marvinthemartian

Lastly, I have been busy helping to strip and repair a Matador, converted to breakdown wagon, and suffered an accident several years ago. Just a few views of current progress. Bit of a sorry state. Undercover and starting to remove panels. OS nearly naked. From the back end. I don't know how long this will take to put back on the road, as there is an awful lot to do to the old girl.

I have also been beavering away in the shed stripping and repairing an indicator control box which was in pretty poor condition. Needed a bit of welding and infills on the box itself, and the plastic? panels were fine wet sanded to remove many years of gunge, and polished up with T cut. Quite a few new parts are being used, warning lamp, indicator switch, wiring and terminal connectors, and flasher unit too. Before. Repairs. New parts. Nearly there. Just waiting to get some short screws to finish off.

Having finally seen a bit of sunshine this week, I have got a bit more DBG used up. Got a few more items painted, and left out for a day to dry off. Hydraulic fluid tank an brackets, accumulators and other odd brackets and bits got covered. Tank & brackets. Accumulators, took some thinking on how to paint in one go, and odd bits hanging. More odd bits hanging off whatever I could find!

Almost forgot, I've got a new book to read, this one being the user handbook for the FV1110 LWB cago truck. In as new condition.

Been rather quiet again on the Martian front due to weather, but in yesterdays bit of sun I did get a bit more painting done. Managed to slap some DBG on the compressor and half of the drive gearcase, got a few little brackets cleaned up and primered. I have also removed from the truck the complete speedo drivecable/gearbox assemblies for cleaning up and servicing, the cable from the auxiliary gearbox is a bit worse for wear, as it sits too close to the exhaust silencer ( slight mod there upon refit I think), and begun stripping the tyre inflator unit, mostly bits that I can do sat in the shed out of the rain, nothing too exciting unfortunately. Angle gearbox before and then in pieces, not a lot of lubricant inside, mostly caked up too. Straight gearbox too, lubricant not too plentiful. Gearboxes primered and topcoated. Intermediate drive cable is otherwise in good nick, just the conduit stiff from being in the same position for 55+ years, a good soaking with WD40 and some oil helped free it off a bit, and a good clean of the outside, and looks good to use. The rearmost cable I may have to completely strip and rebuild, I haven't really got into it that far yet. I had done the tyre inflator originally many years ago, but only really did half a job, so completely stripped and blasted ready for fresh coat of paint. Just got to wait now for the sun to shine again!!!!!

Howard, if it's any help, you can borrow my .303 Bren ( deac of course) to measure, take pics or whatever. Don't think 7.62 is much different size wise, just barrel detail and straight mag, though I could be wrong. Also not too far away either. Simon

Hi Eddie, welcome to the forum, it's not always wet here, it just seems like it!

I can honestly say I've not seen anything like that Andy, but I'll keep my eyes peeled.

Another week with not a lot done due to work and weather, why is it always sunny when at work, and wet, windy and generally miserable when at home? Post man was busy though, have had some interesting items delivered, some nos hydraulic filter elements, and a couple of original manuals, artillery tractor user handbook, and parts list for recovery vehicle, as they were built on the same running gear and chassis. On the working front, just done a little bit more panelwork, measuring and marking to drill holes for rivetting, trying to line them up to utilize the existing rivet holes, not easy when working with channel section frames. Maybe a little bit off with some of them, but I'm sure they'll line up and not look too bad when done. Also managed to get a bit of undercoating done too, as the sun shone for a while in the evening.

This what you're after Andy? Got these to do my rear woodwork when the cab is finished. Metric and threaded all the way, but no one sees the bit in the middle. Think they were cheaper too than shanked ones.

I went as a fathers day treat to myself, there was a good turnout of vehicles, I think the lack of trade stands was a bit of a let down,when I last visited the show must be a good 8 years or so ago, there were lots to wander around. I do like a good rummage through assorted bits and bobs, you never know what you may find! Anyway not too bad a day, good just to walk around the vehicles and museum. Hope my Martian turns out as shiny as the Pig.

Hi Jon, a warm welcome from another in sunny Lincolnshire.

I think brake lights and indicators were wired through a different switch to isolate them.

