Ex Army FV434 Instructor

yes they do! an air compressor charges to operate pressure on the servo (thats why you have air tanks on them for) there an air over liquid system (same as a bedford MK)

its funny this one, everyone (including me) seems to know someone who was there, as its became more of a must see event. One bloke at my old unit ( the gunnery instructor) told me he witnessed it and that some officer had got in (which sounds feasable) and started it up put it straight into gear and he was off, problem was the hand throttle was tightened full on and he flapped. Someone else who was on the top when it happened reached in to the drivers hatch and turned off the master switch and stopped it (eventually). These stories always get embelished over time, and i dont know how much of what he said was the real truth. Mind when I was there I witnessed a crew take a Chally 1 past a load of skitish officers horses being taken for a walk at full throttle, the next thing there was stable girls being dragged through hedges and over roads whilst hanging on for dear life whilst the six or so horses scattered. Bet somebody was tapping the boards for that one

in the most obvious answer possable a FV434 as it comes with the following fantastic features.... a multi fuel engine a crane loads of space in the cargo bay to put your weekly shopping

thats just brilliant, (especially the second one) think we need another that looks like Stalin

yes just to clarify that point I obviously meant dont pick up any of them, once its been fired after a couple of years whats left of the paint goes anyway so they all look the same (so you couldent tell one from another anyway) and honestly who in their right mind is going to try picking up live ordenence? Having said that I read about a French farmer not so long ago who'd been picking shells up and storing them at his farm on the Somme, they reckon they were picking up whats left of him for days.

so you mean that gets the customers in and there going "ive got 5 grand i'll have that DROPS please", and they go "no this is the DROPS that you get for 5 Grand" and show you a pile of rust on some axel stands that's genius

I'd also keep in mind that we used to fire allsorts at them with the RARDEN's quite often HE (High Explsive) APSE (armour peircing secondery effect) that's explosive and phosphorus !!! as well as Sabot and Prac rounds which I wouldent worry about. The first 2 i would though as i'm sure there must be quite a few that didnt go off

yes I also picked up on that when I read it. It must be properly knackered. It might not be to bad though, there'll soon be loads and some in good condition that's been parked up at TA centres ect coming onto the market anyway, as the MAN fleet starts to replace everything in the next few years, including new DROPS vehicles.

what often also transpires is that more often than not the governing politicians tend to be somehow connected with or very soon after they leave office end up being on the board of the particular company that won the contract.

Most of the problem is these people either in whitehall or any outside company that supplies equipment ( at the cheapest cost possable) have never been in the army themselves. Therefore you end up with people developing the kit who have all sorts of academic qualifications and no real experiance apart from on paper of whats needed. This is nothing new is it?

i think now just being able to recall the novelty of driving one that hadnt broken down long enough to have been qualified with familirisation training on my FMT, or doing road tests (which it usually failed) I honestly cant remember what the visability was like in the rear view mirrors. Like i said before they broke down so much that I ended up being the only VM in the workshop who'd had a working one long enough for an instructor to sighn me off as Familirised on it. I remember even senior ranking VM's asking me "so what are they like to drive?"

yes silly me forgot the mirrors, cant fault them, 2 of them one on each side, so shiny you can see your face in them, (cant see very well behind you due to the box body) (Actually i was making that last bit up)

were all guilty of that one, you can always spot someone who'd been doing a sleeping inspection of the turret when he got out due to him having cramp in his neck. what was said earlier about Bovington taking it as a gift, It reminded me of something. I was talking to one of the curators when i was there and he said when the first arms amnesty happened after the Hungerford masacre, some police force sent them an old live 38 webley revolver and about 20 rounds of ammunition through the post in a jiffy bag, that someone had handed in at the local nick. He said there was hell on......you couldent make it up could you?

yes ok its been nearly 20 years since i last drove or worked on a stolly (you start to forget little things like the weight of them after a time) Knew i was right about the flatrack size though!

and another fault i just keep remembering them..... it's like remembering a bad dream On Operations as well as the chassis spliting the box body ones (with the secure kit in I mentioned before ) they started being cast for the rear axel housing splitting with metal fatique as well, just past the differential housing.

I think the reason we couldent put FV430's on the back of DROPS had more to do with the width than anything else. (we carried CVRT often) Although the weight was a factor. Having said that how much did that stolly weigh? got to be about the same as a 430 series. The more I think about this i'm sure it was the width of a FV430 and it overhanged so the tracks werent fully on the flatrack, so therefore it couldent be secured safely and we couldent haul them. It was a definete no to us ever hauling them on DROPS even under STGO CAT 2 authority.

