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Don't do this in your CVRW Fox


Deuceman

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Whilst Chris MacMillan and family are familiar with this picture, I thought you might appreciate seeing what I managed to do in my Fox on Exercise Keystone in Germany in 1986 whilst in the TA with A Sqdn Royal Yeomanry (Swindon).

 

It was my first Germany exercise and my commander was Shaun "Wol" Collins 1st Troop's Troop Sergeant. Wol was the best commander a rookie driver could want and had given me a friendly but firm baptism of fire as his driver earlier that year (supplying him with McVities chocolate biscuits from down below had been a good ice breaker though!). He had however been tipped in a Fox previously and had had a narrow escape, so was always drumming in to me about their high centre of gravity and the appropriate driving techniques to adopt.

 

On this occasion we were about 24hrs from ENDEX and patrolling in single file moving tactically from covered location to covered location one vehicle at a time. We were last vehicle in our troop and the others had raced across the field at this location. In line with Wol's advice I took it more gingerly than the others and all of a sudden forward movement became lateral movement in a rather disconcerting and unstoppable fashion! Wol shouted 'were going over Kirk' and we ended up as you can see, moving over in an almost slow motion fashion.

 

There were just the two of us aboard as we did not carry a radio operator on this Exercise and Wol is pictured in the helmet reporting in to 'Zero' that we required LAD assistance!!

 

Neither of us were injured, but the BV did lose all of it's hot water! That meant no hot drinks whilst we awaited the fifth cavalry (LAD).

 

This picture always makes me smile because the incident happened about half a mile outside of the town of Gehrden and that morning we had spent about two hours there during a stand down, stocking up on provisions from a grocers and washing and shaving whilst parked in the town centre.

 

We hadn't been there long before a few kids on bikes turned up and soon there were about six or seven of them with us, speaking pigeon English and looking at the vehicles. It was one of those occasions that stays with you, because one little girl who seemingly could speak no English, watched me getting my wash kit ready and tried to communicate something to me. I didn't have a clue what she was saying, but she ran off jabbering only to return a few minutes later with a brand new razor and some shaving soap!! Priceless and all the more amazing to me, because they couldn't have been strangers to British army exercises in that area.

 

One of her friends is the guy in the photo with his hands in the air, having just come over the hill with his mate to see 10 FD 73 lying on its side!

 

Needless to say we waited hours for the LAD in their Spartan! When they did turn up, they did a neutral turn on the ploughed field and shed both tracks before they'd even left the vehicle!!!

 

The REME permanent staff officer from our LAD detachment turned up and I have another great shot of him stood on the Fox and looking up to the heavens as of to say 'god help me'!! He was off to Hong Kong shortly after this exercise and you could see that in his eyes it couldn't come quick enough!!

 

Eventually a Scammell turned up and positioned itself up on the bank to the left of the track and pulled us back on to our wheels. In doing so it pulled the recovery chains down on both front and back wings such that we had to crow bar them off of the wheels to get moving. Having written off both of the right hand wings in the accident, we had quite a big job when we got the vehicle back to Swindon later that month.

 

Once righted, we checked the fluids and got back into the war, but 73 looked like a giant had used her for a roller skate. We didn't let it bother us though as we were "roughy tuffy TA warriors".

 

Later that month the Sqd CO Major Arkle came up to me at the drill hall and said "bad luck Trooper Stevens, it wasn't your fault", so I felt somewhat better after that!!

 

So, who has a Fox I can have a drive in?

49.jpg

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We used to carry out the repair work for C Sqn. Royal Yeo ( and HQ Sqn ) and after any of these annual exercises, we would have to deal with all the destruction that had taken place.........kept us very busy. I remember the first outings they had when Fox was introduced and I do not think there was one that did not want a new gearbox :(.

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What happened there then, looks like something gave the back end a nasty smack

 

 

Copied over from the Alvis forum..

 

This is what happened, as told by the man who was there

 

My accident. -- I was commanding the fox at the time, We was going down hill at about 25/30miles when my driver lifted off the gas and milliseconds later we was sliding sideways and as he tried to over correct the steering. By which time the front wheel went into a small ditch running along side the road, which cause the fox to turn over 360. Fortunately we all braced for impact and no one was injured apart from cuts and burses.

The biggest danger was the fuel. We had about 50 gallons left on board, when the fox turned over, all the fuel was pouring out creating a vapour cloud of about 20 metres high. To this day I am truly grateful to big G up there in the sky for not igniting the fuel

 

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In June 1976 15/19H were in Tidworth, back from Omagh and training in earnest in our new recce role. C Sqn were away in Cyprus. B Sqn were on Scorpion training to be Medium Recce. A Sqn were on Fox, training to be close Recce.

 

We (B Sqn) found ourselves on a day trip to visit the frigate, HMS Arrow, which had been twinned with the regiment. We came back to Tidworth in late afternoon where, standing in the cookhouse queue, we learned there had been a death in A Sqn.

 

There was a driver training area ("The Dustbowl") right outside the back gates of Aliwal Barracks, whence the Plain extended for many miles. An instructor was out with two trainee Fox drivers.

 

The dustbowl included all the most difficult features a military vehicle driver might encounter, including some unfeasibly steep slopes. One driver attempted this slope. As he neared the top he needed to change down. He smacked the GCP (Gear Change Pedal) to engage the preselected next-lower gear, but not hard enough and he suffered the dreaded false neutral.

 

Fox immediately started to roll back. It would have rolled out quite safely, so commander pressed pressel and told him over the IC, "Don't hit the brake."

 

Unfortunately, he spoke too quickly for the Larkspur IC to warm up and the driver heard, "Hit the brake." Which he did. This would have Fox stopped dead, but being on such a steep slope, it rolled over the back, end over end. Commander tried to get the other trainee driver (in the gunner's seat) to duck his head inside, but he tried to jump.

 

He didn't make it. Not pretty.

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  • 1 year later...

We had a fox roll over down a small ist hill in germany the commander and gunner were both out of the fox watching him as he went along the track at the side of the hill When the road gave way and the fox rolled side to side down about a 60foot drop. Came to rest on its wheels. lucky the drive braced fo impact but he did get some nasty burns for the hot water in the bv.

Reme tip up to one look at the fox. One of them jumped into the drivers pit fired it back up and drove it so far up the bank to make it easy to recover. It did make a mess of the fox lots of bent bits kit all over the place and a very bent gun barrel.

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  • 7 years later...
We had a fox roll over down a small ist hill in germany the commander and gunner were both out of the fox watching him as he went along the track at the side of the hill When the road gave way and the fox rolled side to side down about a 60foot drop. Came to rest on its wheels. lucky the drive braced fo impact but he did get some nasty burns for the hot water in the bv.

Reme tip up to one look at the fox. One of them jumped into the drivers pit fired it back up and drove it so far up the bank to make it easy to recover. It did make a mess of the fox lots of bent bits kit all over the place and a very bent gun barrel.

I thought I read all the posts on Fox's but just discovered this one! I am going to drive mine very carefully, pretending it's a cement truck and my beloved dog is jogging behind, tied to the bumper.

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