FE-FC Holden Discussion Forum

Hi people,
I have purchased a FE Ambulance from New Zealand and are looking for some help with the research of its history. It was restored in Ashburton near Christchurch where it was rescued from a paddock.
From earlier posts here I gather the body was modified by Smallbones Brothers in Ashburton in 1958.
It does have a Victorian registration label from 1988 on the quarter vent window but unfortunately due to the condition of the sticker I was unable to read the label clearly. It makes me wonder if it was an Aussie ambulance at some stage.
It should be arriving in Australia by the start of December.... what a great Christmas present. ;D
Any help will be appreciated.
There is more photos of the ambulance plus other vehicles I own at:
http://gallery.oldholden.com/hr-hearse/

Cheers
Paul

(http://i580.photobucket.com/albums/ss248/hr-hearse/NZOct09083.jpg)

I worked out how to add a photo to this forum. I probably should have done this before I did my original post  ???

Cheers
Paul

Welcome to the forum Paul - I like your unique choice of cars!  ;D

You may want to catch up with Zulu - he's currently restoring an ambulance - I'm sure he'll be very interested in your latest acquisition. http://fefcholden.org.au/forum/index.php/topic,13824.0.html

Nice score Paul. I've seen a picture of this car on the internet before. Its good to see it coming 'home'.

When I was over in Auckland I saw an FE/FC police car as well. It was at some sort of museum just out of the city? Do you know anything about that one?

Just saw your pictures.

Gary is going to love seeing this car. Check out the jump seat. They've even moved the ashtray - very handy so you can have a smoke while you're taking to patient to hospital  :o

(http://gallery.oldholden.com/d/344412-2/NZ+Oct+09113.JPG)

Hi Paul, great to see another Ambo! and an FE at that.
Thanks for posting the pics also, looks like a great find, I look forward to seeing it at some stage

As Craig A & NosFEratu have mentioned, I am currently restoring an FC Ambo, your pics may assist me with my resto as the lower section of the rear attendants seat is missing on mine, also, it's handy to see the siren bracket / stay, as all I had there were 2 holes in the lower skirt where it had been

Regards, Gary

Curiosity says how many bananas?


 8)

Thanks for the praise Craig. I cant help you out with the FE/FC Police car. Wish I had known about it before I went to check out the ambulance and I would have tried to track it down. Oh well least it gives me an excuse to head back over the ditch.
Cheeers
Paul

Hi Gary,
If you require any detailed photos of mine to assist with your restoration drop me a line.
hr-hearse@oldholden.com
Look forward to a photo shoot with both of the ambo's some time in the future.

Cheers
Paul

Paul, I remember when this car was being restored as I had a 3 door FE van that I was restoring at the same time. I have many articles on FE ambulances from GMH. There appears to have been quite a lot made particularly for rural hospitals rather than metro ones.
I would estimate that more than 50 would have been made but after duty was finished most ended up as tradesman's vehicles and were worn out and scrapped - very few survive. Only yours and Zulus to my knowledge. It would be extremely difficult to trace where the car came from without a paper trail since it literally could have come from dozens of hospitals up the east coast of Australia.

Ken

Hi FE Ambo. Welsome to the site.  Damn another site you can now get views in your shed up.  It was only a matter of time.  I think its game over from now on. YOU WIN

http://gallery.oldholden.com/hrpremier/

Hey Paul.
Nice to see another FE/FC ambo survived.
Looking forward to getting an eye full of this beauty in person.
Congrats on the score.
Regards
Alex

Hi Paul,

Nice FE ambulance, as all others have said, good to see it survived, Congratulations on your purchase.
I too look forward to seeing it in the flesh someday

Keith

The ambulance has arrived in Australia and I pick it up later this week  ;D

After reading Zulu's and Cajerridoc's posts on vannettes and sedanette I now wonder if the ambulance might be either of these or a three door station wagon?  :-\

Cheers
Paul

Paul,

The vehicle ID tag will give you an indictaion of the true origin of the vehicle. If it is an FE 2104 it was originally a panel van and has been converted, if it was either an FE 219 or 229 then it began life as a wagon.

Looking at the abscence of chrome trim I would suggest that this originally began life as a panel van.

Keith

Keith is probably correct Paul, a bodyworks establishment more than likley converted it to an Ambulance from a Panelvan

Thats what happened in the case of our Ambulance, an FC 2104 Panelvan was ordered by the Boonah (Queensland) Ambulance Transport Brigade from Faulkner Motors in Ipswich & delivered to Hedges Bodyworks to be converted from new into an Ambo, ours has rear barn doors & a rear door added, only our rear door is on the drivers side

(http://s4.postimage.org/10dtw0.jpg) ($2)


(http://s2.postimage.org/1T810S.jpg) ($2)

Good luck with yours Paul, it looks like a very unique vehicle, an FE Panelvan is scarce enough, let alone it being an Ambulance!

