This original 1948 Ford Marmon-Herrington Super Deluxe 4×4 Station Wagon was almost certainly one of the world’s first luxury 4×4 SUVs, it was constructed by Marmon-Herrington using a factory-fresh Ford station wagon, with production starting all the way back in 1937 – two years before the outbreak of WW2. The Second World War was responsible for…
The Snow Cruiser – Antarctica’s Abandoned Behemoth is a short documentary that gives a concise history of one of the most unusual land-based vehicles ever built. The film uses a combination of archive video footage and still images to tell the story of the Snow Cruiser, it’s a remarkable tale of ambition and engineering that…
The Toyota Land Cruiser J60 series was one of the most important iterations in the history of the globally renowned Japanese 4×4. In a way, this was the moment the modern Land Cruiser appeared, with luxury amenities like power windows, dual air conditioning, front and rear heaters, and an upgraded interior more aligned with Range…
This is the Rallye Edition of the International Harvester Scout II Pickup, with its distinctive red and white paintwork including the “rallye” logo emblazoned on each front fender. The Scout’s popularity has been skyrocketing in recent years along with the popularity of vintage Broncos, Jeeps, Land Rovers, Range Rovers, and Land Cruisers. Even though over…
This Toyota FJ45 Land Cruiser Pickup has been through a comprehensive restoration to factory-fresh condition, just as it would have looked rolling off the boat from Japan in 1983. The FJ/BJ-series of Toyota Land Cruisers have been skyrocketing in value in recent years side-by-side with their vintage 4×4 counterparts from the United States and Britain,…
The story of the Africar is worthy of a Hollywood film, it involves millions of dollars, a Cambridge-educated engineering genius, a film crew, a global adventure, a wildly unusual automobile, and ultimately, a controversial prison sentence. Tony Howarth, and A Dream of a Car for Africa The Africar was the vision of Englishman Tony…
The Kaiser Jeep M715 is the military variant of the civilian Jeep Gladiator. By the mid-1960s it became clear that the current US Military 4×4 truck, the Dodge M37, needed to be replaced – rather than put out a tender to manufacturers for a new vehicle design, the military went looking for a current production…
First There Was the “Blitz Buggy” and a War to Win The beginning of the Jeep CJ dates back to the origin of the “Jeep” itself, a story that began on 11th July 1940 when the US Department of War sent out an urgent request for a manufacturer to design and build a prototype quarter…
This Land Rover Defender SOV (also known as the RSOV) was originally built as a prototype for the American Special Forces, specifically the US Army Rangers. The vehicle was one of three prototypes built and saw extensive military service, it’s also been demonstrated in the Middle East and at arms exhibitions, and it’s been featured…
The DUKW 6×6 Amphibious Utility Vehicle is typically just referred to as the “Duck” after its official name “DUKW” – a US Military code for its design: “D” means designed in 1942, “U” means utility, “K” means all-wheel drive, and “W” means dual-tandem rear axles. The DUKW 6×6 Amphibious Utility Vehicle The DUKW would become…
The Unimog 404 was the second major iteration of the legendary German off-roader named by taking the letters from three words – UNIversal MOtor Gerät, or “universal power unit” in German. In the years shortly after WWII many engineers at automakers around the world were seeking to build a vehicle that could function as both…
The Steyr-Daimler-Puch Pinzgauer is renowned as one of the toughest and most capable off-road vehicles of its time, particularly among the military service members who used them extensively on deployment. The Steyr-Daimler-Puch Pinzgauer Engineers at Steyr-Daimler-Puch developed the Pinzgauer in the late 1960s as the off-road military transport solution for the future. They left almost no…
