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I had one of these in Rwanda in 1995 when I was running BDS. It was donated to us by the French Army when they withdrew. I had a very interesting rear axle drive arrangement. It was multifuel with a huge engine. It was clearly designed for overseas operation. I am sure that it would have been good at crawling up a mountain with a heavy load I liked the soft top arrangement and the simple cab. I would love to see one again. John

Dear Malcolm, The necessary direction direction to rotate the turret would be pretty obvious I would have thought. You just need the clearance to lift all the decks and NBC equipment out of the way. I would guess, this means gun left at 90 degrees. Having to lift the pack for relatively minor maintenance is not unusual. I am sure that the advice from everybody will be to have the manual (EMER or AESP) that covers lifting the pack. There may also be a SEME Bordon precis on this. There will be numerous special points that you need to be aware of. For instance, on the cooling: On refit, you need to bleed the quick release connectors by depressing the bit inside the connector. Don't put neat antifreeze in the coolant header tank thinking it will mix eventually. I will not but it will go to gel. The engine will not reach working temperature without driving it. These are just a few points that I can remember! John

The problem that I have is that whilst I have got the Cent safely tucked up in bed in its barn. However, I have not got any fuel to get the transporter back to Lyneham. Planned move is for 19th Oct so should be OK by then. John

Bob, I am not surprised that you have not been able to find any. In all my years of reserve service I never saw one. I spent plenty of time sorting out electrical faults due to the complex IRR electrical systems on the rovers! I would imagine that they were kept in ordnance depots and never issued to units as part of the units peacetime establishment scaling. John

Dave, I am John Attlee and I only live in Horndean. I have a little bit of knowledge about Cents. I was driving one today! John

Do you know, I cannot remember if either the Explorer or the AEC carried a gas axe. The Conqueror ARV certainly is fitted for gas bottles. I think the Cent ARV did but I cannot remember because it is two years since I opened the REME Cent's lockers!

My qualification for opining is that I am a qualified HGV driving instructor and a retired major in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers reserves. I also have a certain amount of experience with Road Safety legislation. In the Army, a tracked AFV commander does not necessarily hold an H licence although he will be qualified to command an AFV. For our purposes, the commander or whatever we call him or her, needs to be competent. That means that they have sufficient skill and experience to undertake the task in question. The driver needs to be sure that his or her commander is competent for reasons that I will come onto. When I dove John D's Cent at Capel, I can assure you that the commander TOLD me when and where to go. I was confident that he would not tell me to go when it was not safe. Remember that the road traffic acts apply on the rally field! There is no need for legislation to say that you need a commander for a particular type of vehicle apart from the need for an "attendant" on certain types of abnormal load. Dangerous driving is defined as a standard of driving that falls far below that of a safe and competent driver and a safe and competent driver would know that to be the case. In my opinion, and I am sure that anyone with military experience would agree, a 'safe and competent' AFV driver would not move an AFV without either a competent commander or competent dismounted control. Therefore driving without a commander etc would be dangerous driving. Of course, I may be wrong, I often am! It will be interesting to see if anyone with military or Defence experience of AFVs corrects me and puts me back in my box. John

My view is that if you had an accident and did not either have a commander or were under dismounted control, you could be up for Dangerous Driving. If the prosecution could find a suitable expert witness, say an ex-army master driver who was both AFV trained and a police driving instructor you would be in deep trouble. The DVSA test is a red herring and would not help you. The examiner is effectively your dismounted control. Don't even think about taking a 432 out on the public road on your own because anyone with experience with these matters would say that you are reckless. John

If you indicated where you were, someone might have a proper bore gauge near to where you are. Mine has a dial gauge on the top and can measure the bore accurately. John

Dear All, This is my Contractor towing the REME Museum's 60 ton Dyson trailer, transporting John D's Centurion MBT at the fab Capel 2021 show. John

Dear All, Does anyone have info on the wiring system for the bogie blocking system on the Scammell EKA recovery vehicle. It would be particularly helpful to know the functions of each of the five wires coming from the five way mill connector between the body and the hydraulic box. Contacts are identified A, B, C, D & E. I understand how the system works (more or less). John

Dear Martin, Richard Nixon is the spares secretary for the Foden Society, has contacts and is knowledgeable. His e-mail address is: Richard Nixon <ricknixon@btinternet.com> John

