A while ago, I made a new rule: I wouldn’t photograph cars in undercover parking lots anymore. The photos never turned out all that great, rarely meeting my standards for Curbside Classic or for my Instagram. This beautiful, blue ’65 Chrysler Valiant wagon, however, defied all photographic odds.
This is an AP6-series Valiant. For the first few months of production, the AP6 Valiant wagon used the same rear pressings as the US/Canadian Plymouth Valiant wagon. Shortly thereafter, Chrysler Australia made some changes: vertical taillights, revised side windows, and new rear quarter panels and a new rear bumper, among other modifications.
For comparison’s sake, here’s a ’66 Valiant wagon. Personally, I think the original rear end looked better.
From 1963 until 1971, Valiant wagons used the Safari nameplate. The AP6-series Safari was available in regular Valiant and fancier Valiant Regal and Valiant V8 trims and with either the Slant Six or the 180-hp 273 cubic-inch V8. This was the first series of Aussie Valiant to have a V8 option, as well as the first to be available in ute form. The utes are hard to come by nowadays, well-maintained or restored wagons being the most common 60s Valiants on the roads. The metallic blue paint may or may not be stock as the AP6 series also heralded the introduction of metallic paint as an option.
Here’s another AP6-series Safari I spotted in the wild. The AP6-series was an evolution of the AP5, the first Valiant to be manufactured in Australia instead of just assembled. The AP5 also saw some meaningful differentiation from its US cousin, including a different trunk and rear window on the sedan.
The big three Aussies of the 1960s – the Holden, the Ford Falcon, and the Chrysler Valiant – were all handsome cars but the Valiant has a special kind of swagger. Remember, Americans and Canadians, that these were considered to be standard or full-size cars in Australia and not compacts. Chrysler did offer some larger vehicles like the Dodge Phoenix but the Valiant was their bread-and-butter. It also beat the Falcon to the punch in offering a V8, if only by a few months; Holden’s V8 option was still a couple of years off.
By the AP6, Virgil Exner’s excesses had been mostly toned down but there were still some creative flourishes. Kudos to Exner for designing a wagon that didn’t simply look like a sedan with a box on the back. Coupled with the glimmering paint of this example, the AP6 Valiant Safari is worth breaking a rule for.
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Looks like Chrysler had used the Safari nameplate a bit longer in South Africa like this 1975 model.
https://www.vintagemotors.co.za/product-page/1975-valiant-safari-by-chrysler
Nice, the wagons seemed to be rarer years ago, I had a AP6 sedan 225 3 on the tree it was an end of life $20 pile of rust but it ran just fine,
The V8 Valiants were the first Aussie car to have any actual performance in NZ and Valiants were a popular car, survivors are thin on the ground in all models now and sought after.
I still have my ultra rare ’77 Pontiac Astre FORMULA Safari (kammback) Station Wagon…
https://www.automobile-catalog.com/car/1977/2826680/pontiac_astre_formula_wagon_2_5-litre_5-speed.html
Were Vega Utes a real thing in Australia?
https://i.pinimg.com/1200x/a5/d5/58/a5d558462259aa1d389cd0f4c2daab0c.jpg
Vegas were never sold here in any form. Holden had their own line of Vauxhall-derived small cars.
Very interesting and a nice adaptation by Australia for this reliable daily transportation. Hmm.. Pontiac Safari in the 1950’s. Valian Safari in Australia in the 1960’s. GMC Safari minivan in the 1980’s in the U.S. Everyone wants to travel south. “Seefer” is the Hebrew word for “south” from which is derived the word for an African Safari. Israelites pre-Christian days would travel to Egypt, thus South. I studied Hebrew in college in my Neanderthal days. Arabic was not being taught, which I preferred.
Not to mention the Citroen DS wagon was marketed as the Safari in the ’60’/’70’s, as was the LWB Landrover with the Safari roof (a second roof about an inch above the main one for shade), as well as the Hillman Hunter Safari wagon of the late ’60’s.
