Don't sweat the duty, it's a ute not a truck. Utes are car based. Tell them I said so. Desertratrodder, sorry I missed you at LARS. We had a csr trader mag from home with us, there were a few Mainline utes for sale in it. One was around $1500 from memory. Would have been rough though.
Plenty of austalian utes and trucks here in my old tin post.... http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=179509
Here's some pix of my mate's '49 Ford Ute. He's just got it MOT'd (U.K. road legal) and will be puttin' plenty of miles on it this summer. It still runs the 24 stud flathead. Any body who might have a spare set of tail-lights for this car, we'd be in the picture to buy them? More pix here... http://koops.typepad.com/photos/edgars_49_ute/index.html
I have posted some of these photos in a previous thread but seeing as how we are on the subject of utes here are a couple of my old daily driver from 1984 when I was still living in Adelaide, South Australia. The vehicle is now in Indiana (has been for 17 years) and my brother is collecting parts to build it, having just sold his 27 T to fund the build. If you compare the pix with Roadkill's advertising material you will see the fact that the body from the firewall back is the same as the Chev and Vauxhall utes. Also of interest is the fact that the doors roll under at the bottom rather than ending above an exposed sill as per the US bodies. The door upper frame is a channel section too as opposed to the stamped upper section on the American version. This body was basically a coupe shell with different rear quarters as were all the utes of the era and was exclusive to the Holden built Willys. TJ Richards built the 4 door sedans and also the 5 window coupes (still can't find the photo that I have of one of them) that used the American style exposed sill. The Richards' coupe used 4 door sedan front doors so the opening is shorter at the belt line but longer at the drip rail. Roo
heres a photo of my old 38 ford ute its the only photo i have electronically will have to scan some to put on hamb
Old thread I know, but Holdens did in fact build Ford bodies prior to Ford setting up their own plant in Oz. I was just looking at an old book I have and I believe this was in the period between the wars. (Late teens, early 20s). Holdens were not owned by GM at that stage and built Buick and Dodge bodies also. I have a Marquette cowl in my shed with a Holden badge on it. When were they built, 1929? Pete
rooman that's a tasty old # plate on your Willys. Don't be chuckin' that away. Hang it on the wall if you don't hang it back on the car. We came across a nice '37 coupe years ago in the mid north. The farm kids were using it to drive to the gate to catch the school bus. No sale. On the same trip we bought a '55 Ford hearse and drove it back to Adelaide. Had to sell- we lived on Cemetery Road and mum said 'no way'.
Ran into some info on wartime utes somewhere...1939 chassis based, they were modified with wagon springs and axles from the 3/4 ton line to give heavier carrying capacity. Ford Canada did similar truck mods to '40 and '41 station wagons for the desert war, and many of these were cut down into roadster wagons in theatre.
I noticed that the OZ cars, especially the fords were dated a year later than the same body style in canada. I owned a 55 canadian ford and met a guy in Mooloolaba who had an identical car ( 4 door sedan). He claimed it was a 56? Some of the literature posted above shows a 58 ford ute. In canada, 58 had twin headlights. The OZ car looks more like a 57 canadian model to me. greg
Our Chevy's are all 'Australian made' Fisher bodies and have a few differences from the USA ones. Our 2 '56's have a factory modified hood bird. I have been told 6 were made like this for Western Australian roads. It was deamed that the 'beak' was dangerous and removed. The Aussie 57's all have '56 dashes in them factory. No doubt because they were easier to convert from LHD to RHD. Personally I think they look nicer too I think there are other differences too but haven't studied them hard enough!
Often the base model of one year was the deluxe front from the year previous. Cutting costs that way. I would love that Willy's ute, always loved the 37 Chev utes and the 37 Willys front is the best they made after 33. Would kill for one a a tow car for my A40, that or a 38 standard ute! I will always kick myself for passing on a 48 Anglia ute, $600 with full boxed chassis, tubbed and narrowed 9inch! Young and dumb. I read somewhere that the 48-215 was a US design that was rejected? I doubt it though.
