As the cars of my teenage years age, some brands and series have vanished unnoticed, others achieve mythical status, and a few just roll along and become a blank canvas to their new owners’ creativity or practical needs. Every VH series Chrysler Valiant I have seen for some time now falls into the latter category.
I saw this Regal sedan as its owners were about to leave the beach, and went over for a closer look. This previously well used one owner car had now become a project to be enjoyed by its new family, and not taken too seriously… clearly, have you read the stickers?
The VH series Valiant, introduced in South Africa in the early 70’s, had big shoes to fill. Valiants had been sold in South Africa since 1960, and by 1966 it was the top selling car in the country, a position it held till 1969 when it was unseated by the Beetle. By 1974 it was selling in 7th place.
Until South Africa adopted the Australian developed VH model we had loosely followed the North American Valiant and Dart pattern. Cars were initially assembled in Cape Town, but from ’68 assembly was moved to the Silverton plant near Pretoria, which is today owned by Ford and is where Ranger bakkies are assembled.
Here is a Valiant VJ model, sold from ’73 to ’75 which I caught up with outside the Timour Hall Car Show. South Africa received no V8 Valiants, and no VH or J coupes. We did get the VH station wagon and bakkie though.
I like this aftermarket grille update. These Valiants were not as popular as the models before, as they were getting too big for South African tastes, and the 1974 oil crisis really turned people away from large cars in droves.
Here is the car again some time later, what a great company car this makes!
This is the top of the line model Dodge SE, taken from the Chrysler by Chrysler Australian model.
This car has unfortunately had some very wonky accident repair work done to it but it’s still someone’s trusty daily transport.
Despite Valiants being so popular once in South Africa one hardly sees them anymore. Along with all the Toyota Coronas and Colt Galants most just racked up enormous mileages and gave great service until they were no longer financially viable to fix. Most Valiants became inner city metered taxis at some point, and they were brilliant at that.
I’ll leave you with a piece of music I love, filmed in Johannesburg with a 70’s theme and best of all it features a VH Valiant.
Thank you for this, Pikesta. The cars are mighty fine, but it’s the dazzling blue sea and sky and the white beaches and the colorful houses that are really pulling on me. My desire to see these places you’ve shown us over the years has only grown, but alas, it’s not likely to happen in the near future. But your lovely post cards from SA have made my morning.
I love Oregon and never tire of it, but the yen to be somewhere exotic is strong today.
I agree, that beautiful blue sea and white beaches look particularly appealing on this wet and grey PNW day.
Yeah, 42 and grey in Melbourne, Oz, vs about 57 in Cape Town right now. Looks damn fine from here.
Hi Paul, every day CC takes me traveling to amazing locations, and I always enjoy what all of you are up to, so it’s good to get to share my corner of the world.
I’m always drawn to colour and in Cape Town it’s not difficult to find!
Perfect light to film photography . There is one auto insurance company who’s adds aren’t shot in the UK, if you lock closely.
Oh, Mr P! You have excelled yourself. What wondrous pics of these ole barges you’ve done.
These Oz Vals fell prey to the oil crisis here as well, and were soon not much wanted. A pity, as they were tougher than overcooked leather, and, in comfort terms, better than the (local) rest. We’ll overlook steering (awful) and handling (not good unless a hot version), and stress performance and relative economy, both of which creamed the GM and Ford alternatives.
Mind, I think these SA versions have the old slant six, and not the so-called hemi six: let me know if that’s wrong, Pikesta? Still a great engine, ofcourse.
Dodge SE, you say? Try the “Chrysler by Chrysler”, the utterly ridiculous name given to the top of the line loop-bumpered Vals here.
Music, scenery, even a bloody Renault Scenic of the type I had to break down for you in pic 7, sir, you have made my COVID 19 day.
And long live the VH Val. It’s (very) arguably the best-looking fuselage sedan they ever made.
Thanks Justy, you are quite right, SA only got the 3.6 litre slant six, due to local content rules. These were superb engines with great longevity, but left Chrysler looking like it needed a performance shot in the arm. Flipping through my May 1973 copy of Car magazine the Dodge SE costing 5020 Rand was up against a Chev Constantia V8 at 5047 Rand [a rebadged Holden..Statesman?] with the Ford Fairlane 500 A/T [Australian] at 6070 Rand.
I didn’t really get the styling when I was a teenager but now I see these as beautiful sculptural pieces.
Pikesta, the Constantia was indeed a Holden Statesman V8 (though perhaps with Chev instead of Holden V8 power for local content in SA?), and the Ford was the stretched Oz version of the old 1960 US Falcon platform in snazzier ’70’s clothing.
