ArtistsRifles

I logged onto Photobucket today and got greeted my a message screen detailing new price plans. Having read it I was left feeling incredibly pissed off. the whole reason for on-line hosting is to be able to shore the images - or so I thought. Seems the bean counters at Photobucket have a different idea. As I understand it the new pricing plans are: Free 2Gb Storage Adverts everywhere No Linking No 3rd party Hosting Monthly fee Yearly fee Plus 50 60Gb Storage Adverts everywhere No Linking No 3rd party Hosting Monthly fee $5.99 Yearly fee $59.99 Plus 100 110Gb Storage No Adverts Unlimited Linking No 3rd party Hosting Monthly fee $9.99 Yearly fee $99.99 Plus 500 510Gb Storage No adverts Unlimited Linking Unlimited 3rd party Hosting Monthly fee $39.99 Yearly fee $399.99 I am on the Plus 20 package that no longer exists but as a result I have 3rd part Hosting until December 31, 2018. So looks to me like I have a year and a bit to find an alternative and get all my photos transferred over. Corporate greed ruins yet another service :(

Looked from a MV owners point of view it's anything but cheap. Factor in the costs of getting a vehicle there, fuel or transport then the fuel costs for the week and it adds up. When I had the OT it was running between £500 - £600 in transport costs for the return trip with Rex going 50/50 on costs (apparently aid in transport costs is now only available to "rare" vehicles) and then I was burning though £200 worth of diesel whilst down there. As/when/if I take the Militant down it will be in the order of £100 worth of diesel at today's prices just for the return trip, plus the return fuel for the support car to home and pick up either the UAZ or the Landrover then another £50 in fuel for the return trip in that. Then the running around costs. I doubt the Militant will move much one on site as the back is rigged for living (with a porta loo!! :cool2:) . Still not a cheap week. But it is a FUN week and so I keep going! :)

One photo shows it a nice and shiny DBG, the other a decidedly less shiny indeterminate green (might be aged DBG) with Clansman mounts bolted to the front wings. I wonder which one is its current appearance??

Interesting views thus far folks!! FWIW - here's my tuppence worth: I should have got there on the first Saturday but the UAZ had other ideas with the fuel lines giving way quite spectacularly so I had to get a new set made up meaning I finally arrived on Sunday. Wasn't feeling overly happy already because my groups Living history application had been sent in twice already - and lost both times We only found out when Lee the armourer e-mailed me asking why there was a Soviet battle scheduled for us - and we weren't attending! Fairly certain the only reason #3 didn't get lost is because Lee walked it round in person. Upshot of that was - they ran out of room on Living History for us so we wound up in a L shaped plot beside and behind the green NAAFI container . Plus side was we were right by the permanent loos and the washing up points so we had no loo issues apart from one of them getting a broken handle and - on one memorable occasion hearing a loo flush followed by a loud "Oh SH*T" and the sight of a tidal wave rolling out from under the door..... A slight blockage I believe.... Debit side was that we had half our display blocked from view. When I arrived Sunday it took an hour to get through booking in - three windows were open - Living History, MV's and Traders. One person in each and the whole damn queue was Living History. In the old days they would have been pitching in to help - a guy in front of me asked why the other 2 weren't helping the LH guy and got the answer "its not our job". Go figure. We were supposed to have had a trench system carved out by the digger but apparently some one - allegedly the hop Farm people - lost the plans of the underground power and water lines so they would not let the digger dig! We hacked down by hand to approx the depth we wanted in some test holes, found no cables so got permission to use the digger. - which got revoked 2/3 of the way through so we were still hacking the system out on Tuesday. Some dude got uptight when he yanked permission for the digger saying we might hit the power cables to the NAAFI container - at which point we pointed to the cables laid overground and asked if he meant those as they were the only power feed to the container. No idea who he was or who he was with. But we got it finished in the end - L shaped trench with a mortar pit spurred off. Those who came to see us liked what they saw. Getting around for the week for me was easy - even in the arena - as the UAZ is shod with the Russian extreme mud tyres on the back wheels - I spent the whole show in 2WD even in the worst of the mud. In my travels around the show grounds I was struck by the lack of loos & showers compared to other Beltring based shows in the areas distant from the main entrance. Original plan was to stay to Sunday - but the owner of the tentage wanted them down dry as they soak up water like a sponge so they came down on Sat morning. That left one patrol tent sleeping 4 to cater for 10. Then in the afternoon the rains came down big time. By 16:00 the show was nearly empty and as most of my kits was already in the UAZ wrapped up in a tarp to keep dry I decided I might as well jump in and head home. Got soaked on the way home as the roof now leaks so badly it might as well not be there. The arena was a bit of a let down but one of the show marshals told us it was leased to a quy running a quad bike business and he had gone ape **** at learning we were using it, seemingly trying to sue the Hop Farm in an attempt to get us banned. Obviously he failed and the word was he had been such a PITA that his contract which is up for renewal in Sept won't be So next year we get the arena back as it should be. On the whole it was good to be back there. Missed the Barmy Army and their party though. If it happened we never heard it or about it. The old W&P "buzz" was definitely back and with a couple more years to get re-established I reckon it will be like we never left. It was great to see old friends who had not come to the Racecourse for various reasons - Maz fuel consumption was a good one Nice atmosphere in the trade stands too. The point about the camping in the America's field - I think was valid. A better place might have been in the adjacent Medway field that had very few exhibits in. The lack of loos and shower in the outlying areas needs attention urgently. As do the food prices. Beer in the beer tent was on the high side but not enough to groan about. Music was pretty good every night it was on. Food stand prices were though. An idea might be to offer a discount based on the colour of the wristband for those exhibiting there in any shape or form. Pre show adminstration certainly need to be looked at as losing successive applications is not acceptable practice. So do some of the actual practices - like the booking in area.. NMJ is not an acceptable answer - if you are working there and standing idle whilst the next window is overworked pitch in and help. Since losing the OT I have lost sight of the practices for transport cost sharing but from listening to people talk it sounds like some are getting nothing whilst other are getting the whole bill paid - there should be some rationale applied. I think in Rex's day the idea was light to medium tracked armour got 50% of the transport bill met (that was the deal I had with the OT-90) whilst the heavy stuff got more - it being a bigger "draw". I did note the lack of heavy armour this year. Apart from the Leopard 1 and Nicks OT-90 it was all smaller WW2 based CVF(T) numbers seemed way down as did 432's, no Centurion, Chieftain, T55, T62 or T72 at least not moving. Another story doing the rounds in the trade area at least - I heard it from several stands was the show going back up for sale. Story being that the new owner wanted to make it a country fayre type event as with his other shooting shows and have live weapons and ammo on sale. Kent police took one look at a plan involving that and a bunch of re-enactors and history buffs and said no chance. Ever!!.Time will tell on that one.

