1954 Vauxhall Vagabond
Powered by Vauxhall, designed and built by Holden, this Anglo-Aussie hybrid is more Waltzing Matilda than God Save the Queen
In recent times, more than one all-Aussie Holden had found its way to Britain. The Monaro coupe began the trend and prior to being withdrawn from the market in 2006, a limited VXR8 edition. A Harrop supercharger added to the Chevrolet LS2 engine bumped up the output to 500hp and a 0-100km/h time of 4.8 seconds.
When Monaro production stopped, Vauxhall replaced it on the UK market with a pair of HSV sedans, the Clubsport then the GTS, both of which were known as the Vauxhall VXR8, the GTS based variant when fitted with a wailing blower (the distinctive sound of it on the Top Gear test track attracting not entirely complementary comment) sold as the “Bathurst Edition”.
So what, you may be thinking, has this got to do with a Vauxhall Velox? Simply, when looking at Neale Ryder’s 1954 Vauxhall Velox Vagabond, it is not as British as it may seem. The tiny badge screwed to the left hand side of the front seat hints at the background to this most unusual car “Product of General Motors Holden’s” (and yes, there is an apostrophe in “Holden’s”). There is no such thing as a 2 door Velox sedan and that is the give-away. While the Velox sedan was imported to Australia CKD and assembled by Holden’s, the car we are looking at here is not a sedan with a roof chop.
Like its rival the Ford Zephyr, the Vauxhall was a monocoque body. While Ford used extra strengthening in the sills to stop their soft-top version from folding in half, for the Vagabond and it’s equally Australian relation, the ute, Holden’s made a bespoke chassis for these two Antipodean versions.
On the outside, despite how it may look, British componentry starts at the grille and finishes at the bulkhead. The doors, back ‘guards and boot are all designed and built entirely by the Holden men at Fisherman’s Bend. Even the windscreen pillars are different, being two inches lower than the sedan.
A media release from the Public Relations department of GM-H on 26 Feb 1953 manages to not quite clarify the mixed parentage of the Vagabond. “Distinguished by original styling and streamlining, two new sports-tourer British Vauxhall cars were released by General Motors-Holden’s Ltd... the 23.4hp ‘square’ engined 6-cylinder VELOX VAGABOND” certainly mtakes it sound like another import from the Motherland however the next paragraph tells the rest of the story, “Designed and proved in the engineering department of GMH, the Australian bodies of the Vagabonds feature inviting luxury and spacious seating.”
Under the (British) bonnet sits the 64hp pushrod ohv six cylinder 2262cc engine found in the standard EIP sedan and utes. Neale’s car has the optional Laycock-de Normanville overdrive attached to the back of the three speed gearbox.
Working on second and top gears, The Autocar of 6 Nov. 1953 announced the arrival of the “Five–speed Vauxhall”. The switch for the overdrive is very intelligently placed on the column gear lever and both the lever and the o/d can be operated without the driver having to remove their hand from the steering wheel.
Interestingly, at a recent rally when Neale had the Vagabond parked, he was approached by someone purporting to be an expert on Vauxhalls from the era who confidently informed Neale (a lifetime devotee of the Luton brand) that “GM never put a switch there” and despite Neale’s protestation, was not going to be persuaded otherwise. I think from now on he will carry the Autocar photo with him to fend off any more self-proclaimed experts.
Inside the car, while the dash is Vauxhall, and as the press release states, features “glove box with lock and catch and three ash trays – two recessed in instrument panel and one recessed in the back seat”, the remainder of the interior is 100% Holden, seats, door trims and even the floor panels are specific to the Vagabond.
And it is here that the one feature which puts the Mk1 Zephyr ahead of the Vauxhall is evident. In a surprisingly archaic throw-back to the 1920s, the Vagabond does not have wind-up windows!
Certainly the solid framed side screens are very effective (if rather claustrophobic with letter-box slot sized windows) at keeping the weather out, but by the 1950s the hassle of undoing the two wing nuts which clamp each screen to the appropriate door or rear ¾ panel and the associated drawback of taking up boot space by having to stow them somewhere, was really a thing of the past.
In Holden’s defence, the Vagabond was actually cheaper to buy than the sedan version but surely it wouldn’t have been too big an ask to put some side windows in the car?
Despite being made by our closest neighbour and the Velox outselling the Zephyr 2 to 1 on the New Zealand market, we never saw the Vagabond on this side of the Tasman. In those days when car makers could sell anything with four wheels they could lay their hands on, Vauxhall experts are of the opinion that there simply was no need to complicate matters here by adding another model to the range, especially when it would be cheaper than their top seller.
The soft-top Velox was never produced in great numbers and was only available in 1953 and 54. There is still debate about how many were actually built with figures as high as 1700 quoted, however the Australian Vagabond expert puts the number as somewhere around 900 with no higher body numbers seen on any surviving examples so it seems he is closer to reality (Neale’s is in the mid
600 range and was built in 1954, so to meet the supposed 1700 production figure, that is an awful lot of basically hand-built cars needing to be made in a short time).
From the 900’ish made, around 70 survive and from this 70 there are only 30 which count as being whole complete cars, the other 40 being in such various states of disrepair that it is unlikely they will ever see the road again. As far as is known, this is the only Vagabond in New Zealand.
