Aluminium bulkheads on series 1's ? didnt know that?

[mildred]

Hi Tony,
I know that you like to keep your finger on the pulse with regard to land rover series One stuff , so have a look at this excellent UK site for all makes of cars inc landies series 1's, its a great site to keep an eye on the prices of "Morgans" to :D

Land Rover Series 1 80" Soft Top For Sale (1952) on Car And Classic UK (http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C175572/)


BTW I did not know that landies S1 had aluminium bulkheads? check out the blurb in the advert!
True or false ? every S1 that I have come across is steel!


A great site if you want to reminisce about all the cars your Mar and Pa owned in the 50's and 60's or even early 1900's (horseless carriages) if you are very old but young at heart . :o Whooo there Neddy..:whistling:

[123rover50]

Hi Tony,
I know that you like to keep your finger on the pulse with regard to land rover series One stuff , so have a look at this excellent UK site for all makes of cars inc landies series 1's, its a great site to keep an eye on the prices of "Morgans" to :D

Land Rover Series 1 80" Soft Top For Sale (1952) on Car And Classic UK (http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C175572/)

BTW I did not know that landies S1 had aluminium bulkheads? check out the blurb in the advert!
True or false ? every S1 that I have come across is steel!

A great site if you want to reminisce about all the cars your Mar and Pa owned in the 50's and 60's or even early 1900's (horseless carriages) if you are very old but young at heart . :o Whooo there Neddy..:whistling:

There was a time when the presses for the steel bulkheads broke.
Hand fabricated bulkheads in alloy were used as a stopgap.
These are quite rare. Steel is the norm.

[Scallops]

News to me - mine is steel.

[chazza]

Visit the Series One Club forum in the UK and you can see photos of one that Fen Boy has restored and also some links to an interesting discussion on why they may have been made,

Cheers Charlie

[Lotz-A-Landies]

News to me - mine is steel. Old news to me! :angel:

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/08/833.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/08/834.jpg

[Landy Smurf]

i did hear about this a while back but is interesting

[mildred]

Old news to me! :angel:

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/08/833.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/08/834.jpg
how do we know that these are pics of aluminium fabricated bulkheads, look the same as steel ?
just by looking.
if true it must have cost land rover a fortune and many hours of O/T to keep the production line in operation?
just an observation that's all mate....
this is the real stuff of a Forum, go for gold...........woh harrrrr

[Landy Smurf]

they are different

[Landy Smurf]

actually looking at the footwells this could be a great solution if your footwells were beyond repair

[isuzutoo-eh]

Hey Diana, Is that your collection of bimmers? If it is, I don't like your taste in portable stereos :p:angel:

[Lotz-A-Landies]

how do we know that these are pics of aluminium fabricated bulkheads, look the same as steel ?
<snip>Que?

Look the same as steel 80" firewalls?

Only one answer to that statement https://www.aulro.com/afvb/ I can get you an appointment if you can't see your own way there!

[mildred]

Que?

Look the same as steel 80" firewalls?

Only one answer to that statement http://www.interactcm.com/images/Newsletter/opsm.gif I can get you an appointment if you can't see your own way there!
Actually I had 2 pairs of glasses made up by "SPECSAVERS" in
Triple C, Taree,this week for only $129 pair, great value . OPSM are true rip off merchants and want $170 each .love the specs. So dont go any near :arms::clap2::misclock::whistling:them if you want good reading glasses or others.

[bobslandies]

Irrespective of the writings of some Land Rover experts who maintain that these firewalls were produced when the "Rover" factory press broke down in 1949 (and the press may have broken down possibly on a couple of occasions) it is remarkable that:

1. There is no run of exclusively Aluminium / Steel fabricated firewalls when one would expect there to be a run (if the press broke down and production was continued). After all, up to hundreds of vehicles were assembled every week by the end of 80" production in 1953.

2. When an Aluminium / Steel fabricated firewall does turn up there are usually other vehicles in existence with vehicle numbers quite close that have standard pressed firewalls. Further, the few vehicles that have Aluminium / Steel fabricated firewalls span all the 1949/50/51/52/53 years of production - from a total of many tens of thousands of vehicles. So was the press breaking down all the time?