I like many others here look forward to some more pics once you have it back home

The ambulance is now home safe and sound tucked up in the shed.   ;D

The body identification tag number FE 7-36603 s
Trim Number is blank
Paint Number is blank but I believe its Glacier White as there was a tin of touch up paint in the glove box.
 :o


I am now starting to believe that it may have always been in New Zealand as I found an old number plate AI 6900 under the carpet. On the back someone has written "original black plate FE VAN"
The Victorian registration label that was on it has been mucked about with sections cut out of it. The only thing I can think of is someone from New Zealand thought it would be cool to have a Vic registration label on it as its an Aussie car.
I will post some photos in the members car section over the next few days.

Cheers
Paul

Congrats on getting the ambo home safe and sound.
Looking forward to the pics, and even more so to see it in person some day.
Regards
Alex

Well done on getting the car home Paul.

That AI 6900 plate, if it is black paint on heavy aluminium base would be from at least 1964 or 1965.  Prior to that NZ used steel plates which were colour coded and replaced every 5 years.  The car would have been about 7 or 8 years old when it received these plates.  Not inconceivable that Australian states replaced their ambulances after this amount of time.  What year is the Vic registration label?

... alternatively, the car could have been registered from new in NZ and the AI plate would have been the second or third plate fitted to the vehicle depending on first year of registration.

And thirdly, were ambulances required to be registered in NZ?  If not, maybe it was used from new in NZ as an ambulance and then pensioned off to a private owner at which point your AI plates were fitted. 

Probably only made it MORE confusing, not less.  ??? ;D

The tag does not seem right for a NZ made car. If it was made in NZ, the tag would read FE-2104-XXXX-NZ, the trim no and paint no would be blank.
If the van had a new shell, the plate would have the part no followed by a 2 or 3 digit number.

The number 7 36603-S looks like a chassis number from the Sydney plant. A check to see if there is a chassis number on the van would confirm if it is the same.
It is strange that it has FE in front of the number.
A photo of the ID plate would be good

Ken

(http://i580.photobucket.com/albums/ss248/hr-hearse/PICT0027.jpg)
The body number hasnt been stamped in the inner guard, but I am told this was a common practice for cars assembled in New Zealand.

The AI 6900 number plates are heavy aluminium with black paint.
The Victorian registration label was from 1988.

Still placing all the pieces of the jigsaw together.  ???

Cheers
Paul

The plate is genuine New Zealand and indicates that the van was assembled there. You can just see the "NZ" after the S.
I've been trying to come up with some logic for this.
Maybe the van was built in Sydney as a complete standard van and then sent to the New Zealand Holden assembly plant where it was fitted out as an ambulance and the original body plate was removed and replaced with this one. I think the NZ plant only routinely assembled sedans during the FE model run

The old trim and paint codes would have been wrong since the van was retrimmed and repainted. So the easiest thing to do was replace the tag and stamp the new one with the original Sydney number - This is only a theory :P :P

That tag bears quite careful examination.  It appears to have another number stamped underneath the 'FE 7-36603S NZ'.  The dash (or hyphen) is a '1' on its side too.

From teh photograph, I reckon that I can see the following overstamped numerals:
unknown under the F and E;
hyphen or dash under the first 3;
8(?) under the first 6;
maybe 5 or 7 under the second 6;
9 under the 0;
4 under the S.

Trim and paint codes may be discernable with good lighting and a magnifying glass.

Cheers

Brett

The tag has also been previously removed/replaced as the rivets are not genuine.
Brett-f

By george you're right Brett, The plate has been over stamped.
If the plate belongs to the van from original, it should read FE - 2104 - XXX - NZ
In this case the XXX could be 879 and you can just see the 2 at the start of the 7 but you can't see what's after that.
I'm pretty sure that FE is stamped underneath the FE at the start.


It needs some very close examination to see what is there.
Ken

Just my guess, but I think that when it was rego'd over there they would not have been happy with the difference between the subframe and the shell so the subframe number won out in the end.

I had a similar discussion when I went to re register my van 8 years ago.

Jason.

That sounds plausible Jason, so that would give Paul both his chassis & body nos if he can decipher the body number from the overstamped no

lol not having much luck Paul ... poor bugga

Before they restamped they had ago at flattening out the old numbers, checkout the bottom of the word "identification" & "trim No" the letters are missing from a bit of panel beating.