What was your first car.

[kylarama]

After ready the last couple of posts in the 'Ugly As Sin' thread, I thought this would be a great thread.

Everyone always talks of their first car with great affection, no matter how big a crap heap it was.
Everything is a first. Your 1st trip to the pub, your 1st trip home from the pub, 1st driving holiday, 1st speeding ticket, 1st prang, 1st breakdown and first time in the back seat

Here's my 1st car.





It's a 1970 HG Kingswood (with a HK grille), had black Premier interior, prem hubcaps and Whitewalls!
Started life with a 161, 3 on the tree and drum brakes all round. By the time I'd finished it had a 186, traumatic and power discbrakes, but unfortuantly under all that shinny paint was a ton of rust. I went to hell and back with this old girl in the 18 months I had her, sold her to a couple of 20 year old female English backpackers who then drove it around Australia.






Since this is a forum about towing classics, her a couple of pics of my old ski boat.



It's an early 60's twin cockpit clinker. Would have had a 138 grey holden motor originally, but was fitted with a 186s when I got it. Suitable hotted up with a Yella Terra head, lumpy cam, balanced bottom end and twin strombergs.

Hit a submerged tree at Lake Elidon after 3 months of owning it, so did a full strip down and rebuild.



Had it almost 8 years. It was one of the sadest days of my life when I had to sell to buy my first house.

[olfarts]

The first road car i ever owned was an X2 HD Holden.

My first car ever was a bush basher Trumpy Herold convertible when i was 13.

The best car i have ever owned is a 560 SEL Mercedes Benz.

The fastest car would be a 1971 VH Valiant Pacer Six Pak.

What is my daily driver today??? 1993 VR Commodore on LPG.


Dave

[getaway]

Unfortunatley I don't have any pics but my first car was a 1948 Dodge 4 door sedan.

Best car I have ever had .

This was back in 1970 when I got my licence.

I am still to this day regretting getting rid of it.

Mick.

[Deleted]

My first car was.. Da Da ........... a Renault 750, 1952 model that my sister and I bought between us in 1961 just after I got my licence. Wow was it cheap to run, did about 50 MPG and stopped every time it rained as the ignition coil was mounted on the back of the engine just behind the grille. (rear engined car). I actually got it up to 60 MPH (about 105KPH) on a long down hill section of Monavale road in Sydney. That was flying for a Renault with a 750cc motor. Kept it for about a year and traded up to a Renault Dauphine, what a wreck that was, had been pranged and back yard repaired, every thing that could go wrong did go wrong. Sure don't miss those days of motoring.

Frankidownunder.

[bobt]

hi ya all..

My first car was an ex work ute from my dads work..

Sure looked good on the outside from a distance. It was splattered in concrete and the tray was "cactus". Rusted and dented, seriously dented. Then one of my dad's fitters offered to weld a new floor in. He did.............. it was 1/4" plate

It was 3 years old when I got it...



It was reliable and took me to places that no one would dare... We use to set up the deck chairs in the back at the drive in....

Owned heaps of heaps cars over the years. The one that I had the most fun in would have to be this one.. ;D ;D



You didn't drive it in the rain. No windscreen, rain hurt at 60kph. SWMBO hated it....


had my share of lemons too.. ;D

bobt

love that HG

[kylarama]

Yeah bobt I loved that HG, but I would have swapped it in a heartbeat for that XT ute.

I always regret not buying an XY ute when I had the chance. It was a 2 owner 302 manual that had a canopy fitted it's whole life, so the tub was spotless. Decided I'd had enough of old cars so I bought an EB s pack Falcon instead. What a tool!

I've been in a few very quick cars in my life, but the most impresive was one of those Clubmans fitted with a Kent Formula Ford engine. What a buzz!

[bobt]

I love my old cars. Just cannot have enough. BUt alias..she who must be obeyed has other ideas.


back in the days I had the ute there were moments when I would have killed for a back seat

Now that my everyday car has a back seat... I have no real need for it...............

[Deleted]

;D,
My first car was a 1966 Hillman Gazelle that I bought in 1971. It took me on a trip to Queensland that Christmas and various trips to Sydney and other places. When I joined the RAAF in 1972 it took me across to Adelaide, but that's where the engine died. It was going to cost me $500 too fix it and because the RAAF doesn't allow immobile private vehicles on their bases I traded it in on a new Torana 1600. Worst move I ever made. It was a comfortable enough car, albeit without the Gazelle's reclining front seats which from memory could be slid right foward and the backs reclined to make a camping body. Reliability wise the Torana was a dog. I ended up selling it it 1975 for a 73 HQ Kingswood. In 1980 that engine died on the Hexham bridge. Fortunately we were just over the hump in the bridge and I was able to seelct neutral and let her coast down on the Raymond Terrace side.

Cheers,
Ross.

[bobt]

hi rossjools

Man you sure know how to pick them. So what are you driving now??




I wanna make sure I don't buy one ;D ;D ;D

bobt

[Deleted]

My 1st car in late 60's was a 56 VW (half it body weight was BOG ;D)
Then a Ford XR.... bloody thing enough said.

MY first New Car 1975 Blue Datsun 120y 2door :-*Ooooh the good times( life in 70's was gooooood

Married life saw a 8seater star-wagon no mod con but we had fun
with our kids and half the Towns kids at any one time ;D ;D

2006 the kids grow up and I get my New Hilux Ute sweeeeeet
then at local car park with a for sale sign in the window a
1975 Blue Datsun 120y 2door she now in the shed being restore

[kiwijim]

I think I have had my share of cars over the years,

the Best ( 68 HT Holden Premier )
The Worst ( 79 Sigma )

The Premier, I purchased 2nd hand after seeing it advertised on T.V. as a Company trade-in. it only had 30.000 on the clock and ran like a dream,

this car carried us across the Nullabour when it was unsealed and closed after three weeks of flooding, 150km in first gear with water bow-waving off the windscreen and not a miss,

We took the Holden to N.Z. and drove it around there for a number of years until the first off-spring was almost due, then much to my disappointment had to be sold to make a deposit on the house....D#@%!!
I have recently been told from a friend over there that the farmer who bought it off me way back in 78 still owns it, but it is now stuck in a shed on his property, no longer a goer.

Now the worse car I have ever owned was that 79 Sigma........
"GEEZ" what a load of C#*#,
This car was almost new when we payed $8.900.00 for it after trading in a perfectly good X.B. Falcon Station Wagon.

I owned the Sigma for around 18 months and in that time I replaced parts worth well over $2000.00 on it, including the Head which blew with-out any warning,
after finally getting it back on the road the gear box started to whine, that was it I decided to trade it in on anything I could find.

The first half dozen Dealers I tried would not have a bar of it, all saying the same thing.....have a look down the back, "Yep" Flamin Sigma's stacked up waiting for the crusher ever-where.

I finally did get it traded...on a H.Z. wagon, that Sigma cost me the best part of $11.000 and I was offered $2.000 trade-in,
I grabbed it and took the Holden home.

[murray]

I use to dream of a datsun 120y fastback , was out of my reach at the time so had to settle for an orange 4 door GL demo model. Sheer luxury ,am radio, carpet ,heater demister and vinyl top.........was I cool or what.(don't answer that)
;D

[Deleted]

Gday Murray
Dato's were cool because you got the things that Ford and Holden wanted you to pay extra for like...carpet...
AM radio...clock..dimista ...

But you also got more Rust free over time as they were made from a lighter grade steel.The tech-no boy would know more about that
I got the dato because the Ford s*%#& itself for the final time outside a dealership and they had a sale on demonstrators ;D ;D

So yes Dato owners were cool even though the rest of Australia Disagreed
cheers Bazz

[Deleted]

Here' a similar car to the first one that I wholly owned; 1934 Austin Light 12/4



Though I did have a part share in a 1938 Morris 8 tourer a bit like this one before that:



That was in 1960/61 while still living in UK.

[Deleted]

;D, Ha ha bobt,
You very funny man. The Hillman and HQ died because of a lack of maintenance on my part. I'll admit the Torana was a mistake on my part. I should have gone the extra few hundred and bought the little six. However disc brakes were an extra cost option on the sixes, unless it was a GT-R which had them as standard. The fours had them as standard.

Actually I can pick em pretty well. My current cars are a 1990 VN Toyota Lexcen and a 1997 Lada Niva. They both get maintained as they should and have given me little trouble. The Torana is the only brand new car I've ever bought, and probably will be the last one I ever buy. Obviously the Lexcen will be my tow car but I believe the Niva would be fine to tow a small camper (eg a teardrop) for short weekends away within say, 200kms or so of home.

Cheers,
Ross.

[kylarama]

My fathers a very rare breed.

He's a Citroen fanatic!

His first car was a 1952 Light 15 like this one



and his all time favorite, which he wishes he still had today was a then new chocolate brown 1978 Citroen CX Pallas, like this one.



Unforuantly the Pallas had an altercation with an AP6 Valiant's rear bumper. The Val drove off and the Citroen went to Sims.

[bobt]

the citroen was certainly a car ahead of its time.

I once had a friend that owned one and he use to take delight in showing us the things he could do with the cars suspension.

If I have it correct they were the first or the very earliest to produce a front wheel drive car.


The 52 models are real rare these days I guess only collectors would have them now and as for the 1978 one. I don't think we had to many way down under. They were a car you either liked or hated... The owners were always passionate about them.

The latest versions are about but rather rare..

