Skywagondriver - your quote "In the '60s just about every aero club in NZ had one as the 'cross country' machine." made me wonder who else apart from The Auckland Aero Club, had a C180 (ZK-BUF-refer to Sharpies post 25th Nov) I can't think of any other club that had one.
Did my own conversion to the C180 with Bruce Chapman in 1962 on BUF at Ardmore, somewhere around the time that Sharpie left to go to PNG.
Blackburn