3. When the press may have broken down for the first time (1949) only a few months had elapsed from when ALL firewalls had been totally fabricated in steel sheet and some thicker sections (hinges, tops of A-posts, etc) for the first 1500 1948 models - Vehicle nos 860001 - 861500. So why on earth make a completely new design out of angle iron and other components? They already had a good design for a stopgap firewall. Even the bonnet hinges are bolted to the top edge of the firewall on the fabricated version.

4. These firewall have turned up all over the world in vehicles and also new old stock (NOS) ones have also surfaced here in Australia, Papua New Guinea and in British Military Stores disposals.

5. So - What is the explanation when there are effectively two versions of the Aluminium / Steel fabricated firewall - with and without sidelight position holes?

Pretty obviously they were/are a replacement part made AFTER the production of 80" vehicles ceased - most likely during the 1960s when any stock of original pressed firewalls was exhausted and 80" vehicles were needing firewalls owing to the cracking around the pressed area, accident damage or collision repair..........and rust!

Bob

[JDNSW]

According to John Smith's book, the die used in the press broke on four occasions, and each time alloy bulkheads were fabricated until it was repaired. The four occasions would perhaps explain the differences.

John

[bobslandies]

According to John Smith's book, the die used in the press broke on four occasions, and each time alloy bulkheads were fabricated until it was repaired. The four occasions would perhaps explain the differences.

John

John,

I am not disputing the fact that the press may have broken down. John Smith's book is a marvellous contribution and like all books may stand corrected in some minor ways.

As I was careful to say there was already a fabricated firewall fitted to the first 1500 1948 models and there would have been tradesmen quite conversant with its production.
So the press breaks down and they make a more complex firewall that required lots of rivetting as opposed to simple folds and tack welding (the first 1500 firewalls have lots of tack welds rather than full runs). Anyway there would likely have been stockpiles of firewalls. There was also outsourcing even in those days - many parts for Land Rovers were made by other manufacturers.

However, to produce more than 15,000 vehicles in a year from the 1950 model (over 60 per day/5 day week) I would expect to see runs of the Aluminium / Steel fabricated firewalls for each alleged breadown.
The fact that there are many MORE vehicles with standard pressed firewalls around each of the few that have turned up - and some with close or consecutive numbers - points more to the later replacement part.

Also the NOS ones that exist - not many NOS pressed ones.

This area is now being researched as Charlie has said and the Series One Club and correspondents around the world are contributing a great deal of information that is calling into question some other "myths" about early Land Rovers.

Bob

[Lotz-A-Landies]

[B]
Actually I had 2 pairs of glasses made up by "SPECSAVERS" in
Triple C, Taree,this week for only $129 pair, great value . OPSM are <snip>Do I need remind people about the name and shame rule?

We can name and praise but not name and shame however I will take the information about spectacle makers on board!

[digger]

what would be good would be a template to make the alloy firewall
(looks like lot of rivets!)

it would get a lot more landys rolling!!

cant wait to hear how the rest of this thread goes

[chazza]

Bob presents some compelling points and I must say the "broken press" story doesn't make any sense to me.

Where I work as a maintenance fitter the press also breaks down at regular intervals and as it is the only press, production comes to a complete halt. In our case it is all hands on deck until the blasted thing is repaired.

Rover of course would have had the same policy and lying in the heart of industrial England there would have been hundreds of businesses and tradesmen to call upon to fix the press. I find it hard to imagine that something so catastrophic happened to the press (on 4 occasions!) that it was deemed economically sound to start a slow and laborious hand-fabricated replacement programme. ;) ;or that the breakdown took so long to repair, given the skills and resources which abounded in those days!

Presses and dies, as we know, are immensely strong structures, so likely fail points can be limited to: electrics; hydraulics; or at the worst a wide-scale disaster such as fire, which would probably have destroyed more than the press and be well-known. The other two faults are relatively easy and quick to fix.

What is far more likely is that long after the 80" ceased to be produced, the dies were removed from the factory and destroyed/recycled; replacements then needed to be fabricated and as Bob points out they could have been made by any small fabrication shop in Britain as emergency replacement parts.

The press - being a very expensive piece of capital equipment and slow to wear - probably soldiered-on making new panels such as roofs for S1 and S2's ,

Cheers Charlie

[JDNSW]

The actual breakage is said to have been the die.

