Ford blitz ambo project

[Tony Wheeler]

First pic shows the final stage reached, with only the bumper yet to be fitted. Good roofs were scarce even back then, so to keep out the rain whilst parked I rigged up a makeshift canvas top supported by a flimsy wooden frame.

With the project now driveable I came under increasing parental pressure to move it elsewhere, so they could finally retake possession of the backyard. Arrangements were made to park it in a sawmill in Wesburn belonging to a fellow blitz enthusiast, who owned a C15A at the time. Second pic shows preparations for towing; third pic passing through Yarra Junction; fourth pic at the sawmill in Wesburn; final pic on first test drive in nearby mountains.

[lynx42]

Originally Posted by Tony Wheeler

; third pic passing through Yarra Junction;

Notice the cost of petrol! .52.8 cents per gallon. That equates to 0.117 cents per litre. Today I paid $1.46 c/l on special which is $6.57 per gallon.

Great thread Tony, Thanks for all the wonderful photos and the facinating story to go with them. Keep them coming.

Regards Rick.

[Tony Wheeler]

Originally Posted by lynx42

Notice the cost of petrol! .52.8 cents per gallon. That equates to 0.117 cents per litre. Today I paid $1.46 c/l on special which is $6.57 per gallon.
Regards Rick.

Yes I thought that sign might bring tears to a few eyes here Rick! Oh for the good old days, when you didn't need a bank overdraft to fill your tank.

Believe it or not though, that price was outrageously expensive for the time. It was a few months after the 1973 oil crisis which sent petrol prices soaring. I worked in a servo back then and I remember the outrage at the pump when customers saw the price go up almost daily during that period. As I recall it went from around from around 35 cents per gallon to around 50 cents in a matter of weeks. People started panicking and selling their V8 cars dirt cheap or trading them in on minis and VWs etc., anything with 4 cylinders! That was when we really started to see Jap cars in this country in numbers. This photo shows how things looked before in Australia - nothing but 6's and V8's.

Of course, as you'd expect, the price never came back down after the crisis was over. Your calcs tie in with my recollection Rick. Metrication was underway when this photo was taken, and when I got my licence about 6 months later I recall paying 12 cents a litre. I could top up the 9 gal tank in my Wolseley 1500 with a 2 dollar note, or fill it up from dry and get change from a fiver!

I remember too when Fraser got in and introduced "world parity pricing" for petrol in 1978. It went up overnight from 12 to 16 cents a litre, and hasn't stopped going up since!

When you consider we're virtually self-sufficient in oil and yet pay double US petrol price and 50% more than Canada, you'd have to conclude we're getting ripped off somewhere along the line. Not that we can expect any sympathy from our UK/EU friends!

[Keith Webb]

Originally Posted by Tony Wheeler

Arrangements were made to park it in a sawmill in Wesburn belonging to a fellow blitz enthusiast, who owned a C15A at the time. Second pic shows preparations for towing; third pic passing through Yarra Junction; fourth pic at the sawmill in Wesburn; final pic on first test drive in nearby mountains.

That was the F15A Wayne owned... he was an avid Ford man! Remember he fitted a winch and then managed to severely bend the chassis?

[Tony Wheeler]

Originally Posted by Keith Webb

That was the F15A Wayne owned... he was an avid Ford man! Remember he fitted a winch and then managed to severely bend the chassis?

Yes I remember it well Keith, here's one of your pics with Wayne driving and me on the step. I think this was before he bent the chassis.

I don't know why I called it a Chev earlier. Possibly a Freudian slip - Wayne dropped in recently after spotting a blitz in the driveway and it seems he's become a Chev convert since I knew him 40 years ago. I may have to work on the poor fellow and guide him back to the true and righteous path!

Sounds like he's had a few more CMPs over the years including a C60X which he now regrets letting go. I can certainly understand how he may have been swayed by one of these magnificent vehicles, but that's because it's not a true Chev!

[Tony Wheeler]

Wayne mentioned that his "old Ford" had been converted into a forklift which was now resident at a nearby construction yard. I checked it out and as you can see from the pics it's pretty well disguised! You'd need a keen eye to recognize it as a blitz from the road - I never drive down this road but even if I did I'm not sure I'd give it a second glance.

However I don't think it's Wayne's old F15A. It has the original type chassis reinforcement plates which indicate shortened F60S or F60L. Presumably he was referring to a different Ford he owned at some stage. Unless perhaps he rebuilt his F15A on a stronger chassis after bending the original one. But it has heavy steering ends which I don't recall Wayne's F15A having - I think he just put the late type hubs on because he liked the look of them.

Anyway I didn't spend much time looking at it for obvious reasons. I'll find out from Wayne eventually.

[Tony Wheeler]

For those patient souls who've managed to follow the story thus far I shall present the final chapter in the next few posts, then move on to present day projects in waiting.

It's April 1974, and with my resto project now driveable and resident at Wesburn, the temptation to take to the hills and explore the maze of FWD tracks therein was irresistible - notwithstanding my complete lack of driving experience, let alone a driver's licence! So we set out one fine morning from Wayne's sawmill, and within a few minutes drive found ourselves winding through pleasant mountain scenery on one of the better secondary roads, as seen in pic 1.

With the benefit now of half an hour's experience driving a blitz on good flat road, it was time to get a bit more adventurous and put her through her paces on one of the many sidetracks which beckoned invitingly. Selecting what appeared to be one of the less challenging tracks, which from its name one might assume to be suitable for ladies out walking, we duly turned onto it. Proceeding along comfortably up a gentle slope whilst enjoying the wonderful gear whine in 3rd low, with the canvas top rolled up for better viewing, this pleasant leafy track at first lived up to its name - as can be seen in pic 2.

