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[w3526602]

Hi,

I've opened a new thread, as I now have a trailer, so it's no longer WANTED, and I doubt that anybody would "click" anyway.

I'm very, very, pleased. Thankyou Taz! I can start digging my fish pond now, cart the spoil (probably 2m2) to the tip, in managable loads, and still a lot less than a skip, and no time pressure.

(OT ... my Head Carer ,the CEO, arrived to find me up a ladder, lopping branches off a tree in the front garden. Oops! I explained that I had to drag myself up the ladder)

But cost so far will have to be off-set against having a towbar fitted to Barbara's Hyundai iX20 (1600cc engine, unbraked towing capacity 0.75tons says the Drivers hand book), just coming up for 4 years, and it's second MOT, FSH, and has just topped 10,000 miles ... one disabled lady owner, non-smoker, retired civil servant. I won't mention the way it burns rubber if you give it wellie when exiting round-a-bouts. (maybe all modern cars do that?), but it's original tyres are now approaching their sell-by-date.

I haven't looked to see if the MGW is stamped/fixed/painted on the draw-bar, what the men with clip-boards will be looking for, but it does have a secondary coupling ... a chain that stops the drawer-bar hitting the tarmac, if the coupling falls off the ball. (On bigger trailers, the secondary coupling must pull the trailer brakes on, then snap). I'd rather have a dealer's warranty to keep the perceived value up, rather than save a few bucks by DIY. Hyundai, have a very long manufacturer's warranty ... I thought it was 7 years, but now I'm not so sure.

Question. Should I just use my number stamps on a bit of aluminium sheet, and pop rivet that to the drawer bar, go all "Bull***Baffles Brains", and buy a proper plate off Ebay?

I think this trailer is a keeper.

602

[The Shed]

I believe for a 'proper' plate you have to send a copy of your registration certificate. If it legible I see no reason not to make your own.
Though I do believe it is perfectly legal to just have 'On Tow' displayed as per a number plate on the trailer. This is what I used attached to a trailer board.
Providing you are sensible with the loading and the trailer looks legal there should be no risk of a 'pull'.

Many years ago we would regularly do a 'Beer Run' to Calais. Transit or similar loaded to capacity, and no more. Both of us working as a Drivers we new the legalities, and risks.
Many did not and where often seen 'pulled'. Anyway, one weekend in the early hours of a Sunday Morning we where exiting Dover docks, positioning ourselves behind an ex Post Office Sherpa so as not to attract attention to our sluggish Tranny going up the hill. Unfortunately the Sherpa left us in a cloud of diesel smoke and powered away.
Approaching the roundabout exit the Police and VOSA had set up a check point and vehicles where crawling through with some being pulled over.
As we passed the Officer 'on point' my friend who was driving asked him 'shall we pull over' ? 'Erm, yees Ok' was the response.
Why on Earth he asked I will never know to this day ! Anyhows a quick check over and portable weighbridge found we where all ok. Whilst stood waiting I asked one of the officers why they where not pulling up any of the obviously overloaded cars ? They do not have weight plates, so we can't check them was the response ! 

[w3526602]

Hi Shed,

Did you see the TV film "BOOZE CRUISE"? Waving a sub-machine gun (souvenier) out of the car window while passing through Customs might not have been a good idea.

Google should be able to find it, and play.

602

[The Shed]

Hi Shed,

Did you see the TV film "BOOZE CRUISE"? Waving a sub-machine gun (souvenier) out of the car window while passing through Customs might not have been a good idea.

Google should be able to find it, and play.

602

😀 not seen that one, may have to look it up.

[w3526602]

not seen that one, may have to look it up.

Hi Shed,

I think there was a follow-up, with a similar title. Both worth watching.

Also see The Sandwich Man  (or was it The Sandwichboard Man?) The title character wanders round London in the 1950s/1960s, carrying advertising boards, watching life.

The opening scenes involve a man on a bike and a man on a motor bike ... dressed differently, but the same man. Should amuse Alan.

It's only a short film, worth buying the DVD. It ends with footage of a Triumph Herald based "DUKW" powering down the Thames.

