Thread: 80 Inch 'Tuppence'

IT’S MY BROTHER’S FAULT

July 2010

My name is Nick and I am Charlie’s brother. Charlie is a menace; he admits to owning at least five Landrovers but there are probably many others that he has secreted away that nobody knows about, probably hidden in mates sheds. I have owned Rovers in the past and expressed a vague interest to him in a series one. Charlie showed me a 107 inch on the net but I thought that I would prefer an 80.

Charlie has a keen eye for spotting anything mechanical and with a background of Manual Arts teaching, he can fix almost anything as well.

When it comes to spotting any old Landrover he can pick them out in traffic several kilometres away, but he becomes maniacal when a series 1 is involved. These he can spot inside a barn through a small hole in the door at 400 metres without any trouble at all.

I live in The Northern Rivers area of NSW on the other side of the continent from Charlie. He and his lovely wife Lynda graced us with the pleasure of their company for a whole week very recently. We took the time to dine out just about every night and just hang out together doing touristy stuff, as you do. We decided to go out to lunch one Saturday in a place called Eltham about 20 kilometres away, I glanced at the map to memorise the route and then foolishly left the map at home.

Nearing our destination I turned up a road that had a similar sounding name to the one that we wanted. Needless to say it was the wrong one. All of a sudden there was a high pitched scream from the passenger seat “STOP THE CAR ……..STOPPPPPP!!!”. I slammed my foot on the big pedal in the middle and my 300 Tdi Disco came to a sensible stop in the middle of the road.
“What the hell is wrong?” I asked.
“Laaannndddrover” came the reply.
“Where”
“Over there” said he pointing frantically to a shed on the top of the hill. I could barely make out the square top of and old Landy’s windscreen poking bravely out from the top of a pile of old timber and various other assorted farmyard rubbish.
“There’s two in there” he said “pity we haven’t got some binoculars”. I pulled some out of the glove box and handed them over. Charlie sat up straight in the seat, I could sense that both his pulse and blood pressure were rising. “It’s a bloody series 1, an early one too it has got the triangular cut out in the door.” “Let’s go and have a look.”
“Hang on” I said, “We are supposed to be going out to lunch with your sister and she will probably be cross already because we are late”.

I could see that he was disappointed but living with his disappointment was going to be easier than with the wrath of our sister should we choose to incur it. Needless to say we had a lovely lunch but I could sense that Charlie’s interests lay elsewhere.

After lunch he and I excused ourselves while the girls went to do something useful at a nursery. We decided to call in and check out the little Landy in the rain on the way to the Naval Museum in Ballina. A woman answered our knock on her door and told us that it was her father’s car, she directed us to his house across the road. A fellow who seemed to be nearing his eighties greeted us and spoke about the Landrover. He invited us to come up and have a look.
“Before we go fellas” he said “Take a look at me cars”. He opened up the garage doors, there was a 2005 long wheelbase Holden Statesperson in Black with not a blemish upon it, one of only 500 made and a 1983 series 3 Jaguar XJ6 in champagne that was one of the best that I have ever seen. We offered Irvine a ride up to the paddock in the Disco but he insisted on taking the Jag complete with an overweight wet spaniel sitting on the pristine leather of the passenger seat. Irvine drove the Jag through a paddock covered with mud and bovine manure to an open shed where the series 1 had last been parked by himself 12 years before.

After removing some of the rubbish that was stacked around it, a very straight little 80 inch started to present itself, rust free, a little sad but presentable. Upon inspection under the bonnet we were pleasantly surprised to see that everything that should have been there was in fact there. There were some things that were there that should not have been there, such as copious quantities of rat poo and outside door handles. Only the door top on the driver’s side was not original but the rest was there, even the hood bows and the ignition key were still in position!

“So what do you think” I said after we had managed to drag ourselves away after about 45 minutes of inspecting the goods very closely indeed.

“Buy it, everything is there” he said. I then got a long drawn out history of the condition of Charlie’s own series 1; the things that he had to find, what was rusted, what was missing, what he has had to make and how good this one was compared to his. “Just buy the bloody thing!”

We doodled our way along to the museum which was the whole purpose of having the afternoon off, only to find it shut. Too much time spent with lunch, good company, wine and Landrovers!

Charlie and I had been sitting in the lounge having a tinnie and discussing the merits of whether I should own a series 1 or not when the girls arrived home in the car bristling with vegetation.

He said “I am not saying anything”. In front of my wife Jenny, he denied ever having told me to buy the Landy, he denied any sort of coercion, he denied telling me that it would look good in my garage, he denied saying that it would be good little runabout on the beach etc, but he did enter into conversation about how good it was. My wife said that I could have it if Charlie and Lynda visited every year. Lynda said to me “You are not getting much resistance” as she left our house.

The following day I had to go to work, during my hectic schedule I found time to call the owner of the Landy and I offered him a ridiculous amount of money for it, which he accepted. I went straight from work to my sister’s house where the clan had gathered for yet another meal. The first thing that was said was “Did you ring him”? Not hello or any other sort of greeting. “Did you buy it”?

It is my brother’s fault although Lynda somehow got the blame for my purchase during the evening. I suppose I should be grateful for my relatives expressing a concern that I didn’t have an old Landy and miraculously spontaneously fortuitously finding one!

It is still my brother’s fault.

Nick

I will put some pictures on soon!

Originally Posted by shaunh

just curious as to your whereabouts? seems to me as you are rather close. keen to see pictures

I am in Lennox Head.

Nick