Rootes Australia

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Rootes Australia
legal form branch
founding 1945
resolution 1965
Seat Port Melbourne (Victoria), Australia
Branch Automobile manufacturer

Rootes Australia was the Australian subsidiary of the Rootes Group , a British car manufacturer .

The company was founded right after World War II and initially imported and sold vehicles from the UK . In 1946 Rootes Australia began assembling the Hillman Minx in Port Melbourne ( Victoria ). This was the first British manufacture of automobiles in Australia. In 1954 the company had a share of 5.4% in the Australian automobile market and announced the establishment of further production lines. They bought 35 hectares of land in Harrisfield, near Dandenong, Victoria , but the planned plant was never built.

Hillman , Humber , and Singer models were assembled and successfully sold for a number of years, with the company also building automobiles made up of parts from all three brands. In the mid-1960s, however, the Rootes group in Australia, as in the United Kingdom, got into trouble due to falling sales and an increasingly outdated model range. In December 1965, Rootes Australia merged with Chrysler Australia Ltd. and the assembly facilities were gradually moved from Port Melbourne to Chrysler's Adelaide facility . Chrysler quickly phased out the Humber brand, but new Hillman Hunter and Arrow models were introduced. In 1973 Chrysler also gave up the production of the Hillman models.

Model range

Important models from Rootes Australia were:

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e The Macquarie Dictionary of Motoring. (1986), p. 413
  2. ^ A b c The Macquarie Dictionary of Motoring. (1986), p. 216
  3. ↑ Pedr David: Wheels Across Australia . (1987), p. 208
  4. ↑ Shaun Birney: A Nation on Wheels . (1987), p. 187
  5. ^ A b Shaun Birney: A Nation on Wheels . (1987). P. 188
  6. ^ A b The Macquarie Dictionary of Motoring. (1986). P. 226
  7. ↑ History of the Australian Humber (English) ( Memento of 30 April 2006 at the Internet Archive )
  8. ^ The Macquarie Dictionary of Motoring. (1986). P. 436