My life in cars: Victoria 1975 to 1985
My life in cars: Victoria 1975 to 1985
This post covers the cars I owned from my first in late 1974 up until we moved to Queensland in 1985. We lived in Bayswater in Melbourne for most of the time.
As well as cars we used as daily drivers, I bought and sold some damaged cars that I repaired and repainted. It was fun at the time.
In hindsight, I should have kept all these cars as they are worth a fortune now, especially the Escorts and Datsun. Probably old blokes like me blowing their super on reliving their youth!
Ford Escort Mark 1 Van
My first car after coming off my motorbike at high speed in early 1974. Dad found the 1972 Escort van at a dealer in Bendigo, from memory it was $1900 as it was not very old. I had the van until the early 1980s, a long time and did over 100,000 km in it, including trips from Melbourne to Western Australia and to Cairns. I remember being very ripped-off when fuel had been hiked to 19 c/litre on the way to WA!
There wasn't much I didn't do to the van. early on I had some side windows installed in the van so I could see out. The 1300 engines had a bad habit of cracking piston skirts and burning exhaust valves, including during the trip to WA. I repaired numerous of each until I eventually replaced the engine with a 1600 engine from a Cortina, then no trouble.
Rust was a real problem, I used to get wet feet while driving! Did a welding course and fixed it all.
I don't remember exactly when I sold the Escort, maybe 1983 and replaced it with one of the damaged cars I had repaired.
Oval lights rather than round in the photo and four windows in the sides.
Ford TC Cortina sedan
Judy's first car, a 1976 Ford TC Cortina sedan bought in 1979 when she finished general training and we rented a house in Ferntree Gully in outer Melbourne. A 2-litre manual that was very quick, a bit too quick on occasions.
Our Wedding Car; Dave's 1928 Chev
My school friend's 1928 Chev as our wedding car in 1980 in Echuca-Moama.
Ford Escort 2-door sedan Mark 1
One of the damaged cars I bought, repaired and sold. It cost me $300 and had a lot of rust in the front.
Ford Capri 1600 GT
Another of the damaged cars I bought, repaired and sold. Nice car, similar mechanicals and engine to my Escort. Colour and stripes are correct for my car.
Datsun 260Z 2+2
A 1977 Datsun 260Z 2+3 in poor condition purchased in about 1982, so not that old. Full repaint in metallic blue and general TLC, it was filthy inside. We sold it for about $7000 as it was just too expensive to keep, a house was $35000.
Holden Commodore VC
Holden HZ Wagon
A lime green 1978 Holden HZ station wagon bought for about $500, with a few "parking dents", a few! Every panel including the roof! Turns out it belonged to a careless tree lopper.
The HZ was a big change for Holden and was very good to drive, with Radial Tuned Suspension. Yes, radials were new in the mid-1970s. The old cross-ply tyres lasted about 5k km whereas radials achieved 20k km.
Good reliable cheap car.
HX Holden Panel Van
We wanted a cheap car to drive to Darwin and back in 1982 so bought a 1976 ex-State Electricity Commission HX Holden panel van for about $1100. It was in pretty good condition although the grey paint wasn't great. I installed an under-dash air-conditioning system.
We drove it from Melbourne to Darwin and back with only one puncture. Coming back was 5 days straight, way too much. We stayed at Uluru months after the Lindy Chamberlin incident and the drought broke as we drove in, so were stuck for 5 days. 20 km of water over the road coming out.
We subsequently drove it to Cairns, Qld a couple of times; 3 days driving in daylight.
We took the van to Qld in 1985 when we moved and kept it a couple more years.
Re photo, ours had plain wheels and no fender scoops.
Comments
Post a Comment