Ambulance Chaser
With a family history in the St John’s Ambulance, Paul Dowdy felt duty-bound to resurrect this one-off machine.
The world of classic cars is as varied as those who frequent it. Some owners opt for the fun of an MGB roadster, while others desire something with a little more presence, a Jaguar MkX perhaps. Other choose something with sporting heritage, but how often does one choose an ambulance!
“We’ve got a family history of being in the St John’s Ambulance,” begins Paul, when we meet at his Oxfordshire home. “It goes back to my grandfather. I’m a member now and my father was in the division based at Cowley’s Pressed Steel Company. It was there that the division identified a need for a small vehicle, which I believe came about as a result of the funeral of Winston Churchill. The division were tasked with covering the route from Long Hanborough to Bladon, where Churchill's coffin was to be placed in the family plot. It was realised
I can clearly remember going along with Dad when I was only small and riding in it
that a means of communication along the route was required. Being based at Cowley, it wasn't hard to find a suitable van, so they spoke to a couple of people and got permission to use it. Keen to keep costs down, someone hit on the idea of putting a stretcher in the back, calling it an ambulance and then getting it re-taxed." Built in 1963, but not registered until 9 December 1964, it is assumed that the van was simply used around the factory up until that point. The half-ton commercial variant retained the frontal profile of the pre-Farina A55, and the old shape remained in production until 1973, with the 1622cc B-series used in the Farina A60 being fitted from 1962 onwards, explaining the ambulance's A60 designation.
Having their own garage at the plant, some members of the St. John’s Ambulance set about transforming the turquoise van of the Pressed Steel Company into an ambulance. “They replaced the side panels with the windows,” he explains, “then liberated the stretcher from an old ambulance before managing to get hold of a seat from a crash-test MGB. That was fitted in the back for the attendant, who would ride with the casualty to keep an eye on them.”
Swinging open the rear doors, Paul climbs onto the rear deck and points to the faded writing on the attendant seat, the word 'BUMP' just discernable. “They finished up by adding the blue light and the two-tone horns, which were quite a new idea in those days, and it served the division for a good few years. I can clearly remember going along with Dad when I was only small and riding in it, which was very exciting for a young lad.”
With a replacement ambulance arriving in the mid 1980s, the A60 was retired and was subsequently bought by the Chief Fire officer at Cowley for a relative, before
being offered to Paul a couple of years later as payment for some mechanical work. Agreeing to the deal, Paul then started to wonder what he had let himself in for. “I was about eighteen when I got it,” he laughs, “it had been stripped of the ambulance equipment, light and horns, but still retained the racking and the attendant seat.”
Keen he may have been, but knowledgeable in the way of restorations he wasn’t, so he turned to the one-time driver and custodian of the ambulance – his father – for guidance. “The bottom six inches of it was all rusty,” explains Paul, “so my dad, Frank, called up a mate with a welder and he came over and patched up the chassis, before putting some new outriggers on it.” Paul started hunting through the old store cupboard at the St John’s depot and found the bits and pieces that you
see in it now, all of which were unwanted, except for the stretcher. “I picked that up at an emergency vehicle show for £3.”
With a couple of years behind the wheel – and now married to Diane, who graciously accepted that the ambulance was always going to be part of her life – Paul decided in about 1993 that a full restoration would be needed.
“I started by taking the doors, wings and bonnet off and put them in our front bedroom. Diane was not pleased,” laughs Paul. “Then I took it back to bare metal, which is when I found the rust; lots and lots of rust. The floors were shot, as were those outriggers we’d replaced before. They just fell apart, so I had to buy replacement panels for the floors, sills and outriggers, but everything else I managed to save and repair, after some welding lessons from a friend and purchasing a shiny new welder.”
Thankfully, little mechanical work was needed, the car having only covered a shade over 40,000 miles in fifty years. With no need to remove the engine, Paul managed to work around it, supporting the engine on the inner wings using rope and lengths of steel tubing while the crossmember was stripped, cleaned and rebuilt. It even remained in situ while the engine bay was sprayed, though that was the least of Paul’s problems when it came to paint, managing as he did to paint the ambulance in his garage. “I had to wait for warm days, clear everything out of the garage and push the ambulance over to one side. I would spray one side, let it dry, move it to the other side of the garage and then spray
Little mechanical work was needed, the car having only covered 40,000 miles
the other side. Thankfully I was able to get a few good coats on and rub it back, which is one of the good things about cellulose, as it’s fairly forgiving when it’s slapped on.”
Looking over the ambulance, such is the quality of the finish, it is hard to believe that the paint has gone on almost panel by panel, including the roof. “I scraped my head on the ceiling a few times I can tell you,” chuckles Paul, before pausing for a moment. “It’s been a great experience,” he continues, “I’ve learnt how to weld, learnt how to spray and even how to put windows in and do the electrics. I’m not a technician, I’m not a mechanic, I’ve got no qualifications in any of that, so it’s really just been about asking lots of questions, and taking a ‘suck it and see’ approach. It has also been incredibly helpful to have my dad around to share his knowledge and offer assistance.