‘Down under’ dolce vita

Dear Classic American,

I believe that the ‘unusual Ford’ on page 77 of the February issue is, indeed, an Australian Fairlane. Please find attached scans of the front and back of a brochure I have for that car, dated March 1972. All but the basic version (250 CID straight-six) had the 302 V8 as standard. I think it’s a great-looking car, and would be a lovely daily driver here in the UK – quick, luxurious and relatively compact.

Regarding the Daimler Dart/SP250 referred to in Simon Oldroyd’s letter, Wikipedia states that the car was launched as the Dart at the 1959 New York Auto Show, whereupon Chrysler ordered Daimler to change the name, under threat of legal action. I wondered whether it had been changed to SP250 just for the American market, and retained the Dart name in the UK, where the Dodge Dart scarcely had a presence. Certainly, I seem to remember it as always having been commonly referred to as the Daimler Dart over here (I’m 60, so remember the car from the Sixties onwards). However, the brochure I have (undated, but stamped on the front as received in May 1963) suggests otherwise, and when Motor magazine tested the car in 1960, they called it the SP250 Sports, so I believe that must have been its official name here too.

Maybe people just carried on calling it the Dart because it’s a lot easier to say!

Tim Adams

Liverpool

Merseyside

Well Tim, thank you for your detective work re the suspected ItalianAustralian Ford… what a strange place for an Aussie Ford to end up, one would imagine the right-hand drive would be particularly unusual on the continent. Those Aussie Fords always looked to have a mix of American and European styling, this one particularly looks like a cross between a Seventies American LTD and a British Cortina Mark III. As for the Dodge Dart, Malcolm Hayes confirmed your suspicions on the previous letters page (22).