John

[chazza]

The actual breakage is said to have been the die.

John

I did wonder about the die breaking, or being damaged but in light of Bob's points, it still doesn't make sense that there is no obvious run of aluminium bulkheads on consecutively numbered cars; or as Bob points out that a totally new design of bulkhead was fabricated, instead of reverting to the early version.

A broken die is a serious problem but even so I can imagine that within one week of hard-yakka it could be cobbled together to keep working, whilst the die makers made a new one if necessary.

Thanks for posting John,

Cheers Charlie

[JDNSW]

I did wonder about the die breaking, or being damaged but in light of Bob's points, it still doesn't make sense that there is no obvious run of aluminium bulkheads on consecutively numbered cars; or as Bob points out that a totally new design of bulkhead was fabricated, instead of reverting to the early version.

A broken die is a serious problem but even so I can imagine that within one week of hard-yakka it could be cobbled together to keep working, whilst the die makers made a new one if necessary.

Thanks for posting John,

Cheers Charlie

You need to remember that in the period in question, Rover was a small manufacturer with very limited resources, that were pushed to the limit by the demand for the new Landrover. And remember that at the time, Britain had had a significant proportion of their productive capacity destroyed during the war, and most of what they had was still geared toward military needs (this is the major reason behind the alloy body on Landrovers. There is a good reason why the firewall was almost the only (steel) pressing in the early (or late) Series 1. The alloy bits that were formed used wooden dies. The steel dies needed for pressing steel were expensive and difficult for Rover.

I can imagine temporary repairs being carried out that failed after a short run, needing further repairs. It is very unlikely, with the demand for Landrovers and production limited by steel rationing, that there would be more than a day or two's stockpile of the largest bit of steel in the car, so that alloy substitutes could well have been rushed into production even if only to provide a few day's production, rather than stopping the production line.

John

[chazza]

You need to remember that in the period in question, ... The steel dies needed for pressing steel were expensive and difficult for Rover.

... so that alloy substitutes could well have been rushed into production even if only to provide a few day's production, rather than stopping the production line.

John

I am well aware of post war austerity and rationing; however; export sales took precedence for steel rations, which is worth remembering as well. In any case if the die did break and needed repairing, it could have been done so without the need for new steel I imagine.

With regard to your last paragraph, there is no evidence that this actually occurred i.e. no batch of cars with sequential numbers sporting an aluminium bulkhead. It also doesn't address the issue Bob raised about trying a completely new way of fabricating bulkheads, rather than revert to the previously proven 1500 bulkhead style,

Cheers Charlie

[clean32]

I am well aware of post war austerity and rationing; however; export sales took precedence for steel rations, which is worth remembering as well. In any case if the die did break and needed repairing, it could have been done so without the need for new steel I imagine.

With regard to your last paragraph, there is no evidence that this actually occurred i.e. no batch of cars with sequential numbers sporting an aluminium bulkhead. It also doesn't address the issue Bob raised about trying a completely new way of fabricating bulkheads, rather than revert to the previously proven 1500 bulkhead style,

Cheers Charlie

Not being a S1 nuttier, none the less I feel the urge to wade in here. The pommy sites all seem to accept that there were production stoppages on the manufacture of bulkheads on 2 or 3 occasions.
the round cnr S1 bulk heads that I have seen would have been a complete pain to press mainly due to there depth and would would not be that easy today for the same reason. I would assume thats why they changed from the round cnrs to square cnrs.
There are some other points to take into account.
There sohill factory didn’t have any heavy presses. These pre war heavy presses were at Coventry which had been bombed during the war. so either the pressed firewalls were pressed at Coventry and transported to sohill or a press was recovered for the bombed out factory and relocated to sohill. I suspect the former is more likely due to the restrictions and problems of the day.
Both the male and female dies would have been cased and hand finished with nothing more than a hard bustard, shark skin and a scraper. As dies were not cased out of any old scrap i would assume that the foundry would have waited until there were sufficient components to cast from that particular Poor. Regardless and even with skilled craftsmen ( NB not tradesmen as its more akin to sculpture than any thing else) i would imagine that to scrape off and finish both dies would be in the order of 500-700 man hours, possibly. No spark eroders in those days! A die is not as a rule reparable.

