MANY WERE SENT TO JAPAN IN THE ‘70s

TO BE RECYCLED AS NISSANS OR REFRIGERATORS

In 1950s and ’60s Australia, Morris J type vans were the Mitsubishi L300s of their time. Back then it was more personal. Your baker delivered bread to your door, the greengrocer delivered the veg and companies like Moran & Cato brought the groceries. The J type van was perfect for these jobs.

In NSW the NRMA had a road service fleet of 101 J vans and the Gas & Fuel Corporation had a large fleet running around the Melbourne metropolis. Large bakeries like Tip Top and Buttercup had Morris Js as did smaller bakeries in country towns.

Where did they all go? Many were squashed and sent to Japan in the ’70s to be recycled as Nissans or refrigerators. Some became chook sheds and kiddies cubbies and some left to guard paddocks. Many a speedway sprint car used an old J type differential to speed around the dirt circles.

A few surfers and hippies in the 1970s had J vans but these wheels never had the highway cred of the VW Type 2 Kombi. The old splitties of which there were about 1.85 million made world wide, could run all day at 55mph and not deafen the passengers.

Some J van owners plonked Holden sixes in lieu of the Morris fours and got to a brisk pace but a quick J was never on the original must haves list.

Little is known of just where the idea for the J came from. Commercial record keeping was shredded during the ’80s and lost. Immediately after WWII the UK needed valuable export income and a 10cwt forward control commercial van seemed like a good idea for the recovering British economy. Just prior to WWII a larger, 15/20 cwt vehicle had reached production, called the PV, but was halted for armament production after only six units were completed. After the conflagration ended the British plants got working again but much of the PV design was then old-fashioned