It’s possible that everyone wanted to go hunting wild animals.
Great color! And at least in this case, it photographs well in the parking garage light.
I’m fascinated by the venetian blinds things in the rear windows. I seem to recall seeing such things way back in the actual 1960s, but I’ve certainly not seen any wagon with these in more modern times.
Reasonably common here back then, but they tended to vibrate at idle, rattle over bumps and collect dust.
No, no, they were DESIGNED to rattle, vibrate, buzz, clatter and shake. The dust collecting was a mistake. Hideous idea in a moving, breezy car.
Admittedly, they can look cool. But they bloody well aren’t!
Auntie Grace had a rear window venetian in her Morris 1500. The garage never got the E-series to idle smoothly. Imagine the noise!
I can’t really comment, I mean, I don’t know how voluble your Aunt was.
Some of my old Valiants used to vibrate, rattle over bumps, collect dust, clatter and shake, and I never even had venetians.
Such a beautiful wagon. I wish they still made Valiants today.
While on temporary military duty in Australia during the early ’80s, I had use of an Aussie Army Chrysler. Not a nice Valiant though. I think it was a rebadged Mitsubishi. Probably quite reliable – but not nearly as appealing as the older Valiant design.
Talk about “wow”!
By the time I was driving in the late 1980’s these Valiants and the following VC model had obtained the cool ride vibe shared with the XP Falcon and EH Holden, if you saw one it was invariably driven by a groovy hipster. However from the mid 70’s through the early 80’s Valiants were driven by a very different sub culture and as such were tagged as “wog chariots” having became the preferred ride of the children of post war immigrants, especially the later Charger model.
Older neighbor had a 66 with 273 v8,was quite fast for his beater car.
So nice to see a ‘real’ Valiant rather then the North American oddities. 🙂
Such common cars once. And this one is such a beautiful colour. Perfectly restored to sixties-spec, just as I remember them.
Older neighbor had a 66 with 273 v8,quite fast for a beater car.
I thought by 1965, the designs were by Engel, rather than Exner. . .
Engel was indeed at the helm of design at Chrysler starting in late ’61, but one can say the 1965 Valiant was an evolutionary version of the model’s 1963 redesign, done mostly under Exner’s guidance; even more so on the wagon, which got fewer updates than the rest of the model’s offerings.
Why do those taillights remind me of a Chevy of some kind?
Really nice looking car
Always have been good lookers. The full rear wheelarch and 14 inch wheels give a surprisingly large lift to the looks of the US original.
I rode in one a bit in the early to mid ’80’s, and it just felt miles ahead of the contemporary Holdens and Fords, even from ten years later (’70’s cars). Very decent seats, that famous slant six, and Torqueflite. How sweet.
As a teenager I bought this model for very little money and enjoyed hearing from older people saying they were rocket ships when new compared to what was on offer. It was defected but the slant 6 225cubic inch motor went into 3 successive valiant bodies before I lost track of it.
This is a beautiful long roof .
I hope there will be an in depth article on Valiant based Utes…..
-Nate
Until 1973, the Australian Valiant station wagons were Safari in the home market, New Zealand and for the small-scale exports to markets in the Asia-Pacific, after which they were “station wagons”, even Holden eventually adopting the term after generations of “station sedans”. In South Africa the Safari name was used to the end of the run in 1978. There was no V8 option and to meet the Apartheid-era government’s local content rules the old 225 slant six was fitted rather than the 245 & 265 “Hemis” used in Australia in the 1970s but to compensate Chrysler South Africa did offer the “Safari Premium” with the US-flavored appliqué glued to the sides, something not seen in other places. Somewhat opportunistically, the advertising copy referred to the “Chrysler Charger engine” but technically that was correct, the 225 being for years on the Dodge Charger’s option list and in South Africa Safaris used a two-barrel caburetor version rated at 160 horsepower rather than the usual 145 so the wagons were more powerful than the few US coupes with the slant-six.