If they are going to start trying to charge users $400 a head for using the site as it was originally intended then I think that's a certainty Phil.

Nope - no account on the site mate. Guess I will just have to roll up and try doing it the old way.

I just had a look at this. Have to admit my first impression is that uploading bulk images is a right royal PITA!! Sometimes it will take more than one image, most times only one. Once up it does look more user friendly that PB. Lets see if the image link works: OK - thats as easy as PB - just got t work out how to upload bulk images in order to swap from PB to Imgur!

What happens if you haven't had a pass sent to you? I'm in a group booking and up to last week they had no record of the booking..... That's now sorted but to the best of my knowledge there are no electronic tickets been sent.

Many thanks for the info

Cheers Rob - nice to have a suspicion confirmed re. the exhaust port. Might be mice to see if I can get a filter to fit over the open hole. Its not the nut that's seized on - its the cap to the stud. All 3 nuts and washers came off quite easily to my surprise. Right now I am trying leaving it to soak in the WD 40 then alternating between sharp taps with a shot weighted mallet and tying to pry the cap up with a heavy duty screwdriver. Then re-soaking. I can feel an teeny bit of movement - and I do mean teeny - so maybe it will free off tomorrow. Top plunger is moving OK - just that the forwards facing section is, as you say, well scored. Running a thumb nail over it feels shockingly bad compared to the polished section. But I'll try fine emery and oil and see if I can polish it out without going too far out of round.

Quick question - in the photos below the hole indicated by the yellow arrow is threaded but has nothing in it. Is there a reason for this ? Exhaust valve or ??? Tonight I started to strip the air inlet side down as per Robs suggestion. However - nothing is EVER that simple. The pedal assembly came off OK as did the three nuts holding the top of the valve body on. That's where easy ended. Two of the three studs were free and easy to move but number 3 looks to be rusted solid. So right now its soaking in WD40 over night to see if it will free off. If not then I am going to have to try and find a way of applying heat to the valve top around that stud. Not sure a hot air paint gun will be enough :-) Other point of concern is the top of the valve where the pedal actually operates. The large dia piston (?) has a polished surface for about half of its circumference - the remaining half is a very different story and has a chewed up look to it as though its gone through extreme wear. So right now I am unsure if this one is actually repairable with long term prospects - or whether seeking a replacement might be the wiser course??

Only way to go really Richard. The site has doubtless changed since our last time there and its all new owners so we'll give a whirl and see how it pans out. Only thing that's off-putting at the moment is the booking arrangements seem somewhat screwed. Our groups co-ordinator sent in the group booking for living History in April. And again in May then as said elsewhere I got hit by a request for group details as they had no record of us booking but had us down for a battle - when in fact the reverse is true. So group co-ordinator had to go through it all again. Hopefully now it really is all sorted.

Right - foot brake air valve is out - and what a GODAWFUL job it was I was working completely on my own and discovered to my horror that AEC had not heard of/embraced the concept of captive nuts in the floor pan - So I had to work out how to hold the bolt head still whilst I crawled underneath to undo the nuts. Got two of them off - the third I wound up grinding the head of the bolt off because no matter what I did I could not secure the bolt head adequately. Six hours of solid, back breaking work. Lessons learnt - life would be a lot easier if the front wheel was off!! By the time it came off it was 19:00 hrs and time to head home so dismantling will have to wait another till tomorrow. The union looked pretty gungy though Looking at the replacement unit I have on approval I think its obvious that they are not alike so if this one cannot be fixed quickly I will have to look for another.