As a result i would say that the story is quite credible and reinforced with the change to the square cnrd firewalls. (if there were no problems why change)

[Lotz-A-Landies]

Not being a S1 nuttier, none the less I feel the urge to wade in here. The pommy sites all seem to accept that there were production stoppages on the manufacture of bulkheads on 2 or 3 occasions.
the round cnr S1 bulk heads that I have seen would have been a complete pain to press mainly due to there depth and would would not be that easy today for the same reason. I would assume thats why they changed from the round cnrs to square cnrs.
<snip>
As a result i would say that the story is quite credible and reinforced with the change to the square cnrd firewalls. (if there were no problems why change)Only one problem with the whole post is that the first 1500 vehicles had square cornered firewalls and as Bob suggests, why would they design a bitsa steel/aluminium firewall when they still had the design and dare I say dies to reproduce them during the press stoppages.

The rest of the stuff on the pre-war machines and nature of the curved 1949-53 firewall panel would be correct.

[JDNSW]

At this stage it is unlikely that the exact circumstances of fitting aluminium firewalls will ever be documented - there are probably getting to be very few people left alive who were involved, and it is likely that there was little documentation, much less than would be the case today, or even fifty years ago. Factories in the immediate post war period were very much into getting things done rather than following procedures!.

What seems quite clear though, is that there were a small number of 80" Landrovers left the factory with aluminium firewalls. The design of these is likely to reflect expedience rather than best practice.

Whatever the circumstances, they are quite rare.

John

[clean32]

Only one problem with the whole post is that the first 1500 vehicles had square cornered firewalls and as Bob suggests, why would they design a bitsa steel/aluminium firewall when they still had the design and dare I say dies to reproduce them during the press stoppages.

The rest of the stuff on the pre-war machines and nature of the curved 1949-53 firewall panel would be correct.

ok I didn’t know that. And its a good question

The first 1500 S1 had a steel fabricated firewall and not a pressed one. from 49-53 they produced pressed firewalls and then reverted back to fabricated firewalls again similar to what we have today. ( is that correct)

Simply a pressed firewall normally would be cheaper both in labor and material to produce. More complicated would be the fabricated firewalls.

For example a pressed firewall would be a 3 steep operation (possibly) stamp ( shape and holes) press, then trim. a fabricated firewall would either be stamp. or cut/ slot/strip ( depending on plant) then either a stamp or fold ( depending on plant) this is for each component. the assembly to Jig and fixing ( welding/ spot welding/ rivet)
Now that would explain the change to a pressed fire wall. And if we were to assume that the pressed firewall was not successfully from a production point which initiated the change back to a fabricated firewall.

That leves the question of why that didn’t return to there fabricated jigging when the dies were being replaced. And its a good question.

2 possible answers
sohill produced the original 1500 fabricated firewalls, to be replaced by the Coventry pressed firewalls. With the problems of the presses Coventry produced the aluminum firewalls as substute. BUT Coventry had steel and sohill had aluminum? So why didn’t Coventry just produce steel fabricated ones?

Or that the original jigging was recycled as soon as the Coventry presses came online. Leving sohill with no jigging and no steel?

i think the second version would have been more likely

I did my apprenticeship ( time) in part under a Scottish tradesman who as a teenager worked for super marine during the war. There were many interesting stories on how English manufacturing was approached during and after the war and how a teenager survived working in a factory full of females. in short the Forman had more influence and was expected to fined solutions pretty much regardless of what the drawings had to say.

[mildred]

Bob presents some compelling points and I must say the "broken press" story doesn't make any sense to me.

Where I work as a maintenance fitter the press also breaks down at regular intervals and as it is the only press, production comes to a complete halt. In our case it is all hands on deck until the blasted thing is repaired.

Rover of course would have had the same policy and lying in the heart of industrial England there would have been hundreds of businesses and tradesmen to call upon to fix the press. I find it hard to imagine that something so catastrophic happened to the press (on 4 occasions!) that it was deemed economically sound to start a slow and laborious hand-fabricated replacement programme. ;) ;or that the breakdown took so long to repair, given the skills and resources which abounded in those days!

Presses and dies, as we know, are immensely strong structures, so likely fail points can be limited to: electrics; hydraulics; or at the worst a wide-scale disaster such as fire, which would probably have destroyed more than the press and be well-known. The other two faults are relatively easy and quick to fix.

