Some 4 wheel drive vehicles

[sjt01]

Autumn 1975 I went to work in Malawi. Looking for an interesting vehicle I found a 1956 Ser 1 86" in the scrap yard. I bought it and stripped it down and put it back together.
As bought

Underneath the local number plate was a British plate, UWD 5. I later found out that a British vet had bought it new from the factory, put it on a boat to Dar Es Salaam and driven down to Malawi. When he reckoned it was too tired to continue with, he gave it to the Catholic mission in the North who kept it going longer, then sent it to Ratto's scrap yard in Lilongwe where I found it.
When I got my next vehicle I sold it to my neighbours, and joined them on a visit to Nykia National Park.

When they left, friends in Lilongwe bought it and we visited Nkhotakota Game Reserve.

They then drove it to South Africa, put it on the boat to Britain via St Helena (the last trip that ship did), reregistered it on the original number and used it for many years. They sold it on last year.

 

[suffolksmallholder]

Great stories!
Loved my Haflinger.
Thanks.
SS

 

[sjt01]

The scrapyard where the 86" came from had something else of interest, a Unimog S 404, with siezed pistons so dragged it home and eventually got it running

Took it on a big trip to the North to Nykia National Park, had to have drums of petrol on board as fuel stations were few and far between.

On the journey spotted something of interest!

 

[suffolksmallholder]

My dad had a 404 with a crane fitted behind the rag-top cab c1960’s.
It was replaced in 1974 by a 764 County. This was then sent to Chieftain Forge to have a new cab and crane fitted on its roof. As far as I know the tractor is still at work in the firewood trade today so good value.
Ok Hiawatha’s hammer but still going
SS

 

[JP1]

Autumn 1975 I went to work in Malawi. Looking for an interesting vehicle I found a 1956 Ser 1 86" in the scrap yard. I bought it and stripped it down and put it back together.
As bought
View attachment 1177170
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View attachment 1177166

View attachment 1177167
View attachment 1177168
View attachment 1177169
Underneath the local number plate was a British plate, UWD 5. I later found out that a British vet had bought it new from the factory, put it on a boat to Dar Es Salaam and driven down to Malawi. When he reckoned it was too tired to continue with, he gave it to the Catholic mission in the North who kept it going longer, then sent it to Ratto's scrap yard in Lilongwe where I found it.
When I got my next vehicle I sold it to my neighbours, and joined them on a visit to Nykia National Park.
View attachment 1177173

When they left, friends in Lilongwe bought it and we visited Nkhotakota Game Reserve.

View attachment 1177174

They then drove it to South Africa, put it on the boat to Britain via St Helena (the last trip that ship did), reregistered it on the original number and used it for many years. They sold it on last year.
View attachment 1177175

Pub near me. Ground up restoration but the original panel "patina"

 

[sjt01]

Took the Unimog to a mission station about 60 miles from home, and collected a 1953 BMW 250 cc non-working motor bike. It turned out that the dynamo brushes were wired back to front, so I soon had my first working motor bike. The lad on the left recognised me 5 years ago at a biogas show where he was selling pumps! They were my neighbours sons who came around to see some mechanicing.

@spin cycle this was in the days when Abbot was worth drinking and Greene King not a corporate! Anyone remember Les Winter at the Lord Nelson, Burnham Thorpe?

Trip to a forest reserve

Ride up to the North on the Lakeshore road

 

[sjt01]

After a break from Malawi for a year, I needed transport urgently when I returned as there were no houses at the college and I had an 18 mile commute. I (and some friends also) got Suzuki 100 bikes.

My commute:

 

[sjt01]

\i managed to get a house on campus, then found a second hand Jeep CJ5 and did it up. The number plate supplier had no L so used 7 upside down.

It needed a new gearbox, and I heard of one in Mzuzu, 250 miles away so a bike trip was in order.

The shopping basket on the back held my overnight stuff and a 5 l petrol can. This is the source of the gearbox, which was paid for and put on the bus for Lilongwe.

The return journey was a bit wetter, this is the M1

Then I came across a river crossing. The Land Rover drivers were prepared to sleep the night in the Land rover, but I did not have the option so tried the crossing. It went OK until the seat went under. I pushed the bike out of the other side, took the plug out, kicked it over so a fountain of water came out. When I kicked it over enough to get a spark, put the plug back in and continued with the journey.

 

[sjt01]

1980 I decided to upgrade from the 100 cc bike to a Yam 175

Then I managed to buy the Haflinger I had seen in 1977, shown with my other transport/lawn mower in the garden

 

[CPF]

What an achievement for yourself and your friends
on your adventures Thank you for sharing.

 

[sjt01]

1985 I was able to buy a set of special tools for Haflinger gearboxes etc. from the missionaries in the far north of Malawi, in exchange for rebuilding their gearboxes sent down to me on the UTM bus. It was the same mission that had originally owned the 86" Land Rover.

