Yards And Yarns

[Carlo]

When Angus was racing the McGinty's truck at Timaru recently some of the Grandkids wanted to change his name to Angus Frog and call the truck Kermit.

[Rod Grimwood]

On leaving there years ago I have been told to be wary of pigs at that time of night. Angus should have just borrowed his car to get home if he took off after damaging the ute.

[AMCO72]

Yeah....not so much a 'Bovine on the Bonnet' as a 'Boar under the Bumper'.
Just kidding as to what he said on impact. That was too strong for him......more like 'bother'!!!!!!!!
He must have inherited his Mothers tough streak. She didn't check on the sheep, and he didn't diligently search for the injured PIG to check on it's well being. I think I would have armed myself with the wheel brace and delivered the 'coupe de grace' to the poor PIG.

[Howard Wood]

Gerald I hope this does not mean the end of the orange Ute. Now just remember you started the stories about road trips to and from race meetings.

For the 1973'74 Formula Ford season my brother Don and I were both running FFs and we decided in our wisdom that we needed a "proper" transporter to carry our two cars around. For $80 I bought a 1952 K model Bedford (for the historians: ex Tai Tapu Dairy Co, sorry I can't remember the chassis #), a walk through truck in the style the Poms would call a pantechnicon. We raised the roof, put in opening windows and ramps for two FFs together with "sleeping accomodation". We pretty much lived in that truck for the main part of the season.
After an early Manfield round I had to fly to ChCh leaving Don to bring the truck and cars back to Hamilton. The trip of course didn't start until the end of meeting festivities had finished and was going well until the Desert Rd when the thing ran a big end bearing. Figuring there was little to be done in the dark, Don had a couple of hours sleep in the truck then set to work on the side of the road in the morning, droping the sump (still full of oil as he had no suitable container) pulling out the offending con rod and piston and puting the sump back on. While diligently cleaning up as all good mechanics do, he discovered the hose clamp intended to block off the crankshaft oilway lying on the ground so had to repeat the whole process. The engine ran on the remaining 5 cylinders, after a fashion, the vibration at anything over idle was pretty fierce but he was mobile.
The engine's overall condition hadn't improved when the bearing ran and was going through oil at an alarming rate and combined with some oil loss over himself during the roadside "repairs" he urgently needed more oil. He drained the oil from both FF's oil tanks, then both gearboxes and continued on.
At some stage during the following night both tyres on the left rear picked up punctures, partially due to their condition but also because being a considerate motorist he was keeping well left. Quickly jacking up the rear, a flat tyre was put on the inside on both rears and he continued.....
Finally some 36 hours after leaving Manfield the outskirts of Hamilton were in sight and he began to think he would actually make it home until an elderly gent on a bycicle passed him and told him the other "good" rear tyre was also going flat. At this point he walked the rest of the way to the Crockers for a bit of a hand.
The good news is that we bought another K Bedford, parked it on the newly formed roads of an upmarket Hamilton subdivision as my mother unreasonably refused to let us park it outside the house and swaped motors. At the end of the season I sold the truck to a hippie who intended to convert it to a house bus and bought a Mk4 Zephyr tow car.
Little did I realize that our days of repairing cars on the side of the road was just getting going!

[AMCO72]

Howard, the 'orange ute' is still being driven around Auckand, until such time as Angus can get to fix it. It is obvious to any casual observer, let alone a cop, that the thing isn't in roadworthy condition, and is ripe for a 'bluey' The morning after the crash, Angus got in touch with his insurance company, as you do, and when told of the damage they said they would probably write it off, and pay out the $3500 for the wreck. However, he is not that easily put off, and I suspect that negotiations are underway as we speak for parts to make good. He has just taken delivery of a chassis for a new 'super-tourer' which has to be built for the next round at HD, about a month away, so I suspect that the Falcon may be on the back burner. The insurance company did offer to pay for his bus fare back to Auckland!!!!!!!Needless to say he told them where to stick their bus fare.
Those K Bedfords were pretty gutless damn things when they were new, and I dont think time, and a million miles later, they would have found any more HP. I used to cart shingle in one in 1962, a machine that was only 10 years old, X Leeston County Council, so quite close to your Tai Tapu machine, and I remember that we could never get it into top gear with a load.

[AMCO72]

Further to that. The K Bedford we used was a regular bonnet and cab model, not like the later TK, which was forward control. It was this model, the TK, that did sterling service in a lot of Dairy Companies tanker fleets later on.
I was thinking about the loads we carried. Our K 'Beddie' was a steel decked tipper, and couldn't have held more than 3 or 4 cu/yds of river shingle. We used to load, with again an X Leeston/Ellismere County Caterpillar loader, which had a 1 &1/2 yard bucket, but it was all too tough for the old 'K'. She overheated on a run one day, cracked the head, and was parked up......joined the dead vehicle fleet under the macrocarpa trees, where I'm sure she has been 'discovered' and featured on an 'abandoned/neglected' thread similar to what we see on RS.

