Thread: Introducing Betty

Over the past months there has been plenty going on to refurbish my old IIA.


I found the rear vision mirror on the driver’s side fender to be totally useless (despite it being original) so I purchased a couple of universal mirrors and then modified the arms to make them fit. They bolt to the windscreen pivot via the existing bolts so can be removed if needed for originality purposes. Some paint stripping and a couple of coats of hammer tone black and they not only look OK but they actually show me who is tailgating me.


With a lot of strain and leverage I removed and dismantled the tow hitch so I could get an old chain link welded to it so I could legally attach a trailer. I then stripped the whole thing of paint and resprayed in black enamel and hammer tone silver. With a tow ball attached it now looks and works a treat.


And finally I had the wheels sandblasted, sprayed in rust proof paint and then sprayed in deep bronze green. A set of 205R16 Maxxis all terrain tyres top the sparkly wheels off really well. I found that I have 2 types of wheels. There are 3 with the wheel centre welded to the rim and date stamped 1/6/1962 while the other 2 have the wheel centre riveted to the wheel rim and are date stamped 18/6/1956 and 25/1/1961. So clearly the older wheels are from a Series 1. All wheels are identical from the outside so it really doesn’t matter. All part of the history.


With the new mirrors and new tyres, Betty now steers and drives better.


Some photos attached.


Nic.

Betty looks beautiful, mate. Wow!

X2

She looks fantastic. Well done

X3!

It looks terrific, well done

Great work. Betty looks super original,....plenty of "period charm" there.
Well done, Pickles.

I'm looking for advice from the many experts on this forum.


The workshop manual notes that the front springs on 88s should have 9 leaves while the rears should have 11 leaves. But Betty has 8 leaves on the fronts (and 11 on the rears). Can anyone shed any light on this? I think I've read somewhere else on this forum that Defence Force 88s had 8 leaves but I'd appreciate any advice offered.


Also, were the strengthening ribs on the underside of the bonnets of Australian CKD vehicles painted black like their UK cousins? English built IIAs had black painted strengthening ribs while Betty's are green like a lot of others on this forum.


Any advice would be greatly appreciated.


Cheers


Nic

Hi Nick,
Nice truck! Looks like there's been plenty of work done to it.

Springs are tricky, depends if you have a diesel or petrol, diesel had an extra leaf. I think that petrols only had the 8 leaves (from memory) but it could be that you have HD springs, or they might be off something else (a different LR) or someone might have decided they didnt' like the ride and removed 1 leaf.

Google is your friend on this one.

SWB petrol 9 leaf front
SWB diesel 11 leaf front
SWB rears 11 leaf

Militaries were different