Ford Incident Vehicle.

Fire trucks at RAF Scampton. The Red Arrows, who fly from there now, are better served than the Dambusters of 617 Squadron. Guy Gibson’s Lancasters, which took off from here 70 years ago this month, had truck conversions on Fordsons to rush, if that’s the word, to their aid if anything went wrong. The 1940 Ford WOA2 heavy utility was usually an upright rugged shooting brake on a reinforced Model 62 V8 chassis, with a military-pattern grille, a 30HP engine and many survived the conflict as breakdown trucks. In wartime some served as staff cars with a folding map table behind the front seats and some were made into open tourers for the desert. Production continued into the late 1940s and, long before the introduction of SUVs, they became general purpose vehicles often used off-road despite not having four wheel drive. Wide tyres with deep treads gave useful grip. Post Office Telephones Home Counties Division bought them for line maintenance and in 1946 added ex-military reconditioned war-surplus stock, some with two rows of seats and two more that tipped-up in the rear. The WOA2 was adapted as a 15cwt General Service truck known as the WOT2, like this survivor at Scampton, with the same bonnet and radiator. The forward control resulted in a narrow toe-board for the driver aft of the front wheel arch. The simplified cab had canvas top and no doors; some had individual small windscreens. Later versions with fully enclosed cabs evolved into proper trucks. WOT2s equipped as fire appliances were used by the National Fire Service.

Production May 1941-1947
Engine 8-cylinders in 90deg Vee; front; 77.8mm x 95mm, 3622cc; compr 6.3:1; 80bhp (59.6kW) @ 3500 rpm; 140lbft (190Nm) @ 1500rpm; 22.1bhp (16.5kW)/l.
Engine structure: side valves; centre gear-driven 3-bearing camshaft; aluminium detachable cylinder heads, blocks and upper crankcase unitary cast iron; engine weight 581lb (263.5kg); Stromberg 48 twin choke downdraught carburettor, coil ignition, camshaft-driven distributor; mechanical fuel pump; 3-bearing cast steel crankshaft; thermosyphon cooling, two belt-driven pumps, pressure lubrication by camshaft pump.
Transmission: rear wheel drive; 9in (23cm) sdp cushioned clutch; 3-speed manual all-synchromesh gearbox; spiral bevel final drive.
Chassis: steel X-braced frame with 4 cross-members; suspension by transverse leaf springs; 4 hydraulic lever arm dampers; mechanical drum brakes; worm and sector steering; electrically welded steel disc wheels.
Equipment: 6-volt electrics, body colours according to service
Production: 11,754 http://www.dovepublishing.co.uk/2013/01/coalition-car.html.
Dambuster film. Aircrew embarks from a WOA2.
See more in the Ford in Ford of Britain Centenary File, still available from good bookshops.

Jargon

A “Growth Partnership Company (which) works in collaboration with clients to leverage visionary innovation that addresses the global challenges and related growth opportunities that will make or break today's market participants,” makes me suspicious. It “supports clients by addressing these opportunities and incorporating two key elements driving visionary innovation: The Integrated Value Proposition and The Partnership Infrastructure. (This) provides support to our clients throughout all phases of their journey to visionary innovation including: research, analysis, strategy, vision, innovation and implementation. (It) is entirely unique as it constructs the foundation upon which visionary innovation becomes possible. This includes our 360 degree research, comprehensive industry coverage, career best practices as well as our global footprint of more than 40 offices. For more than 50 years, we have been developing growth strategies for the global 1000, emerging businesses, the public sector and the investment community. Is your organization prepared for the next profound wave of industry convergence, disruptive technologies, increasing competitive intensity, Mega Trends, breakthrough best practices, changing customer dynamics and emerging economies?”

How do they expect to be taken seriously with such cliché-ridden verbiage? It almost goes without saying that it’s an agency engaged on selling us electric car stuff. It claims “the European Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Market is Becoming Increasingly Self Sustaining. Market to be bolstered by improved strategic access to charging stations and development of robust business models. The electric vehicle (EV) charging industry in Europe is in the midst of transformation, with the focus on ramping up EV charging infrastructure for the rapidly expanding EV market. Significant growth is on the cards as participants from various verticals such as industrial automation, utilities, parking operators and infrastructure operators enter the fray. This development is also set to help the EV market wean itself off government subsidies and incentives, while becoming increasingly self-sustaining.”

“I have seen the future, and it works,” trilled American journalist and social activist Lincoln Steffens (1866-1936). He had been to Russia in 1919 and the Revolution was still new. Many dotty luminaries followed, persuaded by Soviet minders that collectivism was a success, fulfilling their Fabian visions.

Well, Russia was not the future. It didn’t work.

Idealists only want their prejudices approved and electric car enthusiasts who only think that after a bit of research the battery “problem” will be solved are as deluded as the promoters of the electric car vehicle charging infrastructure. I’ve lost count of the Great Electric Car initiatives that have come and gone. Some have failed expensively and publicly once their glib opportunistic entrepreneurs have soaked up subsidies and investments by stupid governments and Greenie authorities.