[Howard Wood]

Gerald, as an 11 year old I learned to drive in an 1948 Austin 5 tonner, around the same size as the K Model Bedford but a far better truck. Powered by what became the Austin Healy 100/6 engine from the A90. It was good for 60 mph, not that I got to do that. At hay making time, as I was the smallest I got to drive the truck in the paddock with the hay elevator. Because the cab was so narrow, the load of hay so wide and I so small, I had to drive standing on the running board, left foot on the accelerator through the open driver's door while looking backwards over my shoulder to line the elevator up with the hay bales on the ground. The mirror of course was a corroded round thing the size of a saucer and absolutely no use.

Today I have a number of Kenworths and the drivers complain when the heated mirrors fog up!

[AMCO72]

Howard, you/we are very lucky that OSH was not around in those days, or we would have been doing a lengthy stretch in prison!!!
Yes the Austin 5 tonner was certainly a better machine that the Bedford, and yet they must have had similar sized motors....about 3 litres. I doubt that the Bedford would have done 60KPH let alone 60MPH. The reason we had the Bedford was because the Leeston/Ellesmere County yard must have been doing an upgrade, and all this old gear was being auctioned off. I went to the sale, and there was an impressive line up of stuff, all of which had had a 'showroom blow' in battleship grey. They must have had 100's of gallons of the stuff, and they hadn't been too fussy how clean everything was, and as for masking up....yeh right!!!!A good bit of overspray on the tyres as I remember. The helpers at the auction started anything that had an engine,......'BUT just remember boys, that you buy 'as inspected', with no guarantees given or implied'. We paid 200 pounds for the old girl, with a current WOF, that was probably going to run out in a week or twos time. [not like nowadays] To be fair, we bought it for a specific job, which it did for a while, but clearly the engine had done it's dash, with all and sundry in the yard driving it over the years.
Heated mirrors...turn indicators!!!!!! The turn indicator on the Bedford was a mechanical arm attached to the door panel that you raised with your free right hand through the open window. There was a little yellow metal hand on the end that could be swiveled to indicate either stopping or turning......high tech stuff.

[Oldfart]

The local school bus contractor in Raglan was still using Ks in the 70s when I did my licence. The testing "officer" had me drive up Government Rd which is just a tad steep, then asked me to stop on the steepest bit and put on the handbrake. He got out and put his fag packet just behind the front wheel. Then through the open doorway told me to hill start, and "by the way, if you squash my fags you have failed". Crawled away and stayed in first until the road flattened out somewhat. His response was "that was a bit steeper than I thought"!

[Trevor Sheffield]

I remember Laurie Powell telling me that the Beddie was the best of all the trucks he had tried in his carrying business and he would consider no other. He also said that a load on the Bedford was inclined to move forwards on the deck when on the move, rather than backwards, which was an advantage and I could see his point knowing that he was not all that fussy in many respects. I also remember his old Dad helping him out around the wharves while bravely driving the old V8 engined B4, which had become very much the worse for wear.

On a prior occasion I had driven down to a race meeting at Ohakea with Laurie and his then partner in the B4 V8 and with my wife in my ACV8. Along the way he tried me out for maximum speed and he had the edge with his Hogan heads and tuned engine. However when it came to scrutiniering the old B4 was turned down. One obvious fault I recall was a loose front bumper, but the bolts were rusted up solid and Laurie claimed that it was safe as there was no hope of it falling off. He was not a happy chappy.

My wife was first out on the circuit in the ACV8 and was tailing another lady in an MG down the back straight, but catching her elsewhere. Sadly I was rather hard on my wife when she finished, but was told that a horrible vibration prevented her going any faster down the straight. When I went out I quickly found that the drive shaft which ran close alongside the seat, whipped itself into a frenzy at near maximum speed. However I put my faith in the fact that the shaft ran over a chassis member and was restrained by a saddle which ran over the top of the shaft.

Back home I jacked up the rear and ran up the revs in top gear and observed a shaft whipping out of line to an amazing extent and in a very dangerous manner. When I came to pull things apart I found that the saddle had been cut and extended when the Ford V8 had been installed prior to me getting the car, joints butted together and the three pieces glued with a thin surface layer of brazing. A knock with a hammer removed the extended section. Prospect --- widower, widow? Not Good! Charlie Black where are you? LOL

[markec]

Rod aske me to post this again to see if anyone recognises any of the people in the background.it is the first appearance of the car at a clubday at Puke, unpainted.

[AMCO72]

Unsign written, rather than unpainted. Dark green with orange vinyl bonnet. Soon to get it's first seasons sponsorship from Dulux, and the distinctive paint job leading to it's nickname....'Stripes'. 70/71 season.
Rod himself in the centre of the car at the back. Others in the pic???????

[markec]

[markec]

[pallmall]

If I recall correctly that incident was on the bit of video from Levin that was posted back about 12 months ago.