What is far more likely is that long after the 80" ceased to be produced, the dies were removed from the factory and destroyed/recycled; replacements then needed to be fabricated and as Bob points out they could have been made by any small fabrication shop in Britain as emergency replacement parts.

The press - being a very expensive piece of capital equipment and slow to wear - probably soldiered-on making new panels such as roofs for S1 and S2's ,

Cheers Charlie

There have been posted many and interesting possible solutions to the manufacture of Aluminium firewalls on series one's.
One that had occurred to me is that the Aluminium ones were JUST Prototypes and nothing else, being refined and tested and eventually found themselves attached to models going out the door? Hence the very limited number and no documentation...... :)

[digger]

so, can anyone make the templates so we can make our own?

Imagine the market, (to sell the firewall or the plans) most of europe just for starters!

would rescue a lot of otherwise scrapped landies

[mildred]

so, can anyone make the templates so we can make our own?

Imagine the market, (to sell the firewall or the plans) most of europe just for starters!

would rescue a lot of otherwise scrapped landies

Tony Schmierer is good at drawing up plans and fabricating stuff,
Give him call, he needs encouragement at he moment, HSC and all...:TakeABow:

[clean32]

Bob presents some compelling points and I must say the "broken press" story doesn't make any sense to me.

Where I work as a maintenance fitter the press also breaks down at regular intervals and as it is the only press, production comes to a complete halt. In our case it is all hands on deck until the blasted thing is repaired.

Rover of course would have had the same policy and lying in the heart of industrial England there would have been hundreds of businesses and tradesmen to call upon to fix the press. I find it hard to imagine that something so catastrophic happened to the press (on 4 occasions!) that it was deemed economically sound to start a slow and laborious hand-fabricated replacement programme. ;) ;or that the breakdown took so long to repair, given the skills and resources which abounded in those days!

Presses and dies, as we know, are immensely strong structures, so likely fail points can be limited to: electrics; hydraulics; or at the worst a wide-scale disaster such as fire, which would probably have destroyed more than the press and be well-known. The other two faults are relatively easy and quick to fix.

What is far more likely is that long after the 80" ceased to be produced, the dies were removed from the factory and destroyed/recycled; replacements then needed to be fabricated and as Bob points out they could have been made by any small fabrication shop in Britain as emergency replacement parts.

The press - being a very expensive piece of capital equipment and slow to wear - probably soldiered-on making new panels such as roofs for S1 and S2's ,

Cheers Charlie

Quite correct. And there is a good chance that this particular press is still thumping away some where. To add to your argument. The press would have been mechanical and highly likely of the clutch brake type, add to that it was probably belt driven as well. We know that heavy equipment survived bombing quite well and a press like this with only 5 moving parts and 7 bonze bushes was immensely reparable.
On the other hand, unlike today the die's both male and female would have been sand cast in individual pours and finished off by hand. No grinders or spark eroders. Just files, scrapers and sand paper. Even then the sand paper probably would have been Shark skin.
If you have a look at a S1 pressed fire wall it is actually quite a bit deeper and more acute than what you would even expect to see today in modern cars. The draw and drag would have been horrible to try and deal with. I could even imagine some one dumping a heap of lubricants in there and then hydro locking the die until it fractured. but that is all conjecture.

As for the steel framed aluminum firewalls. a trial run, a bit of R&D ? possibly but there seems to be to many of them and they all seem to be the same. they don’t seem to be apart of a production run or special order as they seem to pop up everywhere, MOD, private, SA and Australia. But there certainly seems to be enough of them to demonstrate that there was quite a bit of effort behind the idea. Adding to that, the lack of documentation and or Mystery surrounding these aluminum firewalls add credence that they were a result of a failer some where else. i.e. a bit embarrassing, mums the word etc.
Lastly they were under the pump, with a successful vehicle to make, problems keeping up with demand and MOD orders on top.

