General articles

  1. The NATO plug on your trailer makes your hands mucky when you plug it in. The older the plug the worse the problem. It is very tedious replacing the plug, so paint the rubber with tyre paint, this is just liquid rubber, and will give protection for much of a season.
  2. If you have an FFR Series IIA or III, when you change the generator make sure it is compatible with the control box. The transistorised Control Box No.9 Mk4 must be used with the Generator No.10 Mk3, i.e. you must have a single ammeter on the shunt box. The non-transistorised Control Box No.9 Mk3 must be used with the Generator No.10 Mk2, i.e. you have two ammeters mounted on the dash.
  3. Ninety / One-Ten fuses often blow because the wrong fuses are fitted. The ratings specified refer to the holding current. The blow rating of the fuse is twice that value.
  4. When looking for an ignition fault, if you remove the plugs, reconnect them and observe sparks, this does not necessarily mean that the ignition system is OK. Under compression there may not be enough voltage to produce a healthy spark.
  5. The diaphragm from a Series II and III fuel pump with the middle bit removed will fit a Rolls-Royce "B"-series engine (as used in the Ferret, Champ, Pig etc.)
  6. The primary winding of an ignition coil, although seeming to work on 10 - 12 volts, will in fact release in excess of 300 volts when the points open, causing a collapse of the magnetic field in the coil. That's what the spark is at the points.
  7. Testing a condenser with an ohmmeter is not much good because it cannot read high resistances, even if there is a leakage it will not usually be detectable. Low resistance leakages are unusual as the sparking across a defect in the foil within the condenser causes it to vaporise the foil at the point of defect.
  8. "Duck Egg Blue" is not the colour used to paint engines. The correct colour is "Sky Blue", BS Colour 101.
  9. The bridge classification sign should be 230mm in diameter, but sometimes towing vehicles and their trailers show a sign on the right side facing outwards. This sign should only be 150mm in diameter.
  10. "Wolf" is a generic term used by Land Rover to cover their recent range of vehicles. The name has not been adopted by the Armed Forces. The correct title for this range of vehicles is Higher Specification (HS) of which their are twenty-three variants, e.g. Equipment Asset Code NB 4220 3100, TUL (HS) GS Soft Top - or Transport Utility Light (Higher Specification) General Service Soft Top.

Clive Elliott