Thank you very much for your time on the phone and for the calendar. It was nice to speak to someone who had even heard of International Scouts let alone someone who had one. The story of my Scout is that I bought it for £150 in 1973 to use to do a survey of rodents in the high hills of the Tanzania/Kenya border. It was an ex Kenya government vehicle and I presume had been given to them free by Canadian Aid. It was originally a horrid yellow colour and was an 80 series 3 speed pick-up. It had hardly been used and still smelt of wax from it’s coating for sea voyage. It hadn’t been looked after at all and already had a failed clutch thrust bearing due to the return spring on the lever having fallen off. This easily happens because it occupies the lowest point of the vehicle.
I would have much rather had a Landrover but one was not to be had for four times the price even in the worst possible condition. I used it without problems for the rat project, unless that you count that the window winders failed and the doors fell off at the hinges. It went on a few subsequent safaris around Tanzania, the only problem being that a wheel fell off on a blind bend on a mud road on the slopes of Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania. This was my own fault but with no money or repair shops for a hundred miles and all the wheel studs ruined it was a bit of a problem, which was solved as it happened by a local coffee farmer who I had only met briefly three years previously when I had crashed into his parked and brand new Landrover. He had the good manners not to mention this incident which I tactfully didn’t refer to either.
It then went up to Uganda when a friend and I had the bright idea that, that war-torn country would be the ideal place to sell Vietnam Era flak jackets. We loaded up the faithful Scout with our wares but no-one would buy them when we got there. We therefor volunteered for the National Parks, then overrun by heavily armed poachers. The Scout was so battered by then that it was ideal for getting supplies up from Kenya, the thieving soldiers at the road-blocks not expecting any bribes from people looking as poor as us. The main cargo was 110 octane avgas which was purple and we always convinced them that it wouldn’t fuel cars, otherwise it would have got no further than the border before being stolen at gunpoint. The Scout thrived on the stuff though and the avgas kept the plane aloft for spotting the poachers who we then had to go and confront on the ground.
I then got a job supervising the UN lorry workshops in remote northern Uganda. We had a fleet of 77 lorries carrying emergency famine relief into a very lawless area. Nearly all the vehicles had bullet holes in them but as I had a brand new Landrover for transport the Scout emerged unscathed. When my turn for being ambushed came, the Landrover got shot up instead.
After that, back in Kenya, the Scout was used for carrying the building materials for my mate’s house construction. By this time the right hand engine mounting had pulled out of the block and put the engine through the radiator which was the worst setback it has had as there is very little metal to secure the mounting to the block.
I knew where an old Scout had been lying derelict for about 8 years on the Nairobi Industrial area. No-one had bothered to pinch anything off it, as I was the only person in east Africa to whom parts would have been any use. It was a Chicago made 800 series with a four speed box but no engine or windows. It also had a full length hardtop. About £20 to the supposed owner or at least to the man who complained when I started putting wheels on it to move it and I had myself a step up in luxury motoring. After a lick of paint and a swap over of missing windows, engine and other parts, it looked quite passable and the four speed box worked fine.
Not long after I decided to go to England to become a despatch rider, at first for a week then a month, then eventually ten years. Meanwhile the Scout was parked at a friend’s game ranch and various bits got pinched off it, like the radiator, alternator, tyres and for some reason, the carburetor. Eventually my friend told me I had to come back to Kenya and enter the “Rhino Charge” rally and that he would get the faithful Scout ready for the event. I had got married, bought a house and put my old life behind me but he insisted. So back to Kenya I went.
When I saw the old Scout again, I could almost have cried. They had completely re-sprayed it in a proper spray booth and all the upholstery was brand new. The rear deck was new. It had tailor made “Roo” bars, roll bars and a winch. It was in better condition than it had ever been since I’d had it.
The “Rhino Charge” rally turns out to be a 4WD competition whereby the winner is the person who travels the shortest distance between ten controls over one day, dawn to dusk. This means that if you winch yourself up rock faces and ford torrential rivers and don’t crash, you win. The actual winners of course are those who are just reckless enough but not too crazy. It is carefully monitored by sealed electronic, tamper proof distance measures, which is necessary despite there being no prize money as it is taken quite seriously. In fact it costs money in the form of a large contribution to Rhino conservation to get the right to compete. 50 cars start.
So we set off for the sandy semi-desert of Northern Kenya where the ’97 competition was to be held. Just getting there was an achievement that several cars didn’t make it. Being two day’s journey, the last hundred miles being on rocky tracks. Being Kenya where standards of safety and sobriety are not carefully adhered to, there was a lot of racing around, showing off the night before the rally and during this, a free-wheeling hub failed with the immediate result that the Scout bogged down in the sand. All overnight efforts to fix it were unavailing, so we were lucky to even make the start. We got as far as the first watercourse before getting stuck for most of the day. It was very hot and tiring and we came last out of 50.
After that, needless to say, we had to try to improve our position in ’98. This time the competition was in the foothills of Mt. Kenya. The problem was that after a disastrous year for Kenya and my friend’s farm in particular, they had not got around to preparing the Scout other than taking the offending free-wheeling hub off and putting the old fixed hub back on. The Scout only fired on three cylinders and didn’t charge. The thrust bearing had given up again along with a prop shaft universal joint. The winch had packed up. It was good going to reach the base camp. If we had not, it would have been a terrible embarrassment because I had invited a friend with whom I had been on safari in the Scout back in the early seventies. He had become very rich as a banker in Peking and had made a big contribution to the Rhino fund.
Anyway, again it was a miracle to make the start. On the way we couldn’t keep up with our escort and caused our five fellow competitors at that gate to get lost. One of them let us know how he felt about this, which might have ruined his Karma, as he later smashed his steering box at the bottom of the first hill and became 50th out of 50 despite having a professional driver. Selecting low range for the rest of the day, we set off by the safest possible route to checkpoint No.1 on the mountainous buffalo infected course. Almost immediately the brakes failed due to a fluid leak. We could only continue on the strict understanding that everyone jumped out the moment the car got out of control. Borrowed brake fluid at the first control, put the brakes right but they couldn’t be relied on after that as there wasn’t charge to start the engine, it was essential not to stall it, even once as that would have been our day over.
By midday we had covered three controls at very low speed. Getting used to using the handbrake and onto flatter ground, what with beer’s dished out free at each control (this was Kenya) we gained confidence and decided to go for a complete course at whatever cost in miles. We went faster and faster over bigger and bigger saplings and steeper and steeper gullies until it seemed possible we would make point 10 by dusk. