One of my first cars

[Phil Nottingham]

Not the first I restored but I did eventually drive many thousands of miles in in 1970's before I scrapped it in 1980

Pictures taken in 1971 - it was owned by my dad as the family car. Active owners club then too and we went to many classic car/steam rallies all over the country

1959 Auto Union 1000 Coupe deluxe with 1000cc 3 cylinder 2 stoke and freewheel.

Front wheel drive and handled well and quite fast. Freewheel as in earlier Rover allowed clutchless (column) gear changes.

Had the later 1960 1000s panoramic Coupe too which I sold as parts car in 1992 when I got the P5B saloon ;D

[Warwick]

Nice car Phil. I haven't seen one of those in years.

[Warwick]

A 1955 Holden FJ Special. It was the family car from new, until I got my licence in 1968.

Wish I still had it.

[Kev]

;DWell Well,
I nearly had one of these as my first car,
My dad took me along to what he thought would have been a "Barn Find" however,yes it was a barn but the car wasn't a find.
Unfortunatly the car although looked ok,it was rotten,shame really.
so i ended up with a 1 owner NSU 1200C as my 1st car.

Big Kev.

[glennr]

A great photo Phil. I have never seen one of those before.

[David]

Lovely AU there Phil - a very rare beast even then. Same engine (I think) fitted to the SAAB 96 Bullnose 2 stroke?

My first car - Ford 100E side valve 3 speed. Bought for £30. Bodywork sprayed using an airbrush compressor, top matt finished in what I think was underseal. Wheel arches added but could not afford the wide wheels. I was but a student then, so hopefully that would explain the bad taste in the appearance of the car

Sold it for £80

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[glennr]

This was my first car. A 1965 Ford Cortina MK1 2 door super.

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[Phil Nottingham]

They were good quality cars (in W German style!) but by the late 1960's they were really dated and two-strokes were obsolete. The Wartburg Knight from E Germany kept it going this too using a derivative of the same engine (as did the SAAB's)

They were well built but like most (all) cars of that period very poorly protected though the thick box section chassis never rusted. I learnt to oxy-acet weld on that car. I suppose P5's only lasted because they were not used as every day cars and well cherished - so many went into storage particularly in the 1970's when the last fuel crisis added 15p a gallon onto the 35p inside week!

This car actually replaced (in 1970) the 1965 Ford Zephyr 6 which had corroded/holed front wings, sills and front valance! Prior to that there was a 1964 DKW F12 - another smart modern FWD 2 two-stroke from Auto Union which was killed off when VW took over the company from Daimler - Benz as it was too competive to the outdated Beetle.

Not seen a DKW/AU of any sort for years now although there are some in Ireland still.
The AU/DKW 1000s and 3=6's used the same tyre size as P5's and ours sported 185x15 Michellin X radials which never wore out

Pictured was the estate car version - the Universal which I cut up for parts in 1972 - its chassis is in the other picture

[Warwick]

Phil,

The auto colour correction function of Photoshop works brilliantly on the first photo of your. Corrects all the fading without needing any manual tweeking, or overdoing it.

[mjb59]

These are google images of my first car - I don't have any photos of the actual car as I wasn't a photographer.
I bought it second hand in 1979. It's a Mazda 1800 S about 1972 model. The 'S' gave you a tachometer and the fake air intakes on the bonnet. I'm told it was designed by Bertone, and I thought it was very striking. The 1.8 motor was about 100bhp, which was only accessible after hitting the starter motor with a hammer. The longer I had the car the more tools I had to carry in the boot.
My current tinnitus is no doubt thanks to the thumping 'graphic equaliser' I added, which was the most reliable part of the car.
I knew it was time to get a girlfriend when one weekend I was seriously contemplating filling in the writing on the tyres with one of those white pencils.....
In 1984 my then girlfriend lived 300 miles away in Mildura, North West Victoria. After work on a Friday I would drive the 6 hours in the dark to see her, and drive the 6 hours home in the dark on a Sunday night, eyes on stalks watching for kangaroos, ears ringing to Status Quo and the Waterboys to keep me awake.
One Sunday night when 50 miles from home in the bush and very tired, I hit a dirt patch and rolled the car 5 times, writing it off.
The car came to rest upside down by the roadside. I can still remember the starry black sky I was looking up at, the heavy gentle sound of cows chuffing in the field and the pinking of the engine. It was strangely peaceful. No other cars passed that lonely spot for an hour. The contents of the boot were spread out over a hundred metres. I had a bruised heel and nothing else and was deeply fortunate.
The car was towed to a wrecker. I very rarely now see the 1500 version around and I'm told they're collectable.

[Chris]

Sorry Warwick but I detest FJ's with a passion.
I reckon we had about three of them over a period of time when I was young.
Dad would not buy anything more modern, all my friends fathers had cars like a EK or EH one had a new XP Falcon. I use to think that the XP was coolest car about in 1965.
Saying that mum had a 1950 FX ute and later when I had left home to work in the city she offered it to me as she did not intend to drive it any more, and silly me though "Why would I want a bloody old Holden ute" so she sold it to local farmer.
Anyway my first car was a 1966 MK1 Cortina, silver body white roof, bench seat with 4 on the column. The only one of cars that I have owned that I never took a photo of.

Chris

[baconsdozen]

My first car was a Ford Prefect,they were known as the English perpendicular.
I 'tuned' it by adding a straight through silencer exiting under the passengers door and went rushing about all over the place making lots of totally unecessary noise.
Now,many years later I sometimes hear myself tut tutting at the kids doing the same in their 'hot' hatchbacks.

[David]

As it is the same subject and in the same section of the forum, Warwicks post and replies have been added to this thread.

[mjb59]

I knew I had a photo somewhere. This is my first car, Mazda 1800, discussed in my earlier post, and following it's terminal rollover (x 5), from which I walked away with a bruised heel.
Either my head was maintaining the integrity of the roof or vice versa.
I was a lucky boy. I came over all sensible after that and my next car was a Subaru Leone, which was dreadful and looked like a maiden aunt, and soon made way for a Mitsubishi Cordia Turbo, which at 110kw in 1985 was a rocket.

[Warwick]

Mar 24, 2011 9:36:50 GMT Chris said:

Sorry Warwick but I detest FJ's with a passion.
I reckon we had about three of them over a period of time when I was young.

Chris

No need to apologize Chris. They were not good cars, but they were significant cars in our motoring history and they were better than our previous mass-market car - the Austin A40.

They were strong, reliable and cheap to run and they were reasonably roomy and comfortable. But they were obsolete when built and their braking and handling were not too flash.

But nostalgia is a powerful thing, and they are iconic cars in Australia. It's funny though that it's the FJ that holds that position and not its forebear, the 48-215 ("FX"). It was the car that changed the landscape and it was in production for much longer. The FJ was really just the facelift at the end of the model run.

Perhaps that's what attracts me to old Range Rovers - the FJ body roll.