Unfortunately, I didn't notice any Series

602

[Alan Drover]

Amphicar was built in Germany but used Triumph Herald engines.

[Wittsend]

Wheeler Dealers (with End China) did an Amphicar ...

Amphicar


 

[Alan Drover]

I remember that. It broke down and had to be rescued.

[w3526602]

Though I do believe it is perfectly legal to just have 'On Tow' displayed as per a number plate on the trailer. This is what I used attached to a trailer board.

Hi Shed,

My understanding (Pears Encylopedia, mid-1950s edition) is that a trailer did not require a registration plate IF the tow car's registration could be read over the trailer.

That has now changed, but I don't know when. There is also something in my mind, that 2cwt (possibly ULW) was the maximum for an unbraked trailer in the late 1960s.

You now need a full set of rear lamps, and an illuminated registration plate, to match the tow-vehicle's registration (presumably black or yellow, as appropriate) French trailers, in France, have their own registration, and possibly their own MOT and insurance.

I think the trailer lighting regulations (anybody got a copy) show that the rear marker lamps must be within 140mm of the sides of the trailer, but is that the side of the box, or the projecting mudguards, if fitted.

If you are towing a double horse box, you will need a very long trailer board.

602

PS, I believe that 7 to 13pin, and 13 to 7pin adaptors are/were available. Will a 7-pin socket pass an MOT?

[w3526602]

Hi,

I remember going to the cinema, probably mid-1940s, and seeing a film that featured an (American) amphibian car, which with many years of hindsight, I now believe to have been some sort of Jeep, with a "punt styled" body.

Can anybody name that film?

Did Land Rover ever make anything similar? I have a vague memory of seeing a picture of a Land Rover fitted with pontoons, but I'm asking about something with a floating body. A quick bit of mental arithmetic suggests that 1.5 cubic metres of "floation" would be required to float on a "still" pond, plus another 0.5 cubic metres as a factor of safety. Hey! that does not seem unachievable. Where's my slide rule?

1 cu.ft of water = 6.25ish gallons. A pint of water weighs a pound and a quarter,(Rhyming memnonic), so a gallon of water weighs 10lbs ... Doh! I already knew that! ... A quick bit of guestimating suggests that 10 oil drums would float a SWB with a smallish factor of safety .... Lets not bother!

602

PS ... Central heating oil storage tanks should float ......  and our concrete "fosse septique" in France was 2.4 x 1.2 x 1.2 metres, and expensive. The farmers wife next door uttered a French expletive when she saw the hole we had dug. I have seen a floating skip, powered by an outboard motor. I'm now having visions of cutting four holes in a skip, to let a Landy's wheels poke out the bottom .... I'll get my coat ...

PPS ... I read about a couple who needed to move a  residential caravan to their island.They laid a large tarpaulin on the beach, and stood the caravan in the middle, then tied the slack up the sides, and waited for the tide to come in. The tarp manufacturers were happy to warrant that the tarp would not leak, but not the viability of how it was being used. The caravan floated, was towed to the island, behind their outboard powered dingy, without incident. I suggest that the same plan would work with a Land Rover ... IF you do the math.

[Peter Holden]

There is a book called half safe, about an amphibious jeep circumnavigating Great Britain - could that also be the name of the film?

Peter

[biloxi]

Around the World by Amphibious Jeep by Ben Carlin.

[vod80]

What a brilliant title! Now looking for this book...

[The Shed]

w3526602
Landrover did have a couple of attempts at amphibious vehicles. The first I believe was based on a Series 2 and as you suggest, used pontoons.
A 90 was displayed and used in the water at Cowes some years back.
LRO have featured various iterations of Amphibious Landrover over the years. Don't think any where intended for commercial sale ?

[Exile]

A 90 was displayed and used in the water at Cowes some years back.

Yes, that vehicle was one of two soft-top Ninetys built to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Land Rover in 1988.

It was not amphibious in the way that 602 means, but had huge pontoons strapped to front and sides.

I don't know what happened to the "amphibious"vehicle, but the other is in the Museum at Gaydon.

(Civilian Ninety soft-tops had only been available by special order since 1984, so there are very few about).