“New analysis, Strategic Technology and Market Analysis of Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure in Europe, finds that the market for EV charging stations is expected to grow rapidly from 7,250 charging stations in 2012 to over 3.1 million by 2019 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 113.3 per cent over the period 2012-2019. France, Germany, Norway and the United Kingdom are expected to lead the market due to the high adoption rates of EVs in these countries. The availability of charging infrastructure plays a vital role in ensuring that EVs maintain their growth momentum. This, in turn, means easy access to charging stations to eliminate range anxiety and ensure that EV users have the freedom to drive for longer periods of time.”

I won’t bother you with the identity of the growth partnership purveyor. It wasn’t Elektromotive, whose charging stations are featured in the pictures. Search 360 degree, comprehensive industry coverage, career best practices, global footprint.

I see the “annual” London to Brighton electric car challenge has been cancelled.

Spitfire Monaco

Diamond heists at the Cannes film festival. Why didn’t the heisters try Monaco at Grand Prix time? When I covered the race in the 1970s I got to know a lot of ways round the circuit the most amateur footpad could have worked out. You could reach most of the corners by obscure little paths. There was even an underground passage from the Hotel de Paris that came out somewhere just above the exit from the tunnel. You could sprint to a little sloping garden there to photograph cars from above. It was necessary to get from place to place without hindrance during practice or race, so you had to know how to go from one side of the track to the other. Any self-respecting jewel thief planning to liberate a cache from some socialite’s bedroom in the Metropole would be able to make his way to the harbour front, while the gendarmerie and the commissaires were looking at the action on the track. They could have been on board a yacht and half way to Algiers before the rocks were missed. Raymond Baxter used to quip, during his commentaries at Le Mans or Rheims, how it was always a good day for French burglars when lines of white-gloved and belted gendarmes did their self-important sweeps of the pits or the starting grid.

Drove to Monaco in 1967 in this Triumph Spitfire with MLC of Motor Sport. Can’t remember how long it took before the days of the Autoroute, but we usually stopped overnight en route. Can’t remember much about the Spitfire either. It wasn’t a memorable car. I ran one for a while when I was on The Motor road test staff. It was still relatively new, having been introduced in 1962 on the Triumph Herald backbone mainframe, with somewhat agricultural high-pivot swing axle independent rear suspension. This would get up on tiptoe and operating on only the edges of the 5.20x13 tyres get quickly out of control. The one I took to Monaco was the newly introduced Mark 3 with a 1.3 75bhp engine and larger front calipers. It did 95mph but I never took to it, unlike its 1968 derivative the GT6 once its rear suspension had been fixed. A reversed bottom wishbone linkage and rubber doughnuts in the drive shafts transformed the handling. Everybody dubbed it a miniature E-type Jaguar, which it was with the emphasis on miniature. It really wasn’t a very big car yet I drove one to the Swedish Grand Prix at Karlskoga. We drove everywhere then. Never thought about a diamond heist.

Blaming speed.

Blaming speed for car accidents is a bit like blaming altitude for aircraft crashes. A stationary car, like an aeroplane that never leaves the ground, is perfectly safe. Speed of some sort is inseparable from both, cars can do a lot of damage at 10mph, and lowering speed limits (like lowering altitude) does not always remove danger. It would be nice to think that 30mph is safe, and the slower you go the safer you are, but road behaviour is subtler than that.

Enforcing current limits is difficult enough, experience shows drivers generally go along with those they believe fair and necessary, but trying to decrease them may be counter-productive. I once talked to a traffic policeman, who patrolled a notorious A-class highway on which nine fatal accidents occurred in seven years. Progressively lessening speed limits made no difference. Limits were enforced vigorously yet a tenth death only served to emphasise authorities’ bafflement. All the available expertise seemed to offer no solution.

He agreed that the trouble probably lay in the piecemeal nature of the road, which had open, well-engineered stretches alternating with narrow twisting, heavily trafficked ones. The change of pace and interruptions to drivers’ and riders’ concentration were closer to the root of the problem than further speed limits. They already encompassed 60mph, 50mph. and 40mph. Of course drivers ought not to lose concentration, but in such matters of life and death we have to deal with the real world, not the world as we would like it to be.

Anti-speed lobbyists have become so shrill that their perfectly worthy aim of improved safety is lost in a speeding driver scapegoat-search, with the unfortunate (and wholly acceptable to a parsimonious government) side-effect, of diverting attention from road improvements to re-engineer that policeman’s beat, giving him fewer grisly and unhappy messes to clear up.

Full marks to Honda for its support, with a CR-V, for the Scottish helicopter ambulance service.

Which? complaints

Which? claims nine drivers in ten think cars should have spare wheels. That means nine drivers out of ten are either living in the Dark Ages of the motor car, or drive something old with worn-out wheels. They think they may need to get the Stepney out and affix it by the roadside. Don’t they realise life’s not like that now?