My father's first car was a 1934 Singer sedan with pre selector gear box. I didn't know that until after I had rejected an offer of one. I know have "the" photo of his and would like to get my hands on one.

bobt

[Deleted]

, I almost went back to my motoring 'Rootes', pardon the pun last Friday. A bloke out Bathurst way had for sale on ebay a 1969 Sunbeam Rapier fastback. When within a minute of the end of the auction no one had bid at the very reasonable reserve price, I suspected someone must have been using a sniper program so although I was prepared to go to his buy it now price I susected that someone had a higher offer waiting in the wings on his computer to take it at the last second so I dallied. The next day when I rang the owner he had not one bid on the car and rang me later on Saturday to say he was keeping the car and would restore it himself. Bummer, it had the same engine as the Gazelle, only difference being the Rapier has twin Stromberg carbs and the Gazelle had a twin throat Solex. Another difference was that the Rapier has electric overdrive on 2nd, 3rd and top gears. One sore point with the Hillman was that although it had the same basic gearbox and ratios there was a wide spread across the ratios. First gear was good for about 35 mph, second for about 45, third for about 85 and top for about 95 mph. On some hills it was either screaming its head off in second or labouring its guts out in third. The Rapier doesn't have that problem with its o/d. You even have a ratio above 4th to give good highway economy and what is in effect a 7 speed box.

Cheers,
Ross.

[wbski007]

G-DAY fella's,
here's my first car, 1950 Olds, rocket 88 fastback, stock 303 cubic in V-8, 4 speed hydromatic trans, really would get down the hyway for being compleatly stock, I did add a 4 barrel carb on just before I sold it and went into the service, wish I had it today. This is me sitting on the front fender just before I sold it in 1959. Ahh those were the days.
Cheers, Wayne

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[wbski007]

G-DAY again fella's
I'm sorry I lied in the last post this was really my first car, 1924 Ford Model T, I just didn't want to let you guys know how old I really am. ;D ;D ;D

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[Deleted]

, G'day Wayne,
No need to worry about your age here mate, age doesn't matter to us. The main thing is that you found us and we can all share knowledge and experience and our vanning experiences. My only experience of towing a van so far was when I brought my van back from Sydney after I got a job back home in Newcastle. The van was unregistered, so I had to get a RWC and get it registered on a Saturday morning.

BTW that '51 Oldsmobile is a great looking car. I have some sort of affinity with cars (and aeroplanes) from that era, I just think they had a style that we've lost over the years, and it doesn't matter what country they came from I just seem to like most of them. I notice that some cars are heading back to that type of styling within the bounds of modern safety rules of course and I appreciate that. I think all over the world there is a yearning for more relaxed peaceful times and a return to some of the values of those times and this is starting to show up in many areas of life. Just my opinion.

Cheers,
Ross.

[Deleted]

Gday Ross
Bugga you missed out on the Sunbeam

Not being a great bargain hunter like ..
He who name shall not be mentioned

I put up what I think an item is worth and if other outbid me ... well so be it
I have seen item go for more than you pay new at the shop

Still as long as the Sun rises in the East and sets in the West
all is good
cheers Bazz

[Deleted]

,Yes bazz,
I think I need to take a few lessons from that kiwi and maybe make an appointment with the Fremantle Doctor sometime in the future, when I get my van restored. I still have the Sunbeam saved in My ebay so I can ring the owner again and make arrangements to go out to Bathurst and take pics of his restoration progress. There may never be another like that one but soemthing else will come up in the future I'm sure. Maybe even a certain Hillman Gazelle that soemone has fitted the overdrive gearbox to in the last 37 years since I traded it on the Torana. I still remember the body and chassis number of that car. They were the same number and from memory I think also the engine number was the same.

Cheers,
Ross.

[wbski007]

You're rite about the styling back in the 30's, 40's and 50's Ross, both cars and planes each had there own personality that the newer ones don't seem to have, something that got lost over the years I guess, one of my favorite planes is the P 51 Mustang, American body and English motor, what a great combanation that turned out to be. There is something those old propeller driven planes had that the jets just can't seem to capture, not through my eye's anyway.

[ronaldjohn]

Nov 25, 2009 19:55:48 GMT 10 bobt said:

the citroen was certainly a car ahead of its time.

I once had a friend that owned one and he use to take delight in showing us the things he could do with the cars suspension.

bobt

Just going through old posts and saw this one.
I had a D Super Citroen once and the very frirst car I learnt to drive was a 1925 Citroen 5CV, similar to this one. Ours was cut down to a "Ute"


Well this is what I did with mine one day, after seeing it done in a movie ;D

I drove it around the block like that wth no problems.

However my first car was one of these.


The first of the Morris Minors with an overhead valve engine.
Top speed 60mph ;D

Cheers,
Ron