 

[sjt01]

1980/81 I got fed up of cleaning the motor bike chain weekly and boiling it in grease, but still wearing badly so when I saw in a motorcycling newspaper that BMW were bringing out a shaft drive trail bike I investigated. There was no BMW dealer in the country at that time, but I spoke to the German who ran the Merc dealership, and his contacts in South Africa. I was able to reserve one, and at Easter flew down. It was an R80GS.
After the Malawi roads, it was a bit of a shock to get on the bike in the showroom, the biggest I had ever ridden, and out and immediately into 4 lanes of one way city traffic.

I rode it back via Zimbabwe and Zambia, and did the first service at Victoria Falls

Back in Malawi

Trip back to the far North

1985 I moved 18 miles to the capital city, Lilongwe with BMW, Haflinger and horse.

At work we had a Peugeot 505 estate with a 4x4 conversion by Dangel.

 

[upnortheast]

Very interesting thread , Sort of thing circumstances mean most of us can only dream of. & don`t have the mechanical skills (genius ) to tackle it.
In your Landrover days in the early 70`s did you know my old friend Willie Rutherford, Landrover specialist & who used a loophole in the law to convert LR on run on red diesel & pay tractor RFL. ?
Went on to form Logic

 

[suffolksmallholder]

\i managed to get a house on campus, then found a second hand Jeep CJ5 and did it up. The number plate supplier had no L so used 7 upside down.
View attachment 1177385

It needed a new gearbox, and I heard of one in Mzuzu, 250 miles away so a bike trip was in order.View attachment 1177386
The shopping basket on the back held my overnight stuff and a 5 l petrol can. This is the source of the gearbox, which was paid for and put on the bus for Lilongwe.
View attachment 1177387
The return journey was a bit wetter, this is the M1
View attachment 1177388
Then I came across a river crossing. The Land Rover drivers were prepared to sleep the night in the Land rover, but I did not have the option so tried the crossing. It went OK until the seat went under. I pushed the bike out of the other side, took the plug out, kicked it over so a fountain of water came out. When I kicked it over enough to get a spark, put the plug back in and continued with the journey.View attachment 1177389

View attachment 1177390

I had a similar crossing in N Oz. Stopping the wheels from trying to flip the bike was hard work. Water right over the engine.
I drained the carbie, refilled the sump with clean oil and continued my journey.
Next river crossing was done in a big loader bucket, phew!
SS

 

[sjt01]

Very interesting thread , Sort of thing circumstances mean most of us can only dream of. & don`t have the mechanical skills (genius ) to tackle it.
In your Landrover days in the early 70`s did you know my old friend Willie Rutherford, Landrover specialist & who used a loophole in the law to convert LR on run on red diesel & pay tractor RFL. ?
Went on to form Logic

He did a gearbox rebuild in Hexham for me while I was at Newcastle University

 

[Exfarmer]

Such a wonderful thread SJT , hope you have many more pictures to put up. Really regret when I was a young man, helped a friend build a landrover for a cross Africa adventure and did not join him on it. He got down to Botswana which amazed me as we had no experience of mechanics, but they were a little simpler than todays models certainly did not fit fancy cooling systems . We did have to fita new chassis as unfortunately this ex military 109 had been used by the navy , probably not the best buy

 

[sjt01]

Such a wonderful thread SJT , hope you have many more pictures to put up. Really regret when I was a young man, helped a friend build a landrover for a cross Africa adventure and did not join him on it. He got down to Botswana which amazed me as we had no experience of mechanics, but they were a little simpler than todays models certainly did not fit fancy cooling systems . We did have to fita new chassis as unfortunately this ex military 109 had been used by the navy , probably not the best buy

Sorry, not many more at this takes me up to the time when I got married and had to go sensible!
Sad day when I parted with the BMW & Haflinger to a white farmer

The replacement was a Subaru Leone bought from a friend who was leaving Malawi.
An excellent car for the job, it served us well for 9 years.

 

[upnortheast]

He did a gearbox rebuild in Hexham for me while I was at Newcastle University

Very clever bloke. Talented rally driver. One of the 1st to realise when quad bikes came from America they had a roll in Agriculture, hence Logic Manufacturing.
Had a close encounter with Leukemia in his teens, recovered but caught up with him about 12 years ago

 

[sjt01]

Very clever bloke. Talented rally driver. One of the 1st to realise when quad bikes came from America they had a roll in Agriculture, hence Logic Manufacturing.
Had a close encounter with Leukemia in his teens, recovered but caught up with him about 12 years ago

I spent more time at the Highlander Garage, which used to be next to the Highlander pub in Belsay, where Richard Wilson kept a heap of old 4x4s

 

[sjt01]

While I was in Malawi, my father found in a barn an old Land Rover which satisfied his friend's need for a vehicle to restore.

He duly set about restoring it, and during the process revealed the chassis number

which makes it the second production machine.
He did it up very nicely.

The number plate is not original.

He let my father have it, and it was passed on to me.

Unfortunately the chassis was not original, and so many other parts had to be replaced it was not worth what an original would have been.
I decided I was only using it so occasionally that it was time to sell.