The Cohort comes up trumps again. – I was admiring the Hudson Wasp, and “Hey, what’s that in the background?” A 1960 Vauxhall Victor Super saloon, spotted by Curbivore Fred Oliver, somewhere in California, and the subject of some detail shots straight after the Wasp. How many of these are there still on the roads of the US?
The first Vauxhall Victor, from 1957 to 1961 and known as the F Type, was a standard a family size car, for the UK, and we’ve looked at it in detail here before, so no need to go over old ground. It was as conventional as any other, with a OHV four cylinder 1.6 litre engine with 55bhp, 3 speed gearbox with column change, a leaf spring rear axle and a bench front seat on many versions.
Like many Vauxhalls from the early 1950s to the early 1970s, when Vauxhalls stopped being Vauxhalls and became Opels in a very light disguise, the styling was clearly influenced by contemporary North American trends, albeit reduced in size. Often striking, sometimes a bit of fun, sometimes a pastiche, and sometimes oddly proportioned. Even more than British Ford and Rootes products, Vauxhalls brought a bit of US glamour (or glamor?) to Britain, and the Victor was a prime example. 1955 Chevrolet, and an erroneous hot wash cycle?
Reports suggest that this was at the direct instruction of the 14th floor of the GM building, and it had one root cause or by-product depending where you sit. That same 14th floor presumably saw potential for this car to be sold in North America as an import fighter, albeit imported from the UK.
It was shown in September in 1957 and sales started in November, through Pontiac dealers, taking on the sub-compact imports. The car was offered as a Standard or a Super, though little, if any, evidence exists of any Standards actually being sold. The Super cost $1975, and included twin speed wipers, push button door locks, a heater, a choice of interior finishes and trims, and a big boot.
This is a Series 2 car, distinguished by its simpler, calmer grille, loss of bonnet ornamentation, smoother over rear doors and much more modest bumpers.
The original Series 1 cars had more prominent bumpers with bulbous ends, which at the rear enclosed the exhaust pipe on one side, and from which the condensation contributed to corrosion. This was just the start of the Victor’s corrosion issues though. This thing rusted badly enough, from leaks in door seals and round the wraparound screens to get Vauxhall a rust reputation that lasted until the Opel derived cars came through. 1961 cars had a larger rear window and revised rear pillars as well.
Add to this the lack of value in the Victor – at just under $2000.00, and $2400.00 for an estate, it was around 25% more costly than Beetle and nudging towards a full size Ford or Chevrolet.
There may have been little to compete with it in the Pontiac showroom, but any one shopping around would find something. And people not shopping around probably wouldn’t find the Victor. It was also pretty slow – over 25 seconds to 60 mph – and reliability in Interstate use was not great either.
Pontiac stuck at it until 1962, when the F Type was replaced by the FB, again styled as a small North American car way, although a lot more successfully. GM sold 27,000 cars in the US in those four years, but over 390,000 in total, including 250,000 in the first two years. Vauxhall could claim a commercial success.
Canada got the car too, badged as the Envoy, with a different bonnet pressing and trim details, sold through Chevrolet and Oldsmobile dealers. There was more success here, selling something like 40,000 cars through three generations of Victor, before the Envoy name was moved onto the smaller Viva.
And “V” got its entry in the A (Austin) to Z (Zastava Yugo) in the list of Foreign Brands that didn’t make it in America.
Prior to reading this post, if you had asked me to guess how guess how may Vauxhalls GM had sold in the US, I would have guessed a number in the low tens of thousands, not a quarter million. This is why I love CC.
It was 27,000 in the US, 390.000 in total around the world.
One day, I will learn reading comprehension.
I would have guessed zero! I paid a lot of attention to cars as a kid in the 1960s, but I don’t recall seeing a single one.
My parents bought a brand new 1960 Vauhall Station Wagon in spring 1960 in Sudbury Ontario Canada. We had it for 3 years. 5 kids and mom and dads family car.
That spltscreen ad really showed the end was near, with the Tempest next to it looking a full generation newer.
Post-merger, FCA-PSA will have far too many brands, and besides Lancia (and discounting folding Ram back under Dodge and DS back under Citroen), Vauxhall is ripe for the chop. It’d be cheap too if they just started shipping cars to the UK with a blitz instead of a griffin in the grille and put off a dealership rebrand until later.
