New member

[Tim Vibert]

Hi members. Tim Vibert and my first time on any sort of internet forum.  Situated in Victoria Australia I started collecting and restoring MVs in the 1960s. Blitz's, Bedford QL's Chevs etc.from the bush and scrapyards .  In 1984, along with a group of Australians I attended the 40th D Day anniversary.   We came under the wing of Peter Gray and I later imported a Dodge Command Car, Daimler Dingo, Harley WLA, Indian 741b and 2 Matchless G3l's.  In 1987 I attended a local Army Auction that contained a large quatity of Centurion spares which I purchased.  At that stage there was no indication of when the Army's Centurions would be sold.  I pestered the Govt. to no avail.  Eventually they were put up for Tender early 1989.  105 Centurions and 2,500 tons of spares. With the help of a friend and my brother I put in a tender and then the wait began.  The specified 10 days to advice turned into 5 Months.  I eventually threatened to withdraw our Tender, the next day I was advised we had won.  I later found out we were only a few dollars above the scrap dealers.  I won't bore you with the logistics involved over the next 8 months putting these to bed on 2 private properties.  Many early buyers were losing bidders from the Tender.  In 1991 I travelled to the US and then to Europe buying 4 Israeli half tracks, 2 Gama Goats, 4 OT62's and 4 OT810's.   With the fall of the Berlin Wall I began making enquiries regarding purchasing Russian vehicles.  It was arranged, and I travelled with Mike Cecil and Glen Dore to Moscow.  We had a festinating time visiting Monino and the then out of bounds Kubinka.  No vehicles were bought, far too expensive.  At about this time I was accepted on the MOD Tender List.  Ferrets, FV432's and Ferrets were purchased. One MOD Tender was for 36 Saracens and associated spares ex Hong Kong which a colleague and I were successful with.  In 1995 I was approached by Fox Sudios to supply 12 Centurions for the film Courage Under Fire.   These were subsequently shipped to LA and then onto Mexico for the filming. I travelled with 3 colleagues to assist with logistics. The sale of tanks and vehicles continued until the last one was sold a few years ago.  The wind down has started with a near empty shed now.  After ignoring Austin Champs for years I am now the proud owner of one that appeared in the local Army Auctions.  I still have a fair range of spares for British vehicles on my website Empire Trading and Disposals.  All the best to fellow members,   Tim .

[Richard Farrant]

Hi Tim,

Good to see you on here!

regards, Richard

[sexton]

Hi, Tim, just found this. Good to see you on here, it’s a great forum. 
Thanks again for your help with our Cent. We got power traverse working reliably but couldn’t get STAB to work. Shame.

Malcolm

[Rootes75]

That's a fascinating read, the quantity of MV's saved is huge!

[Tim Vibert]

Hi Malcolm, when I first got the Cents I was keen to get the stab working on a rebuilt tank..  Eventually after swapping out control boxes and a lot of research I got it working on one tank.  It operated for 10 minutes then a cloud of smoke from one of the control boxes put me off trying again.  Reading Army reports later, on training exercises, indicated gunnery rarely worked on stab. I have the full technical stuff on gunnery if you want to take it further.   Nice to hear from you. Tim

[sexton]

Tim, you sent me the manual on gunnery so I could scan them and return, remember? 
They’re the only reason I got the traverse working, I owe you!

Got stab working for a bit then it just up and quit. With no spare control boxes,  I gave up for the sake of my sanity!

Regards, Malcolm

[Packhow75]

Welcome to the forum Tim.

Hope all is well. 

Tim