The record
The Australian Army's Series 2A ¾-ton ambulance — Truck, Ambulance, ¾ ton, the 'Bloodbox' — was a Rover chassis with a tall four-berth body built locally; the Australian War Memorial's example was bought on charge in 1963 and the type officially entered service in 1965, with a winch-equipped version following in 1967 and 82 on charge by 1968. They served with the field ambulances in South Vietnam (2 Field Ambulance ran them at Vung Tau) and stayed in use from the mid-1960s to the late 1980s.
As later ambulances arrived, some of the ambulance bodies were repurposed: REMLR records ambulance-bodied vehicles reworked as Emergency Repair Vehicles, the enclosed body carrying a fitter's tools and spares to a broken-down vehicle in the field rather than casualties. The example in REMLR's Ambulance-ERV gallery has lost its crosses and Army ambulance markings under a plain, faded grey-green repaint, carries a later Series III front with the headlamps out in the wings behind a heavy tubular bull bar with a winch, and has a locker let into the body side.
The registry model takes the Bloodbox body, drops its crosses, roundels and roof beacon, adds the Series III front, bull bar, winch and locker, and leaves the bonnet bare as photographed. The ERV conversion is documented only by REMLR, whose pages now sit behind a bot check; the number converted is not recorded.