To diverge a bit here and to try and give some inside to manufacturing of the day.
warbirds. we saw a lot of hawker hurricanes restored to flying condition long before we saw any spitfires. Now since the spitfire was manufactured in greater numbers and for a longer period ( even after the war) one would have thought that spitfires would have graced our sky’s long before someone rebuild a rotten wooden hurricane. More so considering the number of surviving air frames there were laying around the place.
Well the problem comes to not only how they were constructed ( spars and different gage aluminum) but more so that you couldn’t just take a component off one airframe and bolt it onto another. they may have looked the same but they didn’t fit. they may have come from the same factory on the same day and be of the same MK but swapping components was not feasible. Spitfires today are in reality remanufactured. I would go as far as to say you could just about build a new spitfire with new components off the shelf.
The hurricane on the other hand was largely made of wood, bolted to gether with steel brackets and bolts. any chippy can build one of these and they were all the same.

Unlike the Americans where there is a reasonable well known story of a RNZAF SPD Northrop built that was fitted with a Douglas SPD wing. The thing just bolted up. Nothing like that was possible with the British manufactured Kit.
worse you couldn’t pull a head of a Merlin and drop it on another block in the manor that we do today but you could with an Allison.

Lastly I would add that the attitude of the pommy manufacturing would still have been in the early 50s akin to there war time production. “the huns are comeing! Get it out the door"

[series1buff]

. And remember that at the time, Britain had had a significant proportion of their productive capacity destroyed during the war,
John

Well thats debateable . Britain turned out a massive amount of militatry hardware during WW2 . Even Germany , bombed beyond description, increased production of aircraft and tanks in 1944, despite the bombing.

Britain set up shadow factories in case of bombing.. for example all of the Merlin carbies wer made at one location, they set up a shadow factory making them at 2 locations, this was done with other items too .

MIKE

[JDNSW]

A couple of errors of fact - no Hurricanes used a wooden structure, although early Hurricane 1s were fabric covered and the fabric covered fuselage was retained for all Hurricanes, but with stressed skin metal wings. This contrasts with the all metal stressed skin airframe of the Spitfire.

There were around 16,000 Hurricanes built, compared to around 20,000 Spitfires, so the discrepancy was not all that great. But the Hurricane is much more easily maintained than the Spitfire, mainly due to the elliptical plan wing on the latter which means every bit of metal in the wing has a three dimensional curve and is different from every other bit.

Getting back to the subject of firewalls. Another possibility is that the pressed firewalls were the production limiting factor (once the press is going flat out you can't increase production without making another die, which is both slow and expensive), and perhaps a few alloy firewalls were made from time to time just to speed up a batch for a particular order which was otherwise going to be late. The supplemental production would have been a lot slower than the pressed production, so they would not go into sequential chassis numbers, but would get slotted in as each one was finished.

John

[clean32]

Well thats debateable . Britain turned out a massive amount of militatry hardware during WW2 . Even Germany , bombed beyond description, increased production of aircraft and tanks in 1944, despite the bombing.

Britain set up shadow factories in case of bombing.. for example all of the Merlin carbies wer made at one location, they set up a shadow factory making them at 2 locations, this was done with other items too .

MIKE

Yes quite true
But the immediate post war years were filled with a lack of raw materials. raw materials that during the war years were purchased using Loans. This stopped immediately. The Land rover was a result of this, where aluminum was stockpiled for aircraft production and was already in the country, where steel was not.
There is also the fact that after so many years of war and hard production that England had run its infrastructure down. The railways were shot. Heavy plant was worn out etc. The skilled labor force built up during the war years went home and back to the kitchen to be replaced by EX service man returning who were not as skilled.
interesting story along those lines. the cindered cored projectile for the British 25 pounder which was initially needed / used by the allies in Africa after Rommel turned up. Was conceived and developed by a 15 year old apprentice. Being one of two only remaining trades people out of a pre war staff of 9. After the war his apprenticeship was canceled to make room for an ex-service man.

[clean32]

A couple of errors of fact - no Hurricanes used a wooden structure, although early Hurricane 1s were fabric covered and the fabric covered fuselage was retained for all Hurricanes, but with stressed skin metal wings. This contrasts with the all metal stressed skin airframe of the Spitfire.

There were around 16,000 Hurricanes built, compared to around 20,000 Spitfires, so the discrepancy was not all that great. But the Hurricane is much more easily maintained than the Spitfire, mainly due to the elliptical plan wing on the latter which means every bit of metal in the wing has a three dimensional curve and is different from every other bit.