Pretty soon however the track began to steepen dramatically (estimated by Keith at 40 degrees in pic 3) and became distinctly more narrow and overgrown (pic 4) which quickly put paid to the flimsy wooden frame I'd built to hold the canvas roof up!

In addition we started to encounter obstacles in the form of fallen tree branches (pic 5) and in several places, fallen tree trunks lying across the track. In the absence of a chainsaw, the largest of these tree trunks presented considerable difficulties, for we soon discovered that even with 12.00 x 20 tyres, a blitz will not clamber over an 18" log whilst climbing a 40 degree slope! We found however, that with a little encouragement, in the form of a run up, she can be made to crash over! Provided you're still in the cab after this manoeuver, you can continue on your merry way!

That's pretty much how I remember our first "test drive" - merrily exploring fire tracks, having not a clue what I was doing, with Keith hopping in and out to photograph the occasion!

[Keith Webb]

Originally Posted by Tony Wheeler

That's pretty much how I remember our first "test drive" - merrily exploring fire tracks, having not a clue what I was doing, with Keith hopping in and out to photograph the occasion!

I may have been a bit ambitious at estimating 40 degrees, but it was very steep. I can recall being very impressed at Tony's clutchless change from second to first low on a particularly steep bit. But the story became more perilous on the descent... pray continue, Tony...

[Mike K]

Did anyone spot the Monaro in the Yarra Junction pic ?

You guys should have been collecting those , not old junk army trucks .

A decent early model Monaro is worth big $$$$ nowadays

Mike

[Tony Wheeler]

Originally Posted by Keith Webb

But the story became more perilous on the descent... pray continue, Tony...

As Keith suggests we had a rather perilous incident on the way down the mountain, which was entirely my own fault I'm afraid. Having done an obsessively thorough job on the resto it seems I had overlooked a simple task during final assembly, and of course, as Murphy's Law dictates, I chose perhaps the most critical part on a blitz, from a safety viewpoint at least, for this single momentarily lapse of thoroughness in the entire project!

The offending article was the clevis pin which connects the brake pedal to the actuating rod, to which I had either failed to fit a split pin (unlikely) or failed to spread the split pin after fitting - perhaps in a tryout assembly, intending to disassemble/reassemble at a later stage.

Whatever the case, the clevis pin worked its way out over the course of several hours driving, and once again, as Murphy's Law dictates, it chose perhaps the most critical moment of the day to fall out - a long steep descent!

Events unfolded rapidly thereafter - all I remember is the brake pedal falling limply to the floor under my foot and remaining there (very disconcerting!) whereupon I instinctively swung off the track and went bush, in the hope that the heavy undergrowth would retard our progress and bring us to a safe halt, or perhaps allow us to swing back uphill somehow. None of this was thought out, it was just a split second reaction out of dumb instinct, and in a state of considerable fright!

With a little more driving experience I would have reached instinctively for the handbrake, which I discovered later was very effective in 4WD. However this was my very first drive and it never occurred to me in the heat of the moment.

Certainly I had no thoughts of staying on the track - the idea of being in a runaway blitz was too horrendous to even cross my mind! That suggests to me now that we should have been in a lower gear, with less reliance on the brakes. Pic 1 shows the type of track as I recall it, taken on the way up.

Another option would have been to jump out, but again, the idea of watching my beautiful new blitz go careering down the hill out of control and crash into a tree was too horrendous to even cross my mind. Besides, it would have been a little unfair to Keith in the passenger seat!

Poor old Keith had no warning at all – one minute we were quietly driving down a pleasant leafy track, and the next instant we were crashing through the undergrowth as we charged off downhill through the bush – saplings crashing down like ninepins in front of us! Of course, in a blitz pointing steeply downhill, with the occupants braced for impact, the action up front is very much in your face. It can be a little unnerving to watch trees rushing up towards you, and see them give way only at the very last moment! Add to that the jolting and bouncing around in your seat as you hang on grimly to the steering wheel, or in Keith's case the cab frame, plus the tremendous racket going on all around you, what with saplings cracking and splitting and snapping off at the base or getting violently uprooted, with their branches and foliage thrashing down from above you to crash down in front and get run over and dragged along underneath – it all amounts to quite an assault on the senses!

Nevertheless, the plan, if it can be called that, seemed to work, with each impact wiping off our speed, and no real damage being done. Except at the very end of our wild ride, where we bumped into a rather more solid tree, which instead of cooperating by allowing itself to be snapped off or torn out of the ground like the others, stood firm and brought us to a somewhat less gentle halt than we would have preferred. Whilst we weren't flung forward enough to be injured, the impact was sufficient to collapse the RH bumper mount slightly, due to one half of the two-piece assembly being absent. In addition, owing to the steep downhill grade, the vertical tree trunk kissed the top of the front shell, leaving a small dent and producing a ripple in the top panel.

Thus we found ourselves stuck on a thickly wooded mountainside, pointing steeply downhill, nosed up hard against a tree! The only way out was to reverse back uphill over the carnage we had just caused – a little of which can be seen in pic 2. Finally, after some preparatory clearing of said carnage, and much throwing of it under spinning wheels by Keith, we emerged backwards onto the track again.

I don't recall how we got home with no brakes – presumably I learned to use the handbrake, like I should have in the first place. After all, it's not called the emergency handbrake for nothing!

Anyway we arrived back at Wayne's sawmill none the worse for wear, after what by any standards was quite an eventful first outing! Apart from my split-pin oversight the blitz had performed marvellously, and if I'd had a complete RH bumper mount there would have been no damage at all. As it was, the bumper moved back far enough for the tree trunk to kiss the front shell, and to rub on the RH wheel during LH turns, necessitating its removal temporarily. These effects of our altercation with the tree can be seen in pic 2, taken on our next outing.