OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums General Discussion Forum Off Topics Rough Repainting of Green Lawkeeper.

Hi Tyler,

So I guess really what we need is to press out some stainless steel Victa bases? lol

I wonder how hard wearing some stainless steel corrugated roof sheets would be? lol

A mate was here yesterday in his AMC Mattador and I can assure you that it was not galvanized and neither is the Hornet, another friend has one of those.
With these so called galvanized cars they were more likely zinc plated as opposed to hot dipped. The mower bases would be getting hot dipped

The AMC Matador was badged as the Rambler Matador for the Australian market and was assembled at the AMI plant in Melbourne, who also assembled Toyota and others, including Volvo.
It later became the Australian Toyota assembly plant.
They were unique in sharing the same colour palette as the Toyota models and the coffin nose Matadors as the later ones were nicknamed, actually continued using the dash from the previous model, where the U.S models from the Wisconsin plant, had a later design.
The LAPD ordered a lot of the pre-coffin nose model as they offered unrivalled power to weight ratio performance and better handling than the big three could offer at the time and were so well regarded, some remained in active duty until the mid 1980s.
The later coffin nose model still saw widespread service with U.S law enforcement in the 1970s, as attested by their common appearance in police shows at the time.
Only a handful of the coffin nose Rambler Matador were actually produced locally over two years and I got to drive someone's V8 wagon once and it was my first experience driving a V8 and it went! The steering had zero feel and was so over assisted it felt like it wasn't connected to the wheels at all!

Dodge Monaco and the Plymouth Gran Fury were 2 other regular cop cars in the TV shows from memory MF, lots getting spectacularly wrecked over the Dukes of Hazzard series

MF
you may have seen my mates Matador recently because you mentioned Chryslers on the Murray that was held a few weeks ago. The rego on his is AMC 401. Nice big fuel injected motor in it

Hey Norm do you or did you know anyone with an AP5 or AP6? My dad had an AP5 with the push button auto. I even had a photo, which I lost, of my mum cradling me as a bub in the front seat in 1973!
Sadly my dad left it sitting outside for a decade unregistered when it was finally towed away by a wrecker in 1982 full of rust.

MF,

never got involved with Valiants, but I still have a front tortion bar from one I did some front end work on and it is a great big punch that I have used on many occasions, very handy to have

My grandfather bought one of the first VF Valiant Regal Coupes made - the dealer didn't tell him it arrived for 2 weeks so it could be put on the rotating pedestal in the showroom.
First Auto car they owned, and Nanna apparently spend the first week of driving it hitting the brake pedal instead of the non-existent clutch.

Sold it 3 years later because the heavy doors drooped so much they had to be lifted then pushed shut (ran out of lock striker adjustment).

Replaced with a 6cyl torana - lost all brakes when the 4 wheel drums went over a big water puddle - ran down a steep hill into a ditch (fortunately she had it down to first gear to slow it down).

That reminds me of my mate who had an XB coupe which was a 302 when he first bought it but when that died we replaced it with a 351 V8. I drove it before he put power steering in it and it had the standard manual heavy steering. Then I drove it again when he put power steering in it and it was so feather light you could almost turn the wheel with a fingertip. I thought it was way too light for such a big heavy car. But it probably did make slow speed turning especially easy when parking than manual steer.

Sadly I think it was the same year I reckon when I was a kid watching the tow truck take away my dads old white HR Holden sedan down the driveway which was also taken to a local wrecking yard. I think the drivers side of the car was smashed in the doors wouldn't open and close on the drivers side, but it was still drivable, you just had to get in and out from the passenger side..lol. Eventually the police noticed it and said that the car was not roadworthy in that condition.

I had some mates that used to live near here and I went to school with them. They used to all have Valiants of all sorts, sedans, 2 doors, etc. I remember them having a same style Valiant as the one from that movie "The Wog Boy". The funny thing was my mates with those Valiants weren't all that far off what the movie was based on, and they were like that years before that movie was released! LOL!

Cheers!