A gathering of not so recent vehicles from all points of the compass. That’s the best way to describe the collection I see when I walk by said yard, situated in the center. Most of them are actually parked right at the curb, just asking to be captured in a picture. Alright then.
The first one is the 1998 Chevy Van Starcraft above, powered by a 6.5 liter V8 diesel engine.
An overview. From left to right a 1996 Peugeot Boxer 270C 2.0 gasoline, a 2006 Mazda 6 wagon 2.0 turbo diesel, a 1995 Jaguar Sovereign 3.2 (gasoline -needless to mention-) and a 1998 Volvo V40 2.0 gasoline. As an aside, back then the Peugeot Boxer was already the same van as the Fiat Ducato.
The small red car is a 1995 Peugeot 106 Accent 1.1 gasoline. The truck is a 1991 Volvo FL608, still going strong. Under its tiltcab a 170 hp 6 liter diesel engine.
Here’s the Jaguar (X300-series of the XJ) with its purring inline-6 engine. Grace, Pace and Space.
And the Dutch built first generation Volvo V40.
No plate, so I can’t check its details. But of course there’s a Volvo 200 series-adept out there who can exactly tell us what we are looking at.
Finally, a bit further in the background, a 1997 Chevrolet Express 1500; its V8 is running on LPG.
Very pretty buildings .
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-Nate
Well done, Nate! If you can’t say anything nice about the cars, find something that you can compliment. That’s exactly the advice my mom gave me about the date with Betty-Lou Hassenpeffer that my nosy aunt Sue arranged for me.
Hasenpfeffer ?
The ’97 (I’ll take your word for it) van in the last picture looks totally right to me. But the grill on the ’98 in the lead picture, looks unusual. Was that offered in the US market? Or was it one year only, so it never got baked into my visual memory? Chevy and GMC vans were never quite as popular in my area as Fords, yet they’re still daily sights, at least in commercial guise, but there’s something about that grill …
The first date of registration of both vans is in the Netherlands, which means they were imported as new vehicles into my country.
The one in the lead picture in June 1998, and the van in the last picture in July 1997.
The grill in the first picture is from the cheaper version, known here in the US as the “WT” or “Work Truck” version and the one in the last pic is from the upper trim levels, or a “WT” with “Appearance Package” Typically a chrome bumper comes with the upgraded grill and composite headlamps, and a painted bumper comes with the cheap grill/sealed beam headlamps. At least here in the US…
The ‘Work Truck’ grille is used for the export version since it’s cheaper to use the standard H4 headlamp capsules. The sale is too tiny to amortise the cost of redesigning the composite headlamps to meet ECE regulations…
Also worth mentioning that the W/T grille was originally a much darker shade of grey, before years of sunshine took their toll. It wouldn’t look quite so dorky when new.
Great photos – nice to see a first generation Volvo V40 jointly produced at the Nedcar facility with the Mitsubishi Carisma – another one of Volvo’s many short-term joint ventures.
I’m sure you would know better than I but I believe that was the old DAF factory.
That’s correct, the plant started as a new production facility for the DAF cars. It’s now called VDL-Nedcar and MINIs roll off the production line.
Website: http://www.vdlnedcar.nl/?language=3
I will check out that Mazda 6 wagon. In the US it was only sold with the 6 cylinder engine. unfortunately so. My preference would be the wagon with 4 cylinder and manual transmission.
And that’s how they were sold in Europe. 6 cylinder Japanese cars could be a hard, if not impossible sell here.
Why did I ever leave!
In that size / segment ? Only the Lexus IS200 and later IS250, I guess. And I remember the Toyota Camry and Nissan Maxima with a 6-cylinder engine, but those cars were bigger.
And they never sold that well. They stopped offering those for a reason.
That Chevrolet Starcraft van reminds me of the one I saw in Vienna last fall.
Note those were not offered by GM but by specialist dealers. Here’s another one.
