RA Land Rovers go behind the Iron Curtain

Last week my two ex Royal Artillery Land Rovers did a cheeky little 1000 mile road trip from Cambridge to their new home in Prague. I thought I should share a couple of pictures. It was not an uneventful trip but both wagons made it the full distance under their own steam. You can do it in a Land Rover

The runners and riders. 43GF59, 1975 1/2 ton FFR ex 100 Regt RA(V) driven by my chum Gary, an American ex-GI who has never before driven on the left side of the car or the right side of the road. 61KB78, 1983 109' FFR ex RSA Larkhill with a very believable 27k on the clock, driven by your correspondent.

Both these vehicles are new acquisitions for me and I only had a couple of days to prepare and do some shake-out trips to see what was what. One of many issues was the passenger door latch not lining up on the 1/2 ton which was in part due to a bent door hinge. I fixed it quite handsomely with the tool, door-hinge, fine-adjusting, pictured here.

It was something of a leap of faith, departing at 6 am on the Thursday. Problems, we had a few...

My wagon had the only working petrol gauge which was only connected to one tank. My water temperature gauge read the bottom of the red when at normal temperature and the wire had broken off the sender for the Oil Temp gauge. I also established early on that my ignition timing was a bit too advanced and it was pinking at 50 mph on the flat or anything above 30 up a hill. I would have happily adjusted it except that, of course, there is no micro adjuster on the FFR type distributor and the distributor has locked solid in its clamp (probably hasn't been moved in 30 years) therefore I had to get used to the fact that my max speed for the journey was 48 MPH.

A bit of light modification was needed during our overnight stop in Bruges, once I established that the splines on the forward prop shaft of my wagon were shot.

Whilst in Bruges, doing first parade maintenance at the start of day two I noticed that the connector had fallen off the Generator No.9 Mk-3 in the 1/2 ton. I was properly confused as to how something so substantial could just unscrew itself like that but it soon became apparent why. When I tried to put it back on I got about 4 threads down before it got very tight. I got a bit of oil off the dip-stick and that did the trick to get it to screw all the way down. Apparently whoever had last attached the plug had got to 4 threads down and just given up, hence it was able to rattle itself free during day one. Soon after we departed I got some bad news over the radio when Gary reported the cabin filing with smoke. When we pulled over we found battery acid dripping from the drain hole in the battery tray and the batteries simmering at a high heat. Knowing how much I don't yet know of the FFR generating system I figured the best course of action was to press on and do the Top Gear-Special trick of using the other vehicle to charge the batteries and regularly swap them. Here is just one of the 6 battery changes. I was getting pretty slick at it by the end.

Plan A was to get to Leipzig by close of day two but our various problems at the start of the day meant we only got as far as Kassel. Therefore, fairly early on day three we turned off the 7 and onto the 38 just East of Kassel and rolled over the Warsaw pact boarder (into enemy territory).

Other moments of interest included the closed tunnel on the Autobahn. The Germans automatically pull over to the sides of the road in a jam so that the emergency vehicles can get down the middle. Why don't all countries do that?

Long story short we made it home at 6 pm on day 3. Once we'd got used to the restrictions of our respective vehicles we all settled down and day 3 went very well.

Now they are here in Prague I can look forward to setting about them properly but first, a few days rest for both vehicles and drivers.

What an adventure, Good luck with them

I also established early on that my ignition timing was a bit too advanced and it was pinking at 50 mph on the flat or anything above 30 up a hill. I would have happily adjusted it except that, of course, there is no micro adjuster on the FFR type distributor and the distributor has locked solid in its clamp (probably hasn't been moved in 30 years) therefore I had to get used to the fact that my max speed for the journey was 48 MPH.

Interestingly (or not depending on your point of view ) - my '74 109" FFR has a top speed of 50 mph flat out with the timing correctly set and running a Zenith carb. Although at anything over 40 it starts throwing coolant out of the overflow!

Interestingly (or not depending on your point of view ) - my '74 109" FFR has a top speed of 50 mph flat out with the timing correctly set and running a Zenith carb. Although at anything over 40 it starts throwing coolant out of the overflow!

You can get over 70mph in a Series 3 with the 2.6 6 cyl engine. Done some long journeys with an ex-army one. Not in UK I hasten to add.

You can get over 70mph in a Series 3 with the 2.6 6 cyl engine. Done some long journeys with an ex-army one. Not in UK I hasten to add.

Mine is the trusty old 2.25 4 cyl lump Richard - and 3 bearing at that!!

You can get over 70mph in a Series 3 with the 2.6 6 cyl engine. Done some long journeys with an ex-army one. Not in UK I hasten to add.

With or without ear defenders? :cool2:

Andy

With or without ear defenders? :cool2:

 

Andy

Never wear ear defenders, you cannot pick up those tell tale noises of problems arising.

We just took the misses ex military 109, thats now been converted to a Tdi and camper (and eye catching paint job) to Czech and back for the Birmabright Land Rover doo, stopped of for lunch in Prague as well! might see then at next years Birmabright event then :-)