And - apart from the obvious - where would the venue be??

Many thanks Rob. That valve is coming out next weekend no matter what - this air issue is all that really stops me using the old girl right now. We have (had?) fully working lights, indicators, horn - just the wipers needing attention as they are hit and miss - more miss than hit currently Not so worried about the cab gauge at the moment - but the one on the side of the tank should work and doesn't. Martyn from the AEC Society says he has some parts for those - but I need to get the fuel down below half a tank to be able to get the gauge out. The real bugbear at the moment - apart from the air issue - are this window winders. They should fit and work OK but...... The passenger side went in OK but the arm hits the crossbar on the inner door that carries the mechanism. The drivers side didn't want to go in at all and took a LOT of persuasion to fit and if anything the situation with the arm looks even worse. I've been thinking about this on and off all day and and coming to the conclusion that what I am going to have to do is refit the old ones so that the doors can go back together freeing up the inside of the cab to get to work on the other issues freely. Then once all the interior stuff is sorted take them off one at a time and look at either straightening the arms or - perhaps better - swapping the raise/lower arms for the old ones.

Back over to the Militant today - and this time I remembered to take the keys with me!! So fired her up to see how the new silencer worked. All seems good on that score now so another box ticked off. However you will not in the video the temp gauge is still dancing all over the place and the fuel gauge is not working at all. Still need to investigate these two problems. And I have another, new, issue now - the air is not building enough to stop the warning buzzer going off. It was prior to the remains of the silencer being removed and the hunt for a replacement. And just to add to the fun now when the revs drop down to idle (about 400 - 450 rpm) the air pressure rapidly drops to 35 psi. This was not happening before. I am hoping - perhaps optimistically - that it is linked to the prior problem of air leaking from a fault valve in the foot brake valve. I got hold of a replacement at Newark but looking at it today compared to the existing one it seems fundamentally different. The existing one only appears to have two ports on the sides and one on the base whereas the replacement has 4 ports at 12, 3, 6 and 9 o'clock with a smaller port between 2 of these. Existing valve Replacment valve Next time up the old valve will have to come out and be compared physically to the new one - but I am not optimistic that they will match. Next job was the horn. The old carrier was re-drilled to take the new horn and lucars connected to the ends of the horn loom, the power feed and the earth feed. Once all connected up it was tested and worked OK so another box ticked off. Then I turned attention to the drivers door. Getting the winder mechanism in this one was a LOT harder than getting it in the passenger one. I think the holes for the 4 mounting bolts are smaller this side so will deed drilling out but more critically the kinked over end of the lifting arm seems to have more of a problem this side. The original arms in addition to be longer were dead straight. So I am wondering whether to remove the mechanisms and either get the arms straightened or remove the short arms and fit the old, longer, straight ones. I was tempted to just refit the old ones - but the drivers side has a problem - a broken tooth I think. Anyways - for today I opted to leave it and think on it. So - got on with rubbing down the radiator surround then fibre-glassed the inside of the drivers wing and started filling it back into shape. Rubbing down just removed all the lose paint this time. Next time I'll take an orbital sander with me to fully clean it up ready for painting. That all took me up to 19:00 at which point I was getting tired and hungry so I headed home.

In that case look at what Richard suggested.

Is it an Over Head Valve type engine? If so - take a look at the valve stem seals.

Time you heard that mate - you'd be glowing in the dark

Our group leader made the bookings back around the end of April Richard and was told that the vehicle packs would be sent out separately to the owners. As of Monday there had been no sign so I e-mailed the W&PR organizers yesterday evening to find out what was happening with regards to them. And I was stunned to get the reply saying they had no record of our groups booking. Despite the fact the program shows a Cold War Soviet battle - that we know nothing about. Organiser was going to ring them after he finished work tonight - not heard anything yet.

The RAC recovered my Landie AND a Sankey the year before last when I lost the engine down in Hampshire. They sent out an RAC recovery unit who loaded the Landie on and tried to hook the Sankey on the back with a special hitch. Unfortunately the Sankey ring was too thick for the hitch and even if it hadn't been the nose would have been way too low. So they sent out another recovery unit to load the Sankey onto. No additional cost either.

Hmm - lets see if it gives me grief too - sample photo: Hmm - seems to be working OK - if you can see the Militants silencer like I can.

E-mailed them yesterday to query the status of the vehicle packs for our group - and got told they have no record of our group having booked in.... Not an inspiring start

Tony nailed it :-) Although more pudding than pie if memory serves me.

Possibly because no one want wants them these days so units get stuck with shed loads. All the old favourites are gone in the name of PC or "healthy eating". Sausage or burger in beans for breakfast have been replaced by friggin muesli!! Biscuits AB, meat paste, biscuits fruit, yorkie bars, babys head - all gone or more or less gone. I have some modern boxes here that have nothing in that I would willingly select for a meal.