As far as I know US vans and pickups have never been officially imported into any Euro-country, with the exception of the minivans – read MPVs. All of them grey imports.
That’s a lot of Chevy vans. We don’t often see those like the one up front with the cheapie grille and the sealed beams.
I’m befuddled by the whole notion of conversion vans being exported to Europe. I think of conversion vans as being a Midwestern thing, mainly OH, IN, IL and MO, much less common on the coasts and in the south.
There used to be a huge GMC dealership in STL called Behlmann, that sold oodles of conversion vans. That place had hundreds of the silly things on hand. I think it’s called Gateway Buick GMC now, and has a lot full of SUVs.
I have a conversion van I would happily sell to somebody in Europe. My hope is to bring happiness to those who seek it.
Behlmann had still been dabbling with these vans a few years ago but they were camped out back.
Fullerton Dodge sold a lot of their own conversion vans in So Cal for awhile, thanks to an endless stream of low budget television infomercials. The demise of Dodge vans eliminated that niche, and the 2008 recession killed the dealership off for good.
Conversion vans were very popular in Sweden for a while in the late 80’s, early 90’s. With all the high taxes, there will always be people keen on vehicles that gets through the loopholes. I don’t remember the details exactly, but a lot of self employed people bought conversion vans, like contractors and accountants or real estate agents or whatever.
I think it had something to do with the value added tax, and something with a threshold of gross weight, only applicable to vehicles weighting more than cars but less than “real” trucks. IE the only vechicles that fit the bill was American trucks and vans. And the loophole made them being able to shave off 25% of the cost. The loophole was erased after some years, with the weight threshold raised to above what vans weighted, so it was just a fad during a short period of five years or so.
The point was, for the price of a regular car, they could drive around in a nicely fitted van. And in those days, American vans weren’t really used as private transportation in Europe, unless it was a nicely fitted conversion van with captains chairs and whatnot. It was a certain kind of style that appealed to a certain kind of clientele, mainly self employed people with above average disposable income and a keen interest in American cars. It was just a nice way for them to drive around in something interesting for a change, and being able to deduct the cost on the firm at the same time.
Also, in Sweden we never got the Work Truck front, almost all the vans was excklusively the high end versions. Probably because the difference between them was minimal compared to the cost of importing them in the first place. For a small difference, you could get the fully loaded version, so why even bother with the low end?
Wouldn’t the high fuel consumption of these US vans be an issue in Sweden?
No Studebakers?
A friend bought a V40 Volvo wagon a couple of years back paid 2k its been nothing but trouble which was a surprise, the steering column siezed and had to be replaced and the front suspension was clanking loudly last time I saw it, shes now parked it and has a Toyota instead a Fielder wagon, thats Corolla to you.
Didn’t Mitsubishi have a hand in these Dutch-built Volvos?
The first gen Volvo S40 and V40 was built on the same platform as the contemporary Mitsubishi Carisma. Both cars were introduced in 1995 and were built at the Dutch Nedcar plant. Back then a Volvo-Mitsubishi joint venture.
The VDL (Van der Leegte) Group now owns the plant.
There are some Europeans who love Detroit iron – everything American is considered cool, especially big vehicles with V8 engines. A fullsize van fits that bill perfectly.
Conversion vans are a niche that isn’t adequately filled in Europe – there have been equivalents but not direct ones. When the exchange rate is favourable they look like bargains and if you aren’t using it as a daily driver then fuel consumption isn’t such a nightmare. (fuel is currently “cheap” here at around $6 per US gallon)
Big American RVs are not as rare as you might think either, for similar reasons, even in the UK, with the steering wheel on the wrong side.
“American wannabe” Europeans (or Brits anyway) are more likely to have a Mustang, Camaro, Hummer, or old broughamy thing than a conversion van.
Edited to say I think if the UK was LHD we’d see a lot more American cars just because of the “bang for your buck” factor, and you can import anything you like here.
I’ll have the Jaguar (and Nigel the mechanic on speed dial).