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A few Australian long-distance rally cars of the 1950s


Ozmac

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Recently I posted on this forum a “river crossing” diorama based on the 1953 Redex “Around Australia” Rally. In that dio I included one built model and two modified diecast models. I’ve also used the same “river crossing” diorama landscape for a second dio on the 1956 Ampol Around Australia trial. For that one, I also included one built model and two modified diecast models.

 

I thought I’d post all the 1950s rally cars here, using a photo on the left of the real rally cars from historical archives, and on the right my attempt to create something like a replica (some replicas are more accurate than others, for various reasons). So I’ll start with the built models, and I hope you don’t mind me including the diecast ones, which are fairly heavily modded (and of course kits for all these diecast cars simply aren’t available, which is why I used diecast).

 

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Peugeot 203, a 1/43 kit by Heller. This car won the 1953 Redex Rally, which was the first of the Around Australia rallies. One advantage of the plastic kit is that I could convert it over to right-hand drive. The winning driver was Ken Tubman, a chemist from the country town of Maitland, New South Wales.

 

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Peugeot 403, a 1/43 kit by Heller. This car won the 1956 Ampol Rally. As with the 203, using the plastic kit allowed me to make it right-hand drive. The photo on the left is of the 403 crossing the finishing line at Bondi Beach, driven by Wilf Murrell, a grazier from the country town of Hillston, NSW.

 

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Holden FX, 10th placed in the 1953 Redex Trial. The car is a 1/3 diecast model by Trax. As with all the other cars I made my own decals, and for this Holden I decided my third attempt at the sun visor would have to do. The driver in the photo on the left is ‘Possum’ Kipling, of Port Wakefield, South Australia.

 

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Peugeot 203 Station Wagon. My favourite car in the whole group, because the Cinesound Film Unit filmed the whole trial and completed all 6500 miles of the first Redex Trial, in basically the same car that won the trial! The model is a 1/43 Solido, which I modified by adding roof racks, luggage, a winch on the front bumper, spotlights and, of course, home made decals.

 

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This Volkswagen didn’t finish in the 1956 Ampol, but the same driver won the 1957 Ampol in a VW. Out of all the cars which entered the many reliability trials that ran from 1953 through to 1958, VWs have the best record, with a number of wins and high placings. The model is a diecast 1/43 by Lledo, to which I added some decals (but making white decals is beyond the capabilities of my Laserjet printer, so these are not that close to the real deal).

 

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This Morris Minor also failed to finish the 1956 Ampol Rally, but the father and daughter team, the Davidsons, got lots of pre-race publicity. As with the VW decals, I had to settle for a few compromises in the end. The model is a Corgi 1/43 of a Minor 1000, but I added the “split” front windscreen to turn it into the late Series II which the Davidsons entered that year.

 

Edited by Ozmac
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Ozmac, your photos are not showing up, pity 'cause I'd really like to see them, I love these old rallys & have several Trax models of Rally cars from days gone by, when the cars used were at least close to what the man in the street could buy, unlike todays highly modified whizz bombs, not that I don't enjoy modern rallying too, especially when Haddon Paddon is doing so well  :)

Steve

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Rats! On my screen all the photos are showing up just fine. Maybe they are too big? I've made them all the same size 26cm across. Could others let me know if they aren't working, and I will downsize them and edit the post so that they are visible, but right now they look OK ...

 

Steve, I've also logged into the forum via my laptop, and all the pix are visible on it. Not sure what the problem is ...

Edited by Ozmac
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Likewise, unfortunately the photos are not appearing on my iPad or Desktop PC. 

Hopefully you can solve this as I'm sure these will be popular. 

 

Cheers.. Dave 

 

Edit - photos are now visible (to me) and as expected they look great. Very well done. 

Edited by Rabbit Leader
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Just re-sized all the pix to 24cm across, which is the same size as everything else I've ever posted here, so hopefully that will work. If it doesn't let me know, and I'll have to simply post the "old" and "model" photos one by one. That will take some time, so I won't be able to do that until tomorrow ...

 

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Those are really cool, very well done little models - I like the dio too! Very informative thread as well. I've learnt something new about rallying history today!

 

Great stuff !

 

Keith

 

PS, couple of years back I converted a Cararama 1/43 diecast MK1 Capri to a RHD UK 1970's road rally car, so it is possible to convert diecasts too - I mean, if I can do it......!!

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