“shipping cars to the UK with a blitz instead of a griffin”
If you mean badging them as Opels, Vauxhall and Opel already are the same thing for different markets.
Exactly, the UK market is the only one the Vauxhall brand is used in.
The position from Vauxhall (pre and post GM – PSA sale) is that changing from Vauxhall to Opel would costs sales, as Vauxhall is familiar and considered British to some extent, whereas Opel is now unfamiliar. Yes, they are exactly the same cars, from a common manufacturing network, and only the badges differ. Vauxhall’s market share in the UK is higher than Opel’s in Germany, FWIW.
Marketing complexity benefit is pretty low as well, as Opel would have to do English language materials etc anyway
In Ireland, with a Skybox, we get both Opel and Vauxhall ads, although new Vauxhalls are not sold here.
They where still Vauxhall in Australia assembled by General Motors Holden
Love the block of wood at the rear tire, I read somewhere in the past that these were notorious rusters, probably why they are so rare now
Perhaps you just read about their propensity to rust in this article? 🙂
I seriously considered buying one of these a few years ago and making it a ’57 Chevrolet tribute project (V6, two tone paint etc ), but the scarcity of parts and the rust issue was too much trouble.
Vauxhalls in the early to mid 50s were hugely popular in NZ weak rear axle keyways and rust were about all that went wrong my father bought a 54 EIP new it was grey my earliest recollections of it are in emerald green it had the rust cut out and a respray around the time I was born in 58, I can recall accompanying dad down to the workshop where he worked for its annual soaking in old engine oil, then suddenly in 64 he sold it and bought a new PB Velox, Years later I saw the green EIP still in use and it still wasnt rusty the oil treatment must have worked.
Speaking from an Australian perspective, in the sixties it was rare to see any Vauxhall, whether Wyvern, Velox or Victor, that wasn’t rusty. But like Bryce says, the engine would keep going and going, long after the bodywork was unsafe.
Genuine rara avis, especially when these machines fell prey to all sorts of assaults from rust consumption to disappointing performance while accelerating an on-ramp which shortened their appearance in the US. My only awareness came from a Matchbox version in my collection and later in life seeing the odd specimen touring about the benign climate of the West. Appropriate that this one’s in the Bay Area that always saw plenty of automobilia obscura to encounter.
There have to be painfully few of these left anywhere in the US. With 27k sold here, along with rust, attrition would be high. Then again, I’ve seen a Singer Gazelle still on the road.
One I am curious about is how well GM dealers in the US had parts support for Vauxhall after about, say, 1965.
While Vauxhall was a GM brand, I can’t help but see a bit of Ford in there also. Perhaps it’s the headlight covers jutting forward a la 1955 Ford.
I hope this Vauxhall goes to a good home or is able to donate to the cause of another Vauxhall.
Totally off the subject, but I pulled into the parking lot of the Total Wine last year and parked near an ancient French couple emerging from one of these, a classic Salmson, in Cornflower Yellow (ish). Don’t see that every day. They were charming, heavy French accents. I kept waiting for the Edith Piaf sound track to kick in.
Reverse CC effect? Came across this ’61 for sale online yesterday.
https://www.kijiji.ca/v-classic-cars/ottawa/vauxhall-victor-super-1961-trade/1498198746?undefined
The small town that I grew up in had ALL the car brands grouped in oddball fashions. The Oldsmobile dealer was paired with Buick, Pontiac with Cadillac, Chevy was the only stand alone but that dealership sold as many vehicles as it sister brands. And Vauxhall? Sold at the Olds/Buick dealer.
I think in 50+ years of driving, I have seen 4 or 5 of these Vauxhalls, including 1 or 2 wagons. I never knew as a young gearhead where these came from, I think for the longest time that with that name (which I always mis-pronounced) that they were German. To me, this model looks like a small 56 Chevrolet but I also was unaware of the GM connection for quite awhile.
The Pontiac dealer in Iowa City had a Vauxhall sign, but he seems to have stopped actually selling any by the time we got there in 1960. i only ever saw one or two around on the street. There were lots more Opel Rekords around, and they were quite common for quite some time yet. I rather wanted to find an old one in CA in the ’70s, since they were such a common car in Austria in the 50s.