Getting back to the subject of firewalls. Another possibility is that the pressed firewalls were the production limiting factor (once the press is going flat out you can't increase production without making another die, which is both slow and expensive), and perhaps a few alloy firewalls were made from time to time just to speed up a batch for a particular order which was otherwise going to be late. The supplemental production would have been a lot slower than the pressed production, so they would not go into sequential chassis numbers, but would get slotted in as each one was finished.

John

true the hurricane was of tube construction bolted together with wooden slats then bolted to that. With the exception of the turtle deck and control surfaces which were of all wooden construction. The Mk11 conversion to aluminum covered wings was as simple as covering the existing tube wing construction with aluminum.
The biggest problem for restores of spitfires was not the wing surface, although this was the main serviceability problem during the war. But was the wing spars. Being octagonal tubes slipped inside of each other and then bent (cranked). Unable to be disassembled and inspected and more often than not rusty in side.

hurricane production was all but over by 1944. The spitfire remained in production until 1952

As for you thoughts of aluminum firewalls being fitted on the line. I must agree. Regardless of if it was a delay in delivery of the pressed firewalls or the inability of the press to keep up with production etc. it makes sense

[chazza]

Getting back to the subject of firewalls. Another possibility is that the pressed firewalls were the production limiting factor (once the press is going flat out you can't increase production without making another die, which is both slow and expensive), and perhaps a few alloy firewalls were made from time to time just to speed up a batch for a particular order which was otherwise going to be late. The supplemental production would have been a lot slower than the pressed production, so they would not go into sequential chassis numbers, but would get slotted in as each one was finished.

John

That John; is the most sensible hypothesis I have read on either forum!

Whether or not it is the case I suppose we will never know :(

Did you know that the Mk 1 Spitfire had fabric covered ailerons that were not too flash in high-speed dives? I think I will stick with Land-Rovers :D

Cheers Charlie

[JDNSW]

...........

Did you know that the Mk 1 Spitfire had fabric covered ailerons that were not too flash in high-speed dives? I think I will stick with Land-Rovers :D

Cheers Charlie

Yes, I was aware that, in common with most other contemporary aircraft, despite the all metal airframe, the control surfaces were fabric covered. But the problem with aileron reversal at high speed was not due to the fabric covering, but that at high speed the load on the ailerons twisted the wing, acting effectively as a servo. This was countered in the Spitfire 21 (1944) which featured a 47% increase in wing torsional stiffness by increasing the thickness of the wing plating and redesigning the spar. The last Spitfire was delivered in October 1947. Its successor, the Spiteful, never entered service, at first because the improved Spitfires meant it had to be continually developed, and then because jet fighters were obviously the future.

John

[Lotz-A-Landies]

ok I didn’t know that. And its a good question

The first 1500 S1 had a steel fabricated firewall and not a pressed one. from 49-53 they produced pressed firewalls and then reverted back to fabricated firewalls again similar to what we have today. ( is that correct)Yes

The main difference between the first 1500 was that the gearstick was mounted to a platform on the transmission tunnel where the pressed ones had the gear lever arrangement we knew for the rest of series production. Producing the modification of the original design would have been a rather simple change of the vertical panel above the bell housing.

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2014/03/322.jpg
Marco T's R860048

[frantic]

One idea that would be far harder to prove: What if the Aluminium firewalls where accidentally on purpose? The employee at LR wants a S1 and realises the winter salt will eat the firewall pretty quickly, so him and a few mates "accidentally" fabricate a firewall from excess body panels, now if they sell this car after a few years or it ends up going to export insted of to their local dealer they have to do it all again and make another aluminium firewall.

[JDNSW]

One idea that would be far harder to prove: What if the Aluminium firewalls where accidentally on purpose? The employee at LR wants a S1 and realises the winter salt will eat the firewall pretty quickly, so him and a few mates "accidentally" fabricate a firewall from excess body panels, now if they sell this car after a few years or it ends up going to export insted of to their local dealer they have to do it all again and make another aluminium firewall.

An intriguing idea, but I suspect that very few actual employees in that era could afford a car of any kind, even if they could get the coupons for petrol, and they had not been in production long enough for the rust problems to become apparent.

John

[frantic]

That depends on how far up the chain the "accident" was organised;) Maybe not just the shiftworker but also the section foreman or shift boss had an invisible hand in the design?

[digger]

has anyone thought to ask gerry mcgovern?