I had a little ride up north to Jacksons, to collect some bits on Saturday, by the sounds of things there may be many more to come. I got another exhaust silencer, steering control valve, clutch cover, clutch plate, and a LH and RH handbrake shoe, to add to the growing spares list. Hopefully not required, but you never know. A transfer box has been put to one side too, as mine has a horrible knocking which I believe is coming from the input shaft. All in all a good days shopping.:-D:-D:-D

There is some satisfaction about these jobs, taking a crappy old unit and turning it into something presentable. The finished articles. Not really done a awful lot lately due to inclement weather! Trying to get little bits and bobs painted while there is a bit of sunshine, and quickly whip them back into the shed when the rain starts again!!! Giving the air compressor drive some paint, the air line and hydraulic adapters and other whatsits have also had a bit of paint to hopefully keep a bit of rust away till required.

No, they were blooming tight! Aluminium corrosion internally being the main reason. A couple of nuts on each stud, a vice and oil filter wrench eventually worked for me to loosen the metal cap. There should be no loose bits inside them, as all bits are screwed together in some way, shape or form. I have somewhere an ISP drawing of the whole assembly, when I find it I will scan it in.

I have also been working on repairing a couple of horn push & dipswitch units, as I've got a small collection, which was in some stuff from Withams. I think they must've been left outside for a long time, as they were all seized solid.

Making use of the sun again this week, managed to get some more bits painted, though only undercoat so far, as I have run out of paint filters. Priorities were the air compressor and drive gearcase, steering hydraulic tank again, as something didn't go right first time! Most of the 2 accumulators were done too, among other bits.

I went on the Saturday, wet, muddy and a bit cold and miserable. Had a good day though, but lots of vehicles missing. got a few pics too. Simon

Due to the nice weather we have been experiencing lately, I have not done much. In between rain showers yesterday, I braved the cold and after finally aquiring all the conduit I needed, rebuilt my generator cable, as originally I painted it, and later decided it didn't look very good, and made it very stiff to bend. Armed with new flexible conduit and tinned copper sleeving, my first problem was that the new flex didn't mate up to the old cable ferrules, so with much head scratching and wandering around the garden, I remembered I had some old copper refrigeration pipe laying near the shed. With a bit of cleaning up and a quick bore out with a cone cutter, I modified the ferrules. The old ones were cut up, and knocked into the copper piping, a bit of solder was added later when the flex was inserted. One end was soldered up and the leads threaded through to check everything mated up ok. Then I took it apart again to enable me to get the flex length correct. With the other end now cleaned up, I slid over the sleeving, which was a lot less painless than I thought it was going to be. With the sleeve on, I the began to solder up the end of the conduit. With this done, I set about getting all the components of the plug, which considering the size, has a lot of parts. After working out which bit went where, and in which order I had to put them together, for the last time I fed the leads into the conduit ( masking tape was removed as it was fed in) with the cable all together, I started to assemble the plug components, it went together quite easily, the terminal ends being soldered and finished off with a small piece of heatshrink tubing. The rest of the plug was then assembled and the pieces tightened up. Now I just have to paint the plugs when I get chance to. Almost as good as new.

That's a shame, was looking forward to going there again. Will have to find something else to do this weekend now.

While at Withams this morning loading up, three of their Gazelle helicopters were being loaded onto trucks, someone must have deep pockets!

Turret traverse indicators, transmitter and receiver. Various other switch panels: Gun junction box. NBC filters. Still more, but I'll leave those for another day. If anyone recognises any of this or what they came from, or fitment, it'd be nice to know. Simon

Well, picked it up this morning, filled pick up truck and back seat cramming it all in, and on getting home spent around 4 hours seeing what I'd actually got. Counting boxes, writing down NSN numbers, and trying to store them. Got most of it sorted, though still got a pick up bed full to finish off later in week. Lots of interesting bits, probably a lot of junk too! There are some bits that I haven't a clue what they are. Some of the other goodies include a good number of Alvis fuel tank neck strainers, number 2910 99 825 4296. An FV stowage box, off what I do not know, can't find a number yet. [TABLE] [TR] [TD][/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] Horn push & dipswitch units, all used. Radio distribution box FV494582, no idea what vehicle it is from. More to follow. Simon

Welcome in. Which part of Bomber county are you in?