Hi and welcome have you ever built the accurate armour kits, there fidly and expensive ive built a few (not the same as owning a real vehicle but there easier to store!)

It makes sence, our old pattern uniforms were made to fight in Western Europe, when the Warsaw Pact started world war 3, which thankfully never happened. As usual this is just starting to be introduced now, how long have they known this needed to be done, 3 years or 4? Here's a great one for how long the army takes to get things done, my Grandad was testing new sleeping bags and socks ect back in 1938. My Dad finally got his brand new issued sleeping bag to replace his exercise blankets 2 weeks before he left the army in 1965.

oh yes i forgot to add, the 6 we had were all box body versions which increased the weight still further, dont know if the canvas troop versions were any better.

RB44's where do i start ? The first huge fault was the brake disks, they had to fitt the studs for the wheels just a few milimetres from the edge of the brake disks (nobody thought about the wheel sizes) The end result of that was every time they went out on exercise the brake disks cracked once it went over a bump and it was off road again, (I think standing orders was after every exercise they had to be inspected, and you were always fitting new disks) My last unit had 6 of them and there were never more than 2 on the road at any one time. 2nd fault The air braking system, they have the most ridiculous over complicated air braking system which was always leaking and causing the brakes to stay jammed on, or they would fail to put enough air into the tanks (whilst 2 or 3 VM's looked for a leak that was either very slight or non exsistant) and i think I recall there being 3 air tanks (if any one of them didnt reach a certain PSI which I cant recall now) it was again VOR 3rd fault They started putting the new secure radio kits in them and every time they went over a bump as well as the brake disks cracking there started to be new problems. It wasn't long before we were getting reports of the Chassis cracking on operations due to the weight and them being cast. Theres others like the engine being underpowered but I cant remember any more offhand. As for driving one (can anyone remember driving an RL Bedford ? because apart from the split windscreen the drivers view was very like that. Nearly forgot You were advised to double the clutch as well to reduce wear on the clutch (which didn't seem to work either, they were always getting new clutches as well, which was another pain to fit) Once you got off road they were again hopeless, whilst doing cross country driving the wrecker would usually have to follow one round and it would struggle and the engine would be screaming to climb hills in even dry conditions. It wouldent be long before it would start showing black or white smoke. I think to be fair though that had a lot to do with the tyres, the same as when they started to put the newer Leyland Daff tyres on the Bedford Mk and MJ and the 4WD became hopeless in mud. Speaking from experiance I wouldent touch one !

Well you could try I suppose! I think you should try and swap it for the Rolls Royce Silver shadow armoured car, they can only say no cant they?

If your in the buisiness of buying and selling this stuff, i'd ask the Tank Museum at Bovington how much they'll give you for it? Bet they'll pay top price, better than putting it on Ebay (but you could try that as well)

Like i said this is mostly second hand information, the picture of him, sitting plugged in to the eager beaver while wereing an electricaly heated suit which was wired in to to the machine was real enough, it seemed the main pipe ran under his seat to a conection on the chassis floor. (maybe it was late 60's not early, i'm trying to recall a conversation i had 20 years ago!) Again as best as I can recall the conection for it was under the drivers seat. Maybe this was trials kit that never made it into full production, does anyone have any more info on this?

About 15 or so years ago when the Queens Own Yeomanry were getting rid of our CVRW fox armoured cars, they removed the turrets of them and they then came back on Scorpion hulls and we got our new vehicle's ie CVRT Sabre (even though they weren't new at all and they done was slapped 2 old vehicles together to make a new one!) However the mark 5 ferrets (foxes without turrets) we were told were going to be completly overhauled and have a new one man electricly operated turret fitted which mounted 2 50 callibre Brownings and they were then going to be sold on to Mexico. Does anybody know if this actually took place?, if so does anyone have any pictures of the modified ferrets, or did the deal simply fall through as they often do and they ended up on fireing ranges or sold as scrap?

If youre going to get one as well as the CES youre going to need a pack lifting frame, its youre one must have item. You have to be able to take the K60 multifuel pack out for servicing and repair ect and you'll be well stuck without one. (for example you cant change the engine oil filters without removeing the pack) Now there changing all remaining FV430 series vehicles to bulldog diesel engine only variants, this is youre best chance to get one.