Martin, Well done with your efforts, they are most impressive. I have a friend who is a guru on Fodens. I have asked him if I can give you his e-mail address. I believe that the Army changed some of the Fodens to have Fuller gear-boxes which are much easier to acquire. I would recommend an RTO 14613. However, I expect that you would like to keep it original. When we first had a 22,000 litre wheeler TTF at 240 Sqn at Barnet we were told to drive it in a very odd way. We were told to single declutch changing up and to use the clutch brake when changing up. We must have had to double declutch changing down. I NEVER got good results. When I went on my driving instructor's course at Leconfield, the instructor first demonstrated driving the vehicle. I expressed surprise that he was double declutching changing up. He said "of course, it is a constant mesh gear-box". At Leconfield we were trained to go up through he gears to the fourth gear position, double D all the time, when in fourth move the paddle to high range and then change up and into the first gear pos. When in the fourth gear position in high range, move the paddle to overdrive. To get overdrive it was only necessary to press the clutch momentarily. We would then generally pre-select high. When the speed fell away for whatever reason, we would only need to dip the clutch to come out of overdrive. The interesting bit is what we were trained to do next. If the gradient was making us change down we would go down through the gears in the normal way and on a decent hill it is better to change down two gears at a time. When negotiating a hazard such as a roundabout we were trained to come out of overdrive at an early point, pres-select low, get the speed right right down using the service brakes, when the speed was low enough, dip the clutch. This would cause the box to range change from 8th gear (4th pos, high range) to 4th gear (4th gear low range). This was a really good system of driving as it avoided lots of pointless down shifts and allowed you to concentrate on finding a gap in the traffic and avoid stopping. Of course, 4th gear was ideal for negotiating the roundabout. Note that overdrive has to be pre-selected when going into it and coming out. John

Doug, Does Peter still have a Cent ARV? John

Dear Rob, I think that the injection version was simpler because it was not desirable to heat the inlet manifold. I cannot remember the exact layout. There must be some form of bypass hose which is essential. However, I have done exactly what you are seeking to do. The only caveat, is that I have not worked the engine hard driving the winch in the Conqueror. Just make up or buy a gasket to seal all the ports whether coolant of inlet. I use David Manners for classic Jaguar parts. If my memory is correct there is some sort of bypass hose that needs to be in place.. You will obviously have to block up the heater hose outlets. It is obviously not an engine that likes to be overheated. Presumably there is an coolant to sea water heat exchanger. John

Rob, I think that this is what we call the ki-gas starting system for very cold weather. The CVR specialists will know for certain. Nothing to worry about. Just cap them off because they are never needed. John

Speaking for myself, I would always be curious to understand why it has failed. I would strip it right down and apply air pressure to the oil side whilst immersing it in water to look for any bubbles. I find it very hard to understand why a heat exchanger should fail, assuming that it is made of copper and / cuprous alloys. Does anyone know exactly causes them to fail? John

Robert, I might be interested in the injection equipment C/W inlet manifold. Do you have the ECU? John

If you run the starter motor on the bench does it still show the same fault? If it is clean, it should not really be sensitive to exactly the right lubrication. Is there any mechanical stickiness stopping the pinions initial movement along the pinion? John

If it is stolen, good title cannot be transferred no matter what the V5 says. John

Rob, You are most definitely in the right place. Others on the forum will be able to advise you where you might pick up a J60 inlet manifold and carb. However, you might also want to consider getting a fuel injection inlet manifold C/W injectors. You could either use a car ECU or a Megasquirt / Speeduino ECU. If you go down this route, I would advise carrying a spare ECU on the boat. The advantage of EFI is reduced fuel consumption. I don't know if you are seeking more power or not. John

When going to a DAF dealer, try to have the Leyland DAF part number from the parts list and don't roll up asking for a wiper motor for a DROPS! Unfortunately, the T45 range of vehicles is very rarely seen on UK roads. John

I am surprised that nobody has come back to you on this. I do not profess to be an expert on the 430 range but others on the forum are. It is interesting that in my experience British Military User Hand Books are usually very unhelpful in this regard. it is a very useful piece of information to know. So on a Scammell Crusader, it would be useful to know to pull away, running on the flat and not heavily laden in second or third gear (from memory) and certainly not first or crawler. For that vehicle, it would also be useful to know that when changing up going down a modest gradient, go up two gears at at time or you will 'miss them'. The manuals say nothing on this, nevertheless, it is essential that you have the UHB for your vehicle. The gear box is an automatic with oil cooling. I would go for option 1 and leave it in the 3-4 range unless manouevring or going up or down a steep slope where you need the control. As I implied, others on the forum may be able to be more definite. John

Chris, Once again the forum comes to the rescue. Thank you very much for the info. John

Nicely equipped workshop! John