The Saint: Des Hocking’s 1965 Volvo

By Nicole Thomson

Dec 15, 2021

The classic cars of television are something that many enthusiasts like to talk about, but Des Hocking isn’t just talking about them.

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Mr Hocking is the proud owner of a restored 1965 Volvo 1800S — the same car that Roger Moore drove for six series of The Saint in the 1960s.

“It used to be on a TV series called The Saint, Simon Templar used to drive it,’’ Mr Hocking said.

“So I’ve had some things made up for the side with the Saint icon on them.”

Currently, it’s not known how many of this particular car exist in Australia.

“There’s not too many of them about,” Mr Hocking said.

“They made 30,000 of them in Sweden, and most of them went to America, and the others went to Europe and England.

“We might have a couple of hundred out here.

“They stopped making them in 1970 because the American market wanted big bumper rails put on their cars, so it’s made these rarer.

“I’d been looking for many years, and it got to the stage where I had to buy it now or never, because they’ve jumped up in price a bit now.”

The restoration work that Mr Hocking completed on the car has been a long process; the car was not in such a good condition when he purchased it.

“I saw it on one of the internet posts in Jervis Bay, so my mate and I went over and picked it up,” he said.

“I did most of the restoring, and a friend of mine did the paintwork on it.

“It was basically four wheels and a motor when I got it. It didn’t have windows in it, or seats, we had them all in a big box.

“When I got it back home, I said to (the painter) that we’d put a clear lacquer on it, and he started to rub it down and found that it only had one coat of paint on it, so we had to start again from scratch.

“I changed the steering wheel because the original one was too big, it used to sit on your lap as you were driving — the other one was two inches bigger.

“It’s a bit hard with no power steering, but once you get going you’re right.

“It took about 18 months to put it all together.”

The car isn’t exactly an everyday car, but Mr Hocking said he wanted to take it out more.

“I don’t drive it often enough, I get it out once a month if I can, but no airconditioning makes it hot to drive,’’ he said.

“I’ve had to make the side windows open to help it cool down; if you’re closed in, it gets really hot.

“We’ve been up to Sydney in it, and down to Phillip Island a few times.

“I went to Winton and have taken it around the Winton track, it was a Volvo anniversary, so all the Volvos went around the track.”