BRDM Driver

That'd be me escaping the horrible traffic jam at wareham leaving the Purbeck rally...

Ha Ha Ha! Alas the fuel gauge doesn't work too well on this either! :-(:red:

Yes the BS1 engine, a very modern engine for the time and used for many many years... It is odd that its called an Austin 16(hp) with a 67hp engine! It still has a dynamo and it's positive earth! One feature I really like is that there's a dipstick for the gearbox just next to the gearstick. It's had indicators added but the trafficators still work. There's a handle on the dash that opens the windscreen too.

It's a 1946-47 according to the Austin owners club. I don't have much history for it at. Yes it's very 'hands on' to drive in a fun way, not in a scary way! It's all very simple. Cart springs, beam axles - just like the BRDM! It rides really smooth. It has a Jackall system where you can jack the front or rear axles up on built in hydraulic rams.

Fancied something interesting to pootle about in: Austin 16 BS1 (2.2L). Drives great, cruises at 50mph, just doesn't stop too quickly due to pushrod brakes! :sweat: It was RAF blue before at some point and has been hand painted green, bit that all adds to the charm!

Yes it's a Conqueror Recovery Vehicle. Interestingly it has some form of home brew fuel injection on the Meteor and the winch has had modern strain gauges fitted. It's at REME Bordon (not for long though)

Thanks for the info Nick.

I count 3! Anyone want to guess what this is?

I saw a Humber Super Snipe staff car recently. It had some quite wide sand tyres fitted. I didn't get to find out what size these would be, but i wondered if anyone knows what they'd be and, more to the point, what tyre options I'd have on an Austin 16 BS1 staff car (1947)? It has 6.0" x 16" tyres at the moment.

One would have assumed that VOSA and other Gov bodies would not be interested in very expensive, professional, safe Bugatti builds but they are... Absolutely nothing to do with roadworthyness and ALL to do with originality and people owning vehicles that are registered as pre 1960 that have had a substantial amount of (or one - depending on how you read it) new parts fitted... I'm not scare mongering here, just trying to understand what's going on... I only found this stuff out from the Classic Car / Hot Rod forums and took a look here to see if anyone has picked up on it. Clearly the Bugatti thing is all about restorers creating 'new' original cars out of a few old bits to make money and VOSA have taken a dim view of it and simply enforcing the law. Unfortunately they may want to cast their net further...

Just looking into all the stuff on the net relating to the DVLA and 'reconstructed' vs 'restored' historic and classic vehicles lately... The Historic vehicle classification is, in theory, void the moment you put a replica or new-manufactured or newer original component on your 1940's Jeep. Once you do that, the vehicle is no longer 'original' and has to be re-registered and the year it will be registered as will be the year of the newest component you have fitted (assuming you have only fitted original newer parts that are at least 25 years old!). If you have fitted any new replica or new manufactured components, it gets a Q plate. (and to get the Q plate you have to get type approval and pass a Basic IVA inspection?) That's my understanding anyway. (Please correct me if I am wrong) I assume that the 'component' has to be something relatively major like steering/chassis/engine/transmission/suspension/chassis etc and not a spark plug. This appears to be being applied not only to new registrations but also to existing vehicles 'of interest'. So far this has been Bugatti resto's that are really more like replicas due to the large number of new parts fitted... I would guess 'old' landrovers and jeeps that have new parts fitted will be next...

While the fan is out (I really don't want to have to get it out again, ever...), I might as well replace the fan bearings as these seem to fail regularly. Is this an easy task? Any special tools required? The fan runs smooth but the is some end float.

Got the bulkhead out at last! That bolt was threaded into the ali box that goes around the pedals. Once I lifted the bulkhead a couple of inches, i managed to prise the plates apart enough to get the bolt unscrewed and out. clutch next!

Well I nearly got the front bulkhead out yesterday, after taking out the seat and side bulkhead to undo the starter cable so I could thread it through the hole in the front bulkhead.... But some numpty had put the front bulkhead back previously with a bolt in the wrong place! The bulkhead is sandwiched between a flange welded to the hull and a welded plate pedal box. You can see all three layers here with the end of a bolt sticking out: Easy, just unbolt it, but on the other side (in the drivers compartment): What! No bolt head! I assumed it had seared off, but no: It's under the flange! So the bulkhead was bolted to the pedal box with one bolt and then both were put in the hull and the rest of bolts put in, squashing this one! I can get a spanner on it, but the pedal box and hull flange are rigid so there's nowhere for the bolt to unscrew to...:mad: I might be able to get a cut off disk in there and then use a screw extractor to get the remains out, maybe...