They don’t trust tyres. They trust engines and transmissions. They don’t carry a spare gearbox or camshaft belt, yet these are as likely to fail as a modern properly inflated tyre. Dear me yes father always had a spare wheel in the boot or, in our first Wolseley, in a metal casing on the outside of what would have been the boot lid. There it got wet, rusty, and was usually flat when you needed it. Come to think of it the cleverly named Jackall (jack-all, geddit) hydraulic jacking system you worked by pumping a handle through a hole in the floor didn’t always lift the wheels off the ground. Punctures left a Bad Taste.

Which? readers are cross because rascally car manufacturers provide a repair kit which is, “more expensive if you get a puncture because you’ll have to replace the sealant and the tyre each time you get a flat.” Each time. Scandalous. Furthermore, “Tyres can’t be repaired due to the chemicals in sealants. Water-based sealants, such as Honda’s, can be flushed out to allow a repair but only a franchised dealer can do this.” Disgrace. A Vauxhall Astra canister can cost £50 and a new tyre £148. “Conversely, fixing a simple puncture costs roughly £15.”

Which planet is Which? living on? The only people who seriously repair punctures nowadays must be driving very slowly on spindly tyres. Back in the Dark Ages we did drive until the canvas showed through. (I heard a TV Formula 1 commentator say that not long ago – he must have been a Dark Ages survivor too). But it was different with skinny tyres and slow speeds. “Give me a full-sized spare wheel anytime. I’ll put up with the weight and the slightly smaller boot space,” complain Which? readers. “I recently had a puncture and found my car has no spare wheel. Having to spend £200 on a new tyre was a bit much. A total rip-off especially if the tyre has thousands of miles left in it.” How do you suddenly discover your car has no spare wheel? Do people not look? Drivers like that should be condemned to drive on skinny Dark Ages tyres that last 50,000 miles so they will skid on the wet cobbles and get killed.

Nine Which? drivers out of ten have no idea how far we have come in tyre technology.

Pictures: TOP Continental Tyres 140th anniversary BELOW Wolseley 14 MIDDLE Dark Ages. Even record breakers carried spares. In 1924 Malcolm Campbell’s Bluebird (a 350hp Sunbeam, here with stub exhausts) changed wheels between runs at Pendine. Boards prevent narrow tyres sinking into wet sands. Which? tyre test class winner. ContiSportContact3. BOTTOM Continental Tyres Cord: Moscow Fashion Designer creates a new trend. Pictures from splendid Newspress.

Classic book

Guild of Motoring Writers on a front line? A handful of founders in 1944 maybe but not many. Road tests can be written under fire from unhappy PRs, readers throw brickbats, but it’s a relatively safe business so long as you choose carefully who to drive with on press launches. Yet Mike Brewer was actually shot at doing an illuminating series on army vehicles in Afghanistan. Bouncy and enthusiastic, his publicist describes Brewer as TVs best-known car dealing expert, and now he has produced a book on buying and selling modern classic cars.

Brewer presents Discovery channel’s Wheeler Dealer series, which has been running for nine years and is shown all over the world. It illustrates what interest there is in classic cars and Brewer’s book is a useful primer. It covers buying, owning, selling, auctions and basics like giving a car a deep clean. “It never ceases to amaze me how little effort people make when it comes to tidying up their cars,” Brewer says. Quite right. I learned it long ago during a brief spell in the rough and tumble of the Glasgow motor trade. “If it’s looking a bit grimy get the engine steam cleaned, and don’t forget the painted areas like the inner wings.” Every motoring writer should have a spell selling cars. What makes people buy can be revealing, and it’s hardly ever understeer or oversteer or how many seconds it takes to 60.

Brewer’s experience in the trade was more successful than mine. See his Tales from the Trade. There is cogent advice on starter classics. He recommends Mark 1 Ford Escort and Vauxhall Viva HB - plenty of variants and spares are cheap. I was less convinced about his advocacy of the Triumph Spitfire although he does recommend later ones after 1974.

Sporting classics? MGA yes, Delorean definitely not – terrible car – a dishonest pastiche. Favourite modern classics? VW Beetle – OK. Ford Capri ? Maybe. Lotus Elan? Yes. Jaguar E-type, yes certainly although not the lugubrious V12. And Morgan? OK but probably not the Plus 8, which I always thought over-powered for the frail frame. As for the Citroën DS; well to say the complicated suspension and hydraulics aren’t for the faint-hearted is an understatement. I’d go for something more bullet-proof - an MGB maybe with a Heritage bodyshell – to fend off the Taliban.

Mike Brewer’s The Wheeler Dealer Know How! £16.99 ISBN 978-1-845844-89-9 everything you need to know about buying, preparing and selling collectable cars. www.veloce.co.uk.
Top: Jaguar E-type. Ford Capri II. My sturdy MGB. Bottom - I tested military vehicles in my Gunner days. 8 (Alma) Field Battery Royal Artillery Daimler Ferret armoured car, like they used to build in what became the Jaguar factory in Browns Lane. That’s me in the turret.