Hopefully 2003 will find a few Vauxhall enthusiasts from Australia in England to help celebrate Vauxhall Motors 100 years. Things seem a bit uncertain still at this time as to just what celebrations there may be, but we are hopeful that a few Australian built cars will be able to make it too. Billing seems to be the big event and I hope to be there with a 1937 DX tourer, the body built by General Motors-Holden. I had hoped to have completed my 1934 Big Six roadster, again with a GM-H body but unfortunately it is most unlikely it will be anywhere near ready by then. A house move last year drastically set back my restoration plans.

I have been working on a book about Vauxhalls in Australia, which I hope can be published for the Centenary and it too has now taken a lot of my time. The results however should be interesting as we have many bodies built by GM-H from the 1930s to the early 1950s, which were not available in England. Prior to GM-H various other Australian builders provided bodies for the earlier cars and although often very much like their English models did also vary. Fully imported bodies were sold here too in the early times until unfavourable taxation made them too expensive.

One surprise however is a rediscovered 23/60 sedan built in Christchurch, New Zealand. How it came to be in Australia is not known but it is still in the hands of the owner who garaged it in 1958 after clutch troubles and there it has remained. As is the usual practice it was put in a shed with a pretty much open back enabling the weather to get at it. Time took its toll and the shed partially collapsed onto the car about 12 years ago. It was subsequently removed and stored in another shed with some additional rear cover provided. Amazingly complete with only the generator, some instruments and the original wheels missing it seems about to change hands. Chassis number OD 664; engine OD 666 was used around the Mittagong area in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales for many years before being de-commissioned. It carried milk cans and 44-gallon drums on the modified luggage rack at various times in order to earn its keep. The property where it has resided can in fact still only be reached by travelling on several kilometres of dirt road. Unfortunately no photographs of it in its earlier life seem to exist.

Well packed into the shed with a vintage Chevrolet truck and tons of timber and usual farm junk, a photo was difficult to obtain finally balancing on a pile of furniture to obtain a complete shot for what it is. Hopefully those attached will show some of its style. Not that there’s too much of that either, a bender would seem to have been the builders preferred tool. . The borers, rats and dust have taken their toll but much of the timber is sound although it is likely a full rebuild would be required, I only hope its new owner won’t tear off the body to replace it with a tourer!

George Seymour