Neale has owned it for 5 years having bought it fully restored from the late Denis Johnson of Dunedin who imported the rather sad wreck in 1998. In the 6000 miles Neale has done in the dark green tourer, the only problem (and that really wasn’t such a bad thing) was the ill-fitting hood blowing off in a gale.
Working at Bristol Motors in Upper Hutt, Neale works with ace upholsterer David Wilkens and he was tasked with the job of repairing the hood mechanism and making a better fitting example. Even factory photos show hoods with ripples in the rear ¾ and there seems to be some disagreement about the location of the twin rectangular rear windows which meant there was quite some discussion between the owner and his employer as to how the finished article was to look. The end result came out far better than Neale had hoped, the hood is tight, the side screens keep rain out and heat in so all ended well.
Denis Johnson was a Vauxhall fanatic in a similar mould to Neale and in 1996 he travelled to Victoria for a National Vauxhall rally and his eye was taken by the Vagabonds present. He resolved then to one day lay his hands on one of these rare examples of Aussie/British inbreeding! A year later he was back in Australia for the next Vauxhall rally at Newcastle and at the conclusion of the event, he went back to Melbourne with the Victorians having already twisted the arm of one to allow him to buy a very much unrestored Vagabond and bring it back to New Zealand.
Retrieved from a shed in Maryborough, north of Melbourne, the car needed to be water blasted and cleaned to remove any of the nasties which MAF take a dim view of arriving on our shores, it was then put in a container and was on its way to Dunedin.
Arriving at Port Chalmers, the full scope of the upcoming project finally dawned on Denis when the basically complete but very tired Vauxhall slowly was pushed from the container into the daylight. It was another three years of scouring swap meets and Vauxhall owner’s sheds before work finally begin on turning the rather sad-looking hulk back into a respectable looking touring car.
It was only when the body was removed from the chassis and both were sand-blasted, that the true state of the underside was revealed and it wasn’t good. It took a full three years of work at the panel beaters to get the structure back to a decent condition. The front was so bad that it was passed as being beyond repair; luckily these are the only bits which are the same as the sedan so mudguards and a bonnet were sourced from donor cars.
The exterior bright work (with the exception of the front bumper) was all located NOS and rechromed, the chrome bill alone coming to almost $5000.
When it came to the question of paint, Denis was wanting to keep the car as correct as possible but the original Swanston Green (a rather pale shade) of this particular Vagabond just didn’t seem to be meeting with the approval of his mates who thought the car deserved something more eye catching.
It was while he was working on the dash, painted in a dark green that the solution came. Swap the colours around, so the car gets the dark, metallic green (Glacier Green from the 1953 Holden colour chart, an FJ colour) while the Swanston Green now features on the dash. A compromise which certainly seems to work, both are the correct Holden/Vauxhall colours and spot-on for the shape of the car.
The deadline for getting the Vagabond back on the road was the New Zealand Vauxhall Nationals in October 2006 and it was a close run thing but Denis got there. There were a couple of detail things to be attended to but the main thing was the car was there and drivable. To top it off, it was voted People’s Choice for the event.
Today with the new hood fitted and folded away, the rain had stopped and after Neale had driven the car over the Rimutakas from his Featherston home, I arrived at the Bristol’s workshop just as he had finished wiping off the road grime. Perfect timing!
I was very interested to see how this 60 year old car, mechanically very much the medium family car of its era, copes with Hutt Valley traffic in 2013.
It copes very well! With the hood down, visibility is of course, outstanding. The two factory fitted mirrors on the front mudguards seem to be in the perfect location, motorway lane changes are not the “indicate and hope” undertakings of some earlier cars where anything behind or alongside remains a mystery until almost too late.
The three speed gearbox has no synchro on first but still will, with the right revs and a double declutch, select the bottom ratio when on the move, actually easier than some full syncho. ‘boxes of the era. Second and third are both selected with a single finger guiding the painted column gear lever and as I mentioned earlier, the overdrive switch sits on the lever immediately below the steering wheel and the mere flick of a finger engages and disengages it with an absolute minimum of fuss. In o/d top on the Hutt Motorway we were quite comfortable to cruise with the traffic at 100 km/h, the engine felt smooth, quiet and very under stressed.
Never intended as a sports car, the soft leather upholstered bench front seat was very comfortable but would not offer much in the way of lateral support should the driver decide to start throwing the car around and even though it sits lower than a sedan, with coil springs up front and Holden-made leaf springs at the back, the ride is far more in favour of comfort over speed.
At motorway speed the wind noise with the hood down is not obtrusive, it is quite possible to have a conversation with the front seat passenger without having to shout and there is very little buffeting, the bane of many open cars.
A day in the Vauxhall, hood down with the sun shining would be a very pleasant way to travel. The six cylinder Velox engine produces more than enough power to propel the car at quite reasonable speeds and the overdrive is an added bonus for a three speed gearbox that otherwise might be a disadvantage when compared to a four cog unit which was becoming more popular as the 1950s progressed.
There is something appealing about a low production version of a popular family car and Neale’s Vagabond certainly is that. It looks reassuringly familiar to those who remember the Velox as a common sight on our roads, yet the lack of a roof gives it a distinct look all of its own.
A sedan found in the same condition as the Vagabond would never see the road again. It is the rarity of this car which while making restoration such a major job, also makes it all the more worthwhile. And in Neale’s hands it doesn’t spend its life wrapped up; he enjoys it as it should be – a comfortable touring car.