[AMCO72]

Howard, going on from your post 523, I'm sorry to have to tell you that the insurance co. has written the 'orange ute' off. Was all too hard for them even though in my opinion was a relatively easy fix, compared to some. Insurance Companies seem to be very eager to write of cars don't they, yet something like the old Falcon is eminently fixable, and is my bet that some young fella will buy it at the auction, do it up, and have a perfectly good machine....for what it is. Angus is philosophical about it, as he is, as he put it, 'sick of driving around in old heaps of shit'. Is looking at a Japanese diesel replacement. Much more sensible, but not half as much fun.
So, the PIG won that round, but HE maybe pork- chops in the freezer now!!!!!!

[markec]

http://www.gatewayclassiccars.com/new-arrivals/60,
An auction site with a good number of interest American 40's,50's and 60's street cars.

[Dave Silcock]

This seems to be the most popular thread on here so here is my yarn about road trips in ths good old days, or as Lee Child would say ''back in the day'' In the early 60's I used to do a lot of travelling to Dunedin to visit my friends Brian Middlemass, Murray Fraser and Trevor Timms and Johh Chivers. These trips started out in my 6AN Ansaldo, then a 1947 2.5 liter Jaguar saloon and sometimes in company with Chivers in his SS90. Much was made of how long the trip took and soon rules were set down, time from Ch Ch was from the power board clock at Hornby, and arrival at Dunedin was the railway station. Time could be deducted whilst stationary for what ever reason. The Ansaldo, which was unbelivably gutless by modern standards, was regular as clockwork at 4 hours 10 minutes.By the time I had bought my first XK 120, this competion was quite the thing, naturally as a red blooded young man this was a challenge not to be ignored. The girl who was to become my first wife and I left Hornby at 6AM, and by the simple expedient of winding up to 100 MPH in 3RD and then running at full throttle to what ever speed it reached be fore some natural event caused me to lift off,got to Ashburton [50 miles] in 30 mins, Timaru half an hour later ,[100 miles] and Oamaru in similar time [150miles] The only car we passed was a beetle back Vangaurd with fishing rods on t roof. Alas we had used up the whole 14 gallons of feul the 120 carried, so had to wait till a service station opened. Now you can see the wisdom of the time out stationary rule, we finally got some more petrol and headed south. On cresting a rise at well over the ton, we came across a farmer shifting a mob of sheep over the other side, whoops, bugger the ewes, I'll drive through them at whatever speed I manage to get down too, whoops cocky has his kids as dogs hounding the ewes along, thinks I'll go down the left hand side of cockies series E Morris 8, problem clipped said E in left rear guard which sent us through a fence,down a bank, which was almost vertical, into a paddock, the only exit from which was a couple of railway tracks with a few more sleepers to stop one from getting stuck across a creek. We got out to the road, cooky says 'if your still here when I come back I'll get you out' I had to remove the brake drums to get the stones out, let down the Firestone Gum Dipped tyres because of the flats on them, do you know I had a 120 in my shop last month with the exact same tyres on it. The boys were waiting at the service station at the end of the so called Dunedin motorway, and very concerned they were. Got dirt in one of my eyes had to go Dunedin Hospital to get it removed, the doctor was a German lady that informed me, ''that when you drive zee open sports car you vill wear zee goggles!!

[AMCO72]

Great yarn Dave. Wonder what you could it in nowadays with the 'Blue Car', on a 'Cop-less' road. But where were the cops? You may have read my story in Yards and Yarns, page 5, post 92, of the 8 mile chase between Christchurch and Leeston in the early 60's. Me in the XK120C verses the black and white MK3 Zephyr belonging to 'you-know-who'!! This turkey was lying in wait down a side road for me I'm convinced, but on the sprint from ChCh to Dunedin there are precious few side-roads suitable to hide down. Did the cops have radar in those days? I remember the big 'cans' that were on the back of the Zephyrs, which had to be dismantled before giving chase, and with the Zephyrs top speed approaching 90mph, they didn't stand a chance against your XK. Perhaps they just flagged you away as a bad job, or perhaps some dangerous and armed criminal making a break for it. Our mate Ray Archibald was known for his high speed dashes from Timaru to ChCh in the dead of night, after visiting his girl-friend, and I know lots of other 'record' attempts were made down this stretch of highway. I didn't have to 'vear zee goggles' though as I always had the hood up, otherwise I couldn't 'do a thing with my hair' on arrival.....in the days before base-ball caps!! We must have been hoons, but we have lived to tell these tales.... Happy days aye.

[Dave Silcock]

I don't know were the cops were in those days but I never saw them. Further to that yarn however was the first car that pulled up to see if we needed help was a bloody great black hearse. As to the cops ,some friends from my Vintage days who lived in Totora just south of Oamaru saw them out on the road measuring the skid marks, thought I might have caused them and on a visit to my home in CH CH informed me of same. Where the hell did they get that notion from!!