Series 3 SWB truckcab in the Netherlands

Bought myself a nice project. An 1974 SWB truckcab. The guy I bought it from had some personal trouble and had to get rid of it. So, lucky form me, I think I got a good deal. Plan is to first get it all functional and safe, get it trough the Dutch MOT and on the road again.

When I bought it everything that attaches to the bulkhead had been taken off. The wiring loom had been taken out. So, lots of work. The chassis is patched in a lot of places, unfortunately the person who patched it had no experience in welding by the looks of it. so I'm not really happy about that. But for now it's good enough. If all else is good on the truck maybe it gets an nice galvanized chassis. We will see.

With the truck I got a new wiring loom, new seats and new rims. Lots of new galvanized bits, new doors (tops and bottoms) and a lot of other bits.

Some pictures.


Getting the new loom hooked up.


For ease of mind I am replacing al the brake cylinders. Two were leaking.


More to come soon.

Nice one - I'll be interested to see how you get on. Does it have a dutch registration or do you have to go through that process with the RDW?

Did your wiringloom come labelled with what connects to where? I have to put a new one in mine think it will be an auto sparks one and wondered if they came labelled?

Looking forward to seeing progress in nice pictures. It's way more interesting than looking at Coronation Street!

Good luck with your project.

@Stretch: It has a Dutch registration so I only need an APK.

@tomhop: I don't know which brand my new loom is but it has no labels. For me connecting it was pretty straightforward. Al the wire colours are correct and with a multimeter and the schema from the Land Rover manual it is not that hard. I must say I do have some experience with electronics, I can imagine it's a bit intimidating if you don't.

Today I connected the rear lights. These Britpart lights came with the car and I'm not very happy with them. They are working now but the bulbs don't fit very well and come lose easily. I don't think they will say on very long while I'm driving.

Does anyone know where to get good quality light assemblies? The webshops I can find only sell the plastic ones.

roga said:

Today I connected the rear lights. These Britpart lights came with the car and I'm not very happy with them. They are working now but the bulbs don't fit very well and come lose easily. I don't think they will say on very long while I'm driving.

Does anyone know where to get good quality light assemblies? The webshops I can find only sell the plastic ones.

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They were originally plastic - there are some better quality ones out there though. If I were you I'd try Ron Bolleboom or marktplaats for some second hand ones. In each case compare with the cost of new ones from the UK (either of the 'addocks gives a rough idea - both of those places ship for 6GBP to Holland so it often works out cheaper than Budget parts in Holland)

Stretch said:

They were originally plastic - there are some better quality ones out there though. If I were you I'd try Ron Bolleboom or marktplaats for some second hand ones. In each case compare with the cost of new ones from the UK (either of the 'addocks gives a rough idea - both of those places ship for 6GBP to Holland so it often works out cheaper than Budget parts in Holland)

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Thanks for the tip. I already posted the question on the prikkers facebookpage.

I had a 109 before. It had it's original lights, for as fare as I could tell. The lamp-fittings were metal on those and they were bomb proof.

roga said:

Thanks for the tip. I already posted the question on the prikkers facebookpage.

I had a 109 before. It had it's original lights, for as fare as I could tell. The lamp-fittings were metal on those and they were bomb proof.

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Oh sorry I thought you meant the lenses. Yeah the bulb holders were probably not very plasticy but the lenses / covers were.

Stretch said:

Oh sorry I thought you meant the lenses. Yeah the bulb holders were probably not very plasticy but the lenses / covers were.

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Yes, I meant the bulb holders.

Alright. Got all the brake cylinders and the flexible brake pipes off yesterday. I found single, double and bubble flares in the system. Single and bubble on the cylinders. Bubble on the t-junction in the rear. Single flare from the hard to flexible pipe. I don't think they are all correct so I'm glad i took it apart. Ordered some brake pipe and a flaring tool. Should keep me busy next week. The attached photos show the flare on the wheel cylinder. Are bubble, should be double i think.

Today I changed the oils. Well, not all the oil. It was i little hard getting the oil out of the transferbox. Seems someone made a mistake in the past.


So, the lid had to come off. Gear look like this.



It looks to me like they are in very good condition. Can't wait to drive this thing!

Ok, while trying to align the doors i had to push the bulkhead out a little bit. While doing this I noticed that the bulkhead was moving but the chassis attachment points where not. That's not right...


They were not welded to the bulkhead but simply hammered in to the doorposts. Lucky I found out!




Other side was the same. Welded as best I could, Now its solid and safe.

Got a lot done in the past days. Wings, doors, radiator, lights and whipers. It's nearly finished . Took it around the block for a short test drive (max 15 Mph) and so far it runs very nice. Brakes are a bit soft so there is probably still some air in the system. Wednesday I will try to fit the seatbelts. I have to fabricate some brackets for the high mounting point of the belts. I have some brackets for a hardtop but they don't fit in a truckcab. Then of for the APK (MOT)! Will post some pictures tonight.

Took the afternoon of yesterday. Got it all ready for it's MOT. Appointment is made for tomorrow morning. For as far as I can tell there will be no problems tomorrow but you never know. I can't wait! A lot of work so far but well worth it. When the weather gets better I'm going to give her a nice new coat of paint, marine blue which is it's original colour. And strip all the paint from the galvanized bits. I have a razor type bonnet with spare tyre stuff on it. Think I'm going to use that.

Great, no problems at all. It's got its mot so it's street legal again. YEAH!!

Congratulations!

Stretch said:

Congratulations!

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Thank you!

Tomorrow I'm taking it off road at the 4x4 vakantie beurs. Let see how she does in the (no to crazy) mud.

I put the razor bonnet on and with the spare tyre it looks very nice I think. Also took the black paint off the galvanized bumper. In my opinion, galvanized bits and paint don't go together.

Today we had a nice off road day! No problem at all with those 7.50x16 wheels. And overall It's running very good.




And a short video impression.