Perhaps unsurprisingly, this Commer FC van caused a nearly neck-breaking doubletake driving through Seattle. How many of these could possibly live outside the UK? And since the first sighting weeks ago, it has been taunting me, never around when I had my camera handy. That is, until yesterday …
The FC was a lovely stone soup of Rootes group bits, perhaps most distinctively the narrow track front and rear that betray its Humber-derived suspension. It was powered by your choice of three sub-2-liter Hillman lumps, and was most famous for its use with the British Post Office. And it sort of looks like a British fever-dream of a VW Type 2. The owner was nowhere in sight, so based on some crude forensic work, I determined that at one point – perhaps several thousand years ago – this particular example was a camper conversion. It had a strange, tiny pop-top roof element that surely is leakier than an exploded oil well in the Gulf of Mexico, and a variety of dilapidated cabinets inside. But unless the owner has some sort of scam to accumulate AAA towing miles, it has to drive, based on how often it was absent from its parking spot. Could it be a daily driver? For our sake as a nation, I surely hope so. Just imagine the terrible oaths you’d mint if you relied on this Commer to get you to work in the morning! This guy must be a genius with a multimeter.
It had a 2006 SOVREN pit pass in the window – leading me to conclude that it would be the best possible support vehicle ever conceived for a nasty little Imp racer, wot?
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