A nice old gentleman across the street from me had one of these Vauxhalls. I enjoyed seeing him drive it into the uphill driveway. He was quite adept at maneuvering it between the two houses in the narrow space afforded for cars. After he passed, his wife kept the car for years in the ramshackle garage, never driven. I asked if I could come and see that car, and she promised she would let me, but that day never came. I never saw the car again, I heard it was hauled away for scrap, the wheels completely seized by that time. I’m afraid the elements got the better of Mr. Collier’s car.
Deutsche Welle (DW) ran a half hour show on PBS last night:
‘Opel Kapitän – The German status symbol’
In it they describe how Germans sought out American car looks in the 1950s but that sentiment died in the 1960s.
https://www.dw.com/en/opel-kapit%C3%A4n-the-german-status-symbol/av-53354755
Building a unibody car with dog-leg windscreen pillars was always going to make bodyshell rigidity a problem. Laurence Pomeroy (Jr) wrote about Vauxhalls’ struggles in this regard in his column in Motor magazine. Being so highly stressed, the dog-leg pillar was also inclined to rust at an accelerated rate …
The first two models of PA Velox and Cresta were a bit weak but over here they also spent a lot of miles on unsurfaced roads the later PAX and PASX were better, unibody Holdens had no issues with body integrity with the FB and EK models both with wrap around front screens.
Holden may well have benefited from Vauxhall’s experience here. Their first wraparound screen job came in 1960, when it was already looking dated in America.
The F series Victor was certainly up to the minute in 1957, but (odd proportioning aside) it was looking dreadfully dated by the time the FB replaced it. American styling was changing so rapidly in the late fifties, and Vauxhall had the most extreme small-car interpretation of American styling on Aussie roads, to the point of almost looking a caricature in the case of this Victor. Aussies are generally a bit conservative in our styling tastes, and I have to wonder how much better Vauxhall would have sold if they’d been less extreme. Dad admired the big Vauxhalls – Don next door had one – but the styling was too gaudy for him. Vauxhall themselves seem to have realised this with the progressive simplification of the design – the accountants can’t have liked new bonnet and rear door skins for the F series after only a year on sale!
Surely the guys on the 14th floor weren’t thinking of a five-year production run when they signed off on this.
I have distinct, though possibly highly suspect, memories of this generation Victor being sold by the small independent “foreign car” garage that had sold us our 1953 Hillman Minx. The owner tried to convince my Mom to test drive one when we were planning an upgrade from the Minx in 1960, which eventually resulted in another V car, our Volvo 544. Does anyone know if independents handled these in the US, and not just Pontiac dealers?
The one pictured has a license plate frame from Don Signer, which I recall as a Buick dealership in Fremont, California, though at least when I lived in Fremont (40 years ago) they weren’t paired with Pontiac which had a stand-alone store under another name. I checked to see if Signer was still in business, and found an interesting website cataloguing GM’s treatment of the dealership during the ‘90’s and 2000’s.
http://www.donsigner.com There’s some history of the family dealerships, and Don Signer Sr. was apparently a GM employee and Pontiac district rep when this Victor was new.
I’m very sure, in the Portland area at least, that new Vauxhalls were only sold by Pontiac dealers. Of course sold should be in quotes as there were very few of these on the ground, especially compared to the more successful Opel Rekords.
It almost seemed as if the Pontiac stores didn’t care about these cars.
They probably would have made more money from selling the full-size Pontiacs. Especially with all those delicious options!
Hi,
62 envoy was my first car, back in 75. Used the heck out of it. Once taking three others from victoria to Tofino ( and at that time the road was not that great from port Alberni to the ucluelet – tofino road).
And the wee vauxhall carried us all plus our hiking gear thru the rain and dark without a hiccup.
I liked the chrome switchgear, and the three on the tree shift. Oh and I think it cost me 72 bucks a year in insurance.
Alistair
In Canada, we had the Vauxhall Viva and Envoy Epic. Being in GM Parts in the early ’70’s, the supply was no worse than for other models. As I recall, the Viva’s and Epics [HA & HB Series] with the 1200 cc were notoriously hard on timing chains and tensioner components.