(isnt he the designer/engineer living in australia now?)

just a thought

[digger]

just a bit further to this, from another site


"Rover had a known problem with the press tool that formed the series one bulkhead. Some bulkheads are fine, other show wrinkling at various points, as the formers started to pack up and not support the steel poperly. As a stop gap, Rovers went through periods of making Aluminium bulkheads by hand using folders and the like to avoid having to draw any material into deep forms.until the press toll was sorted out and then they reverted to the pressed steel bulkhead."

thought this belonged in this thread.

[Blknight.aus]

its not that hard to explain how the fabricated bulkheads wound up so well distributed.

take a deck of cards lets call the diamonds the ally bulkheads.

with the cards in suit order deal them into 4 piles. pick up one pile and count through, then do the same with another. Add a few more deal outs and see how quickly your pile can become apparently random. now picture this

theres 4 lines outside your pressing plant for bulkheads to be placed into for storage before going off for "finishing" before going to the assembly line forklift operator one lays out the bulk heads in the same way as you would deal the cards but the operator who picks them up to load them to take them for finishing simply picks up the stacks one line at a time and loads them.

The same thing happens at the finishers and then again at the assembly line.

now factor in that all the breakdowns didnt occur in rapid sucession and its easy to see why they dont come out sequentially.

[wrinklearthur]

I wonder at what point they planted the rust seed?

[Lotz-A-Landies]

There was a thread on the aluminium skinned firewalls on the old Trans Tasman and the Series One Garage forums. IIRC Mike B suggested a number of alloy firewalls came out of a distributors warehouse in New Guinea and the thoughts were that the alloy variety were actually after market production finished replacements for the parts chain when the factory had stopped pressing 80" firewalls.

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2013/03/936.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2013/03/937.jpg

P.S. Don't ask me to refer to them as bulkhead, Rover designated them as dash panels which can be confused with the instrument panel so I will always use the Australian terminology firewall

[chazza]

I remember the same discussion Diana but I think the Poms had fairly good evidence of them being made in the UK during a press-tool breakdown. Anyway it doesn't matter, they were about years ago and are a genuine item. Bob Webber found one still on an 80" years ago in WA,

Cheers Charlie

[Lotz-A-Landies]

Hi Charlie

I don't doubt they were genuine but seems interesting that a bunch would be in PNG as replacement parts. (I just corrected what I meant to say in the previous post)

BTW the images I posted came from a vehicle in Canada.

However there was always the fact that there were two sequences of 1950 chassis numbers, based on information in the Taylor book, until someone realised that the missing vehicles that connected the two sequences were entered on the last page of the first book. So information we all accept as true can sometimes be undone by further research. The planet Pluto found that out only recently when it was down graded.

Diana

[manic]

There was a thread on the aluminium skinned firewalls on the old Trans Tasman and the Series One Garage forums. IIRC Mike B suggested a number of alloy firewalls came out of a distributors warehouse in New Guinea and the thoughts were that the alloy variety were actually after market replacements for the parts chain when the factory had stopped pressing 80" firewalls.

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2013/03/936.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2013/03/937.jpg

P.S. Don't ask me to refer to them as bulkhead, Rover designated them as dash panels which can be confused with the instrument panel so I will always use the Australian terminology firewall

What colour is that? It looks remarkably similar to mine (resprayed by a previous owner). I could never figure out where it came from - certainly not from land rover.

[wrinklearthur]

I wonder (again??) if the aluminium firewalls were prototypes for the folded steel firewalls.
Is the centre profile of the pressed firewall in the Land Rover anything like the centre of the firewalls in the P3 or P4 rover cars?
.

[Lotz-A-Landies]

What colour is that? It looks remarkably similar to mine (resprayed by a previous owner). I could never figure out where it came from - certainly not from land rover.It's probably something like British Racing Green.

[Lotz-A-Landies]

I wonder (again??) if the aluminium firewalls were prototypes for the folded steel firewalls.
Is the centre profile of the pressed firewall in the Land Rover anything like the centre of the firewalls in the P3 or P4 rover cars?
.Not at all the P3 cars all had a continuous curve over the transmission tunnel and the gearstick came out of the top of the box at the back of the selector cover. You know that little rectangular plate just in front of the transfer box, that you could never work out what its for.