The Holden/Chev Constantia had the best bones, with a coil rear end and such, but it took until the ’77 model here for the inherent potential to be employed. Till then, it was a truly awful handler. The Fairlane, for all its cruder rear suspension, was better.
And the Valiant should have been the best in ’73, but as our Bryce has pointed out, only if modified. That’s irritating, as there’s no good reason why it wasn’t done in period. The ride would hardly have altered.
The white one in your pics here would in truth be a little scary to pilot quickly, if someone has not tightened things up. From personal experience, it would be downright hair-raising much above 65mph if standard.
This is the amazing thing about CC, I’m getting to hear all the insider info!
I’m sure Constantia would have had Chev power. I think a lot of people would have bought Valiants to tow a caravan with, sounds like there could have been lots of unintended ‘fun’ getting car and caravan to the sea courtesy of mushy handling characteristics..
Another Pikesta feast of bright and joyful colors and car scenery. Thanks!
+1
Is it the styling, or were these last Valiants as big as Coronets? And even without a single badge, I would know the green car was a Chrysler product, no other car company seemed to produce so many avacodo green cars.
Interesting that Ford’s Falcon and Chrysler’s Valiant had a longer life outside the U.S. but the juggernaut known as GM could not, or perhaps felt no need, to extend the life of the RWD X-bodies outside the U.S.
They were considered big buggers for the Oz market, but no, the wheelbase is 7′ shorter than a Coronet, and the total length about 13′ less. The very biggest car ever in this country was the ’73-79 Ford LTD, on a 121′ wheelbase.
Before our US friends have a coronary, Justy, you mean inches(“), not feet(‘). They were big, true, but weren’t THAT big! Not quite…
Fuselage styling made them look bigger than they were, which was not a plus at the time. Already there were rumblings from many quarters that what had been nicely sized cars were getting rather unwieldy, and people were moving to the mid-sized cars (US subcompacts) in increasing numbers, especially the Torana sixes.
From memory these Valiants were six inches longer than the Holden and Falcon, perhaps two inches wider, but on the same wheelbase. The Falcon, and especially the Holden, looked much smaller though. The Holden was blessed with a huge glass area which made it feel much smaller once you were driving. Reportedly Chrysler Australia sent a Valiant over to the US for Chrysler engineers to sort the suspension, only to be told it was the best handling intermediate they’d ever driven. Which is a bit of a backhander, as it wasn’t an intermediate…..
BTW, that Dodge SE isn’t quite the full Chrysler – it has the C-by-C front and rear end on the standard wheelbase body.
And here’s a nice VK I spotted in my little town. Beautifully restored.
Thanks Pete. Nice looking! The bigger wheels really help the looks. Those wheel wells need filling out. SA only got the smaller wheels in period.
HAHA! Oops, I often get that round the wrong way when hurrying, grew up right as things changed to metric.
Mind, when these were released in ’71, they did look that big in proportion to my 3 yo self, y’know, so…
Good question and what’s more strange, they once sold the A-body Malibu in Chile in 1978. https://www.uniquecarsandparts.com.au/brochures_1978_chev_malibu_chile
Love the old Aussie Valiants great cars, I owned several in well used condition the Hemi six was an excellent engine and available in 3 sizes all of which Ive pedaled the 245 and 265 being the best performers but the little 215 gave really good economy backed by a manual 3 speed.
Todd motors assembled Valiants for the NZ market and there trim differences with the Australian assembled cars, not big ones but we got loose pillow upholstery (its where I learned to hate it) on upscale models and twin choke carbs standard on 245 engines, we also got a slightly gruntier 265 standard on the Charger model which won the standard production tintop race series year in year out through the 70s Justy said they dont handle well but if you get the right guy settingvthem up they do Ozzie touring car champion Alan Moffat brought his all conquering GTHO Falcon to NZ to show Kiwi fans what a fast Aussie Ford was all about and could not best a local E49 Valiant anywhere and it was the handling that did it, a few turns out of each front torsion bar and some negative camber works wonders on the old Ethnic Express, my 265 VJ Regal was done that way along with airshocks at the back for towing mainly but it stiffened the old tank up nicely for daily driving and wasnt too bad on fuel 18-20 mpg round town 25 mpg highway and 14 mpg with caravan attached 16 if I went slower than 110 (rare) the 265 pulled like a loco.
Now, be fair Bryce, I said the handling was “not good” unless hotted up, as you describe. That done, they could win touring car races, and did.
It’s odd the US didn’t take on the hemi six, particularly when the fuel crisis and CAFE hit, and especially as it seems Chryco US developed it (and rejected it) for certain trucks themselves (thus the NIH factor being irrelevant).
