Humber FV1600 - ARN 105-819 - Restoration moves forward.

[Dave Mills]

Bookham, have been through this yard on a Champ Camp and have been up close and personal to the Humber in the pic. No go zone i am afraid as well as the champ sitttng beside it, just to long in the open and rather butchered.

However, there is another couple of gems in that yard, one is a Ferret covered in blackberries still upright on its runflats as auctioned from the army disposal auctions; we managed to prise open a hatch and take a sneek peak inside, it is all there and from memory the crew helmets are still plugged into their sockets. It also was carrying its last units colours still painted on the gaurds.

The other hidden gem is in the top shed in the right hand corner as you look up the hill and it is a Humber FV1600, unmolested and 100% complete as sold from army disposal auctions, Richard Couttes-Smith and myself drooled over it when we found it buried amongst all the wartime jeep canvas stacked in crates sitting on the trailer of a Blitz semi also in the shed and the many, many other vehicles stored undercover in a nice dry environment although covered in inches of dust.

The owner will not sell a thing and it took a lot of talking by others to get all of us scroungers into that yard. It is a shame that this kind of hoarding goes on but each to their own i say. Rich and i both felt that we could have just added fuel, dipped the oil add 24 volts and driven the old girl out of the shed. Of course we would have had to remove the back wall of the shed.

From memory Rich scribbled down the Serial Number of this vehicle.

Dave.

[Richard Coutts-Smith]

Yellow Humber had been converted to a spray unit, would have been quite a useful set up in it's time. We certainly did have a good poke around, plenty to see and cry over, like the DUKW converted to a mobile grain bin... Being the sort of Gentleman that typifies Champ Owners, not a thing came out through the gate except photos.

Humber/Commers for Clive
Chassis number 6310001 to 6310150
150 trucks, 14 of which were FFR
ARN 105 674 to ARN 105 823
Sold off '67, '68, a couple in '69

[fv1620]

Thank you Richard I knew I cold rely on you. Nice to have the definitive info. They started selling them off a bit earlier over here 1962-67, mostly 1964. But the Pigs started going 1967 & this continued into the early 1970s until they started buying them back again!

That Commer handbook I have had a print run of 250, whether it has any significance I don't know. Perhaps they wanted a lot of spare copies or maybe they hoped there might have been more than 150 sold!

[Dave Mills]

How is your resto coming along Clive? I am on the scrounge for the seal housing for the winch (see the wanted section of the forum) do you have one?

Glad to see and read that you are just as passionate as us about the Humber,
be it a PIG or GS.

I have the seals for the winch drum as they are stock standard and available over the counter at my local Industrial Supplies, if I cannot find a seal holder my last resort is to go to the local foundary and have one cast. Unfortunately, I do not believe that there is a great demand for these so it will probably be a one off cast.

Dave.

[fv1620]

Dave my restoration of FV1609 continues but I take it to shows none the less. It has interesting embellishments in that after Troop Trials in 1956 it became a police vehicle in 1958. Often little tit-bits of history surface that show me that I need to change or add something.

But the basic maintenance continues, last year I got off all that awful rubber paint that was peeling off the torsion bars. I know of one Pig that snapped a bar over night. Finished the chassis & now even the gearbox & transfer box are painted as original in BSC Lemon zinc phosphate primer (should be zinc chromate but I don't anyone will notice that!)

Your housing. I have a peculiar selection of Humber spares that came all the way back from Africa but there is nothing in that. I sold the only winch I had to a Land Rover owner who felt that these Turner winches or parts of them were fitted on Land Rovers.

There was also an inquiry from Germany from someone who also thought the same. So perhaps your next move would be to see what people in the Land Rover world might have.

The parts book most people use is dated 1960 which of course pre-dates the full implementation of NATO Codification in the UK so I have searched old NATO CDs to try to match up to a NSN that might have been issued later to broaden the search. But nothing. I have also gone through the 5 amendments issued to up date the 1960 book to see if the is any change but nothing.

I've got the 1952 parts book amended to 1957 to see if there were any manufacturer's cross references but nothing I'm afraid.

Have you tried Bannisters? http://www.milweb.net/go/banister/

[Dave Mills]

They seem to be as rare as "Rocking Horse S###". I think I may, just may have located one in Townsville in Northern Queensland, am waiting on a reply. Rich put me onto it. I have feelers out through the Austin Champ group in England and I truly appreciate the MLU and others world wide effort in trying to locate this item.

Cheers,

Dave.

[Dave Mills]

Have started to reassemble the rear diff, suspension and driveline stations back onto the chassis. Only managed one side, will finish it off and start on the other side next weekend. It is good to finally see all the preperation work coming together. The old rusted flexible conduit for the wiring loom is only in place as a template with all to be reproduced or replaced when i start to remake the wiring looms. Thankfully they come in sections so it is rather straight foward (I hope).

Dave.