These featured 'whatever it takes' wartime bodywork/ styling. Definately a Harley Earl- free zone ! There is a '42 Pontiac roadster ute which has scrubbed up well as a street rod. Think it's lolly pink & was in one of Larry's mags. Doc Watson - yes that '37 front is very sweet. The farm kid coupe- I'm having a hard time remembering if it was Holden or T.J. bodied, 3 or 5 window. I do recall it was a blue factory paint, like washington blue, and had factory striping still evident. A runner in vaguely similair condition bodywise as rooman's ute as far as I can tell. Fenders may have been black. It was a pretty little car.
Greg, I was always under the impression that this happened due to shipping time between the two countries. My '51 Chevy Deluxe was sold to me as a '52, but it definately isn't. Strangely enough, it runs the same dash as a '50 Chevy in the US.
Good to see this thread revived but despite a lot of misinformation, nobody has mentioned Larry O'Toole's definitive 2002 book on the subject 'The Good Old Aussie Ute' available from Grafitti Publications in Castlemaine, Vic. or in the USA from www.autobookworld.com/<wbr>shopexd.asp?id=5396 The first misconception is that utes started in 1934 - not so. That is the year that the first production Ford closed ute was produced. Lew Bandt produced a couple of prototypes in 1933 and had one shipped to Dearborn for FORD USA to look at. Obviously Ford USA failed to pick up on the concept until 1957. The first utes were actually built as open models in the 1920s. Photos can be found in Norm Darwin's 'History of Ford in Australia' and 'History of Holden since 1917' as well as the Larry O'Toole ute book. The ute was designed as a dual purpose vehicle that would allow farmers to use it as a work horse during the week but to be able to adrive their wives to church on a Sunday in something that did not look like a farm truck. The closed cab ute was even better as it did not mess up the ladies' hair or blow their hats off.
My UTEs were not titled by model year at all. When I purchased them I recieved a "Certificate of registered interest" and they were listed as a P25 for the Plymouth and SP25 for the Desoto. In American production terms the P25 was the 1954 Plymouth and the SP25 Did not exist since it was an export only model. Luckily when I went to title them here in Iowa I had a copy of the dealer corespondense that showed the Utility coupes going into production dated 1956. a Piece of sales literature dated 1956 and the seller wrote me a bill of sale for each that noted 1956. Of course getting a title made from scratch was a task anyway and it took two supervisors and the window lady to figure it out. They. wanted to title them as 54s since that was the body style and the series of the Plymouth As far as Chrysler Australia was concerned the reason for the delay in model years was the lack of local tooling support. The dies from the Canadian production were sent to OZ in 55 after they were done using them up north. And they continued using the same cab stampings through 1963 on The chrysler Royal series with changes in the front fenders and rear quarters every couple years.
Roadkill My DeSoto is an SP25 also (although it's a sedan), and when i bought it the guy said it was a '54, but recently I talked to a guy in the Chrysler Club of Australia and he thinks it's a '56. Apparently there were very little differences between the years, the main being a peaked headlight bezel, (which mine has) and the master cylinder was moved from under the floor to the firewall, (which mine was under the floor). It wouldn't at all surprise me if mine is actually a '54 that was first licenced in '55 or '56 as a run-out model. The Chevy's of Australia are different than the Chevy's of NZ. My '51 Deluxe is a Fisher bodied NZ car (still there in storage) which as far as I know was assembled in Wellington NZ. They reflected the US versions a lot more than the Australian models. My '51 Chev Ute is all Ozzy though, just to get back on thread. There are so many differences between the models and countries of origin, it's not funny. At the end of the day, I love the ute concept and all that it stands for, probably why I currently have 3.
My Ute has the firewall mounted Girling master cylinders (brake and clutch) and the single remote fluid reserviour. It also has the peaked headlights with lucas semi sealed beam bulbs. I am not sure when they moved the master cylinders but the headlights are a 56 change. I wish there was a way to track production information on them. There is a chance that my Desoto was even made in 57. I would also like to know past ownership history but have had no luck.
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