There’s no doubt at all a 265ci or even the 245ci would have well outperformed the good old 318ci V8, and given economy near to 30% better.
VJ Regal OZ with factory tow package 265 904 ute brakes and 7 inch Charger rims
Dear god, that hood ornament is just scary.
I think that was only fitted in New Zealand….
There’s also some others South African Mopars oddities like their Charger, who’s a rebadged Duster/Demon and the Chrysler 383 who’s a rebadged fuselage Polara. https://www.flickr.com/photos/zacks_classic_cars/43880302201
http://cs.scaleautomag.com/sca/modeling_subjects/f/35/t/82669.aspx
Yes indeed Stephane, I only recently realized the 70’s Valiant Charger was a local standalone product in later years, I need to find one!! The Chrysler 383 was sold as a top end luxury model.
What a fantastic post to wake up to! Colourful cars in a colourful place.
Chrysler South Africa were very resourceful with the American, Canadian, and Australian Valiant parts bins and their own in-house engineering. These ’68 (top) and ’70 (bottom) Australian wagon bodies with U.S. front clips, for example:
Thanks Daniel! I’m waking up to the fact that the Valiant story has many more facets than I first imagined.. I need to do some reading up on the subject.
…and they put together 190-bhp versions of the 225 Slant-6 and installed them in longwindedly-named cars like the 1973 Chrysler Valiant Charger 190 Sports Coupé, a ’71 Demon with right-hand drive and controls and displays labelled in English and Afrikaans. They developed some mindbendingly interesting parts, such as this 4-barrel intake manifold which I understand was developed for police cars.
I can’t tell you if that is the same as the Australian part, but they did a 4-bbl version of the Valiant Pacer in Australia in 1969.
No 4bbl Slant-6 was offered by Chrysler Australia. The only Slant-6 Valiant Pacer model, the “VF” of 1969, had a Carter BBD 2-barrel carburetor.
That Dodge SE lacks the wheelbase stretch and smaller rear window of the top line Chrysler sedan and uses only the front and rear parts of the Chrysler by Chrysler.
So maybe a custom job, did the Dodge SE use the actual long wheelbase body ?
Hi Jonco, I’m convinced that the Dodge SE for SA didn’t use a long wheelbase body, that they just used the front and rear clips. Great observation. Makes sense because they weren’t selling that many and to tool up for a long wheelbase model would not have been cost effective.
The SA Dodge SE used the Chrysler by Chrysler front clip, those bits were just a bolt-on on any wheelbase but for the rear, it’s just the CbyC taillights which were used. The CbyC sedans actually used the rear-end of the long wheelbase hardtops, the CyCs, sedan and hardtop, were all on the long wheelbase.
Thanks Pikesta, hope they didn’t charge too much extra just for just the tinsel 😏
I always thought the VH was a handsome beast especially from rear 3/4 view, like your 3rd picture. Later versions not really improved appearance wise IMO.
For the NZ market, Todd’s did a similar variation on the South African Dodge SE theme. Their VJ Regal 770 (265 or 318), was on the 111″ wheelbase but used the VH front clip except the grill and headlights from the CH/CJ/CK. It may have been just a pragmatic raiding of the leftover parts-bin but, aesthetically, was probably the most pleasing of the VH/VJ/VK series. On the Australia VJs, the 770 trim level was restricted to the Charger so the NZ Regal 770s were unique.
What a nice surprise to wake up to, Pikesta! Looks like the fuselage Valiants get more love in SA than they do in their home country. Aside from the occasional car show, you hardly ever see them these days.
Pikesta, No Valiant Swart video?
Aah! This is great! Know his music, never seen this video. Two cultural icons..
In a barn, Cape Town.
Hi mate,I’m in Australia,and I’m really interested in your short-wheelbase Valiant charges, like this one that you have in the photo of the car in the barn. What model designation is that model of Charger known as in South Africa, because I hope to be traveling to South Africa soon,and I am after a car that closely models the Aussie vh-vk Valiant Charger. I am seriously interested in buying one. Any contact can be made on my email, which is pat.holmes29@gmail.com.
You have a unique position in the world of cars,with factory RHD in normally lhd cars, plus the Australia imports to you. It makes for a great marketplace,but I know what I want-a 76-78 Charger (vh-vk Coupe). Any help or guides would be much appreciated.. thanks guys.
That is not a Dodge SE. The SE do not have a solid crome bumper,
There were two Dodge SE models. The first one was as you’ve posted here, the second one had a loop bumper, and for the third SE model, they were badged Chrysler SE. It’s a bit hard to see on the photo, but there are Dodge badges on the grille and rear C pillar.