Hmmm 45 mins! I'm guessing that was not single handed! (team of 6 perhaps?) Getting that front bulkhead out is a right PITA, especially with all the cables that run through the rear 't' section of it... Today I got nearly everything disconnected with just the poxy starter cable to go. (need to get the side bulkhead out just to undo the other end of that cable as the power distribution box end connector doesn't fit through the hole in the bulkhead :mad:...) I'm thinking it will be 10 hours to get to the gearbox seal!

That's interesting! I hadn't considered doing that! Certainly worth a go initially and if the leak is elsewhere I'll get the box out.

Well I have had a good poke around with the top armor off (it's a lot easier to drive like that!). The oil has collected under the gearbox and under the front (back) of the engine, so pretty sure that oil that has come out of the gearbox input shaft has been spun off the clutch and then sucked through to the engine bay by the fan. The cooling fan and belts are all oily. It appears that the oil only leaks in quantity when the gearbox is hot and when it's running at speed (I've done a few road runs lately). It could be that there are two leaks of course (rear of engine and gearbox), but in the meantime, I'll going to get the gearbox out and change the shaft seals. So has anyone done a 'how to' guide for getting the gearbox out and changing seals? Don't suppose there's an EMER for it? (I'll start searching here, of course!) Any tips, pointers, appreciated. Cheers.

I have an odd fault which I initially thought was a leaky oil seal on the gearbox input shaft. When doing slow maneuvers, oil smoke will come out of the engine decks. One the move, no smoke. I am fairly sure that the oil leak was at the gearbox and is seeping onto the clutch housing, which then burns off when it slips and heats up. Last time I had the decks up, there was a small amount of oil under the clutch. (tiny pactch). I checked it again today and found loads of oil in the bottom of the hull under the clutch/gearbox. (Like 2 pints :wow:). It's black oil (actually slightly grey colour when collected up in a jar), oddly when I checked the gearbox oil level, it doesn't appear to be down and the oil looks clean. So I wondered if it was engine oil. I checked the engine oil level and it looks a bit too full. The oil is a dark colour. There has also been oil getting thrown about off the cooling fan inside the engine bay... So if the engine has too much oil in, could it get ejected at the front of the engine somewhere and get all over the fan and work its way onto the clutch? With oil getting spun off all over the place it's hard to know where to start looking for the leak! So where would oil be ejected if you overfilled the engine?

Some serious work there! Hope it all goes ok.

well 101 views and no clues? I found a picture of one on the net from a german ebay/gumtree type site, but it's long gone, and another person with similar tank asking the same questions in 2009 on some German Militaria forum, no one there knew either... I've ruled out as cooling tank for an MG08 as these look different...

I just came across this item, it's a plated water tank, marked WASSERTANK MOWE with the remnants of a blue triangle logo underneath. It has 2 caps with chains on. Any ideas what era it is? Cheers, Richard.

That's a great idea! They are square tanks, just like the BRDM tank and I get an electric fuel pump too! The mechanical fuel pump is another weak point on BRDM. Not sure about adapting the fuel fittings though. Disco tanks appear to be around £70 on ebay.

Well I just tumbled my tank with a load of M16 bolts! There's a lot of rust in there... I then found a total of three holes! I fixed them by opening them up with a centre punch to create a bit of material to cut a thread into. Then screwed in an M5 copper plated screw. Soldered it with some plumbers flux and an ordinary electronics iron (I didn't think this would work but it worked really well!) Pretty sure that this tank is on the way out so I'll look at replacing it with a much smaller plastic tank. Maybe something I can take out easily... I was looking at a boat fuel tank but I think these are illegal to use in road vehicles. I may go for a small alloy racing tank.

I have found a pinhole in my BRDM fuel tank. The outside of the tank looks as new, but there is rust inside. Is there a quick way to patch the pinhole, while I source a suitable replacement... Cheers!

Anyone tried dry ice blasting? No mess to clear up - other than paint flakes I guess...