Reapers. 

​The BlackHawks President was 'Birdman' played by Tony Allyn. 
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The Hells Angels were paid in beers and dope for their acting services and on completion of the fight scene headed to the Dry Dock Hotel, Balmain. ​

The Long Arm Screenplay
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Examining the youth sub-culture in a modern Australia against the kaleidoscopic back ground of the long Sydney summer.
The Long Arm narrative is the first draft of Stone and the central idea that Sandy Harbutt wanted to explore.
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Explanation 

Stone is a story of alienation - the alienation of today's youth from the affluent society built with care and pride by its forefathers. What makes an intelligent educated young man who has fought for his country in Vietnam, reject that society for which he has risked his life and come to lead one of the hated outlaw motorcycle gangs the Grim Reapers who live for speed, violence, sex and drugs and who have their own law, morality and religion. What makes another young man, a policeman university educated by the force, successful in his work, grow to doubt all the values of a society of which as a policeman he is the immediate authority symbol? These are some of the questions asked by Stone, a film examining the youth sub-culture in a modern Australia against the kaleidoscopic back ground of the long Sydney summer. 

Plot

A leading political figure is assassinated at a peace rally and subsequent violent death of four Grim Reapers who were present at the rally lead police to look for a connection. Stone, an unconventional but strangely effective young detective is assigned to infiltrate the Reapers and find a solution to the murders. The film follows the Grim Reapers on their extraordinary course involving Stone in drag racing, discos, gang fights, gang bangs, the surfing scene and unfolding the reasons for the bikies' behaviour and their attitudes to the society they have rejected. Stone comes to respect and even admire the Reapers for their peculiar integrity and with their help uncover the murderer and his big business political employers; however, any affection for the Grim Reapers is ultimately dispelled when they finally revert to senseless savagery, brutally gang-kicking Stone as a waring to all that they are outlaws.