In the UK, the Australian Safaris & Station Wagons were always described with the familiar “Estate”. In 1966, UK prices for the colonial imports ranged between Stg£1795-Stg£2545 and when Motor Magazine in 1966 tested a six-cylinder estate it was noted the Stg£1945 charged was about the same of that for a Jaguar 420, the two otherwise having little in common except fuel consumption. The appearance of a machine like the Valiant (with engines as large as the 360 V8) in the UK market probably seems curious given that although a “compact” in US terms, it was, by European standards, unfashionably large but Chrysler, having in 1967 ceased production of the antiquated Humber Super Snipes upon their absorption of the Rootes Group, wanted to plug the gap in their range. Even by 1967 that gap probably no longer existed and demand, never high, dwindled sharply after 1973, a consequence of (1) the first oil shock and (2) the UK joining the EEC (European Economic Community) which meant the end of the Commonwealth preference scheme, a low tariff regime which was the last relic of the chimera of imperial free trade. Still, although promotion was only ever half-hearted, the Australian Chryslers could be ordered until 1976. Ford Australia too flirted with the UK market, arriving also in the mid 1960s but found little more success in convincing the British their six and eight cylinder Falcons, Fairlanes & LTDs made sense on UK roads, the last sold in 1984 after several dismal years.
Off and on, the industry has often used “Safari” and a memorable one was the twin rear bucket seats option for the early-build Mercedes-Benz W111 & W112 coupés & cabriolets. While not uncommon in the early days of the industry, separate seats in a car’s rear compartment had, by the time the W111 coupé was first displayed at the opening of the Daimler Benz Museum in Stuttgart in February 1961, become rare and but for a few one-offs by coach-builders, the option was unique. The factory called them “safari seats”, the source of that being a special metal frame which allowed them to be removed and placed on the ground outside, the implication presumably this would be handy for those on safari who wished to sit under a shady tree and watch the zebras. Whether many of these machines were taken on safari isn’t known but the concept was transferrable to those going on picnics or watching the polo. On both sides of the Atlantic, the fitting of individual rear-seats caught on for some high-end models but other than in some utility vehicles intended mostly for off-road use, no manufacturer made them removable although in the 1966 Dodge Charger they could be folded to create additional storage space.
I can’t speak for the other countries, but in Australia, the Safari badge was dropped with the introduction of the VH range.
The wagons were badged the same as sedans, base Valiant, Ranger, Ranger XL, Regal etc.
I love the look of the Safari Premium.
AP6 debuted metallic paint for Valiant in Oz and I do remember AP6 Regals and V8s in a similar blue. However I think base (non Regal) Valiants like this featured Safari weren’t available in metallic paint.
For trivia the preceding AP5 Safari model also saw two types of wagon tail lights; initially the low set US-style horizontal wrap-around, then this later vertical design.
47 years ago I bought a really tidy AP6 Regal Safari in light tan, for about $80 iirc. Unfortunately the Slant had seen better days, so I had the cylinder head record, ported & polished etc by Canberra’s well known reconditioners, Head Mod, who’s catchy advertising slogan was “The best head job in town!”.
This cost $115 fitted – ie more than the car was worth, lol – but wow their magic made a huge difference, to both performance and economy. Valiant speedos were always impressively accurate and I recall seeing 28 IMPG (highway, uncorrected) on a 225 Torqueflite!
Btw for Val afficondos; again in Canberra but much later (circa 1995) I found a superb one-owner 1975 VJ Ranger fuselage wagon in that sharp ‘tomato’ red. The elderly Austrian seller had special ordered it with the 265 Hemi plus ultra rare 4-speed (!) and sports wheels, tacho dash. In all my days I’ve never seen another OE 4-speed Valiant wagon. He’d eventually added extractors (headers) and thermo fan, it was his cosseted low-km pride and joy and went like the proverbial. I paid $2,800 and just why I chose to resell it (whilst retaining my Leyland P76 Executive) remains a mystery to this day?
(Brochure photo of red VJ wagon, among other treasures)