Ford - Ford Vedette
The Ford Vedette was made at Fords French factory based at Poissy, close to Paris, the Vedette using the small flathead V8 sidevalve Ford engine of 2518cc, which putting it in the Frech 13hp tax bracket.
The Ford Vedette was available from 1948 and listed until 1954, available with various 2 door and 4 door options, revised over the years. Ford had been looking at disposing of it's French arm, and this led to a purchase by Simca and taking over the factory with all rights to continue producing the Vedette. The new car was now called the Simca Vedette in France but still the Ford Vedette in other countries selling through Ford agencies for a few years. These Simca Vedettes were updated yearly and were in production to 1957, and later with rebranding and new bodies were in production at Poissy to 1961. The Vedettes were branded with names such as Marly, Beaulieu,Chambord, Presidence.
Tyre size for the Ford Vedette was the millimetric 165R400 throughout it's earlier production, a tyre size which Blockley produces an excellent good speed rated example of - see full details of this tyre at the link below. From 1957 onward all the Simca Vedette models were fitted with "165x380" which was the French way of saying 165R15, and Blockley produces this high quality 165VR15 tyre - see full details at the link below:
The only exception to the above two tyre sizes was the single Vedette Comete model by Ford in 1954 and Simca in 1955 which was listed with 6/40x15 tyres, the equivalent of which is the radial 185VR15 size that Blockley produces - see details below:
