launch it in October 1939 at the Paris Motor Show . By the time the event was cancelled it appears that about five Compound B67s had been produced in the Amilcar section of the Hotchkiss factory. Wartime adaptation Wartime records may not be complete, but it is apparent that the car's front wheel drive layout made it particularly suitable for adaptation to different body types. Between the summer of 1942 and spring 1943 Hotchkiss was able to produce 149 Compound based estate cars, of which 50 were delivered to the postal service, 50 found civilian customers, and 49 were delivered to the French Red Cross who adapted them for use as ambulances. The 149 estate cars delivered between 1942 and 1943 all used the smaller older engine and other mechanical elements from the B38. However, a small number of B67 engined Compounds were also produced during the war years. These featured a simplified but more robust three speed gear box in place of the four speed unit that had come with the B38 Compound, along with a suitably strengthened clutch. The manufacturer also produced a few B67 engines that were shipped to Laffly who installed them in some prototypes for their V10R all-terrain vehicle. After the war, as it became clear that the government would block the company's plans to resume Compound production, the remaining stock of B67 engines was sold, along with the tooling necessary for their production, to Imperia who used them for a production run of about 1,000 of their own front wheel drive TA8 models. Bodywork The Compound B38 made extensive use of , an aluminium alloy, to make castings that were assembled into a frame onto which steel sheet metal pressings were bolted and welded. In this respect the car played a pioneering role in light metal technologies that would be taken on by the automotive and airplane industries, although the rising cost of aluminium would reduce its attractions as a mainstream element in car bodies in the later 1950s. Between 1938 and 1940 it seems that almost all Compounds came with saloon/sedan bodies, although there was also mention of a cabriolet. Drawings came to light in 1946 for a four-door “woody” style estate version with a lengthened chassis, thought to have been penned in 1937 by Clément Vinciguerra, who at that time was in charge of the company's design and development department. A prototype