One minor thing the engine was 1507cc the 1600 appeared with the facelifted FB in 63/4 these Victor were of as far as four banger British cars went untill rust set in 40mpg imp was achieveable and if it wasnt fast enough Aleanders in the UK made a twin sidedraft SU carb manifold for them which perked them up, Not a huge amount of them left now even here where cars like this were kept alive decades past their scrap by date but the odd one still surfaces from somebodoes shed, The same basic powertrain was used in the CA Bedford vans from 58 I transplanted a 61 Victor engine into my 59 CA Bedford van a marginal improvement but it did burn less oil.
The Vauxpedia website has a fascinating account of the genesis of the first Vauxhall Victor, rushed into production with inadequate development under pressure from Detroit, with a body designed by Fisher who didn’t understand the demands of unibody (or monocoque) construction. Vauxhall seemed to suffer from over-dominance by Detroit (perhaps more so than Opel), and was dogged by the consequences right to its disappearance as a semi-independent entity. The FB was a much better car altogether.
+1 on Vauxpedia.
Thank you for using my photos and teaching me more about these cars. The education I get here goes well beyond my typical Wikipedia searches.
One small clarification. The car has California plates, but the pictures were taken at a used car lot in Connecticut.
It seems unlikely that the Hudson or Vauxhall would survive many New England winters as daily drivers.
There was also a 49 Lincoln and a 1970-something Super Beetle on the same lot.
Hi, and I’m glad you enjoyed the piece. Thanks for finding it and posting it.
I’d assumed California based on the plate, but the idea that someone took this to Connecticut is intriguing, so say the least.
Frank Murphy Pontiac, the Perry, NY dealer sold Vauxhall, the only two that come to mind was a white sedan driven my one of the ladies that staffed the Silver Lake Drive-in theater in that town. It had the odd, expanded-metal appearing grille texture. The other a light blue station wagon with severe rust still driven in the late ’60’s.
Even more strange, Philippi Pontiac, Fillmore, NY sold Vauxhall, the neon sign still hangs in the show window and was lite until recently! Both Pontiac dealers sold plenty of new Pontiacs but very few Vauxhalls, gladly moved onto the Tempest when it arrived.
The F Series Victor was Britain’s most exported car in its time and was even locally assembled in markets as far flung as New Zealand, S Africa and some Caribbean countries where local taxation laws made importation of fully built units prohibitive..
They had a 1,507 cc motor and not a 1.6 as stated – the 1.6 only came about for the final year of the FB Victor, launched in autumn/fall 1963.
The Envoy brand was chosen as a sister make to the Vauxhall moniker in Canada. Envoys were sold through Chevy and Olds dealerships, with Pontiac and Buick franchisees having access to the Vauxhall.
The Envoy name was not transferred to the smaller Viva when that was launched into Canada in 1964. That car was named the Envoy Epic, again sold through Chevy and Olds dealers with the Viva being offered by Pontiac and Buick outlets. The Epic name was also used on French market Vivas.
Nice to know that GM marketing was inconsistent even back then.
The F Series were notable rusters as the quality of steel used was abysmal, probably in order to keep costs down.
Vauxhall’s rust resistance improved markedly from the introduction of the HB Viva in late 1966 and their models were equal or better to their British and European rivals, as witnessed by annual used car surveys conducted by the British AA.
It’s always a treat to see an old nag like this, here in very similar condition to when I saw them as a young kid in the ’70’s. It’s as it has fallen through a time hole, sitting there insouciantly on a car lot in 2020 as if it’s a $499 special in 1978. They were ill-regarded bangers by then, driven exclusively by old women in twinsets and pearls, or men in tweed – in short, grim old farts who still had firm views on the value of King and Empire, and who believed only Made in England was best, even as what had got made there opened up under their feet and clearly wasn’t.
As pete points out above, Australians didn’t much fancy the gaudiness of these when new anyway, let alone their ability thereafter to transform into flakes if a drop of water fell. I think they may have been assembled here by Holden from CKD kits, giving the panels some extra marinating time in the salt air and moving the rusting process on from bad to appalling.
They are ridiculous-looking cars. I thought this even as a kid. Perhaps Detroit thought that everyone in England lived in actual tiny houses – instead of small ones – and that when the thing was parked outside one, it would magically assume correct proportions.
Or perhaps it was just a memo misunderstood, when some exec wrote “to the Victor, the spoils”.
This is the kind of comment I appreciate most–semiotics and interpretation rather than just facts and data.
The first Vauxhalls sold in Canada appeared around 1926, before the GM takeover of Vauxhall. They were sold in the Toronto area but the depression ended Vauxhall’s first round in Canada,
After WW II, Canada was having currency problems – no American dollars. Thus importation of cars from the U.S. had strict rules that had to be met. And also import duties, excise taxes and the like.
GM did not build Buicks in Canada after WW II through 1950. And by 1948 you needed approval from the federal government to buy and import an American car, such as Buick (and Nash Ambassador, Hudson Commodore, Studebaker Commander, Cadillac, Olds 98, 8 cylinder Chryslers, Lincoln, big Packards, and a few others).
Thus GM decided to import the Vauxhall for Pontiac-Buick dealers starting in 1949. This line of Vauxhalls included the 4 cylinder Wyvern and the six cylinder Velox. (Models LIX and LIP.) The cars were based on the prewar Vaxuhall 12, suicide front doors and all.
The Korean War began and Canada thus now had US currency on hand. GM did not import Vauxhalls for 1952, instead waiting for the new EIX and EIP Vauxhalls with their ohv engines. The Cresta, with its Kaiser-like grille, was added for 1954.
The 4cyl Wyvern was dropped for 1957 and replaced by the new F series Victor in sedan and wagon styles. For 1958 the EI series was replaced by the PA series Velox and Cresta.
The Victor was doing well and Canadian Chevrolet-Oldsmobile dealers wanted their compact. Thus in 1960 came the Victor-based Envoy models. The Envoy did well at first. In 1960 GM sold more Envoys than Corvairs (which were made in Canada).
GM even imported Bedford trucks – which were made by Vauxhall – and offered an Envoy version. For a couple of years anyway.
Model changes occurred –
– 1962 – Vauxhall Victor (FB) and Envoy Special (B) redesigned
– 1963 – PA series Velox and Cresta dropped
– 1964 – new 1.0 litre Vauxhall Viva (HA) and Envoy Epic (HA) 2 door sedans
– 1966 – new Vauxhall Victor (FC) and Envoy Special (FC)
– 1967 – Vauxhall Viva (HB) and Envoy Epic (HB) introduced
– 1970 – Last year for Envoy Epic and Envoy Special. Epic replaced by the Vega.
– 1971 – Vauxhall Viva replaced by Vauxhall Firenza (HC) in sedan, wagon and coupe models.
– 1971 – Vauxhall Victor dropped.
– 1973 – Vauxhall Firenza dropped and replaced by the Pontiac Astre
Both the first generation Victor and the Firenza, the last Vauxhall sold in Canada, had poor reputations – Victor for body rust and Firenza for almost poor everything.
I remember these when I was a kid in the 1960s and ’70s. Not as popular as the Opel Rekord or the Olympia Caravan, but more popular than the Engish Fords or the German Ford Taunuses.
Question: did Opel Rekords rust less than Vauxhall Victors? They were very similar cars (the Opels looked less gaudy), designed in similar circumstances by GM overseas affiliates. I’ve never been quite sure why Vauxhall got itself into this hole if Opel didn’t. But maybe they did.
Needing a new car in 1961, my parents went down the street to the local Pontiac dealer. They were torn between a used blue and white Vauxhall Victor station wagon and a used low mileage 1959 Rambler American. After the test drive, the kid verdict was unanimous. We all begged for the Vauxhall. A firm believer in democracy, my dad cast the one and only deciding vote. We drove home in the Rambler.
That was my one and only ride in a Vauxhall Victor. We kept the Rambler long enough that I got my license in that car. Ramblers of this era were the very bottom of the teenage gearhead totem pole. Because of this, the Vauxhall acquired a mythical status as some sort of “if only” car.
In retrospect, my dad probably picked the better car. Plenty of the old bathtub Americans were still on the road when I got my license. Ours survived the beating of 3 teenage drivers. Meanwhile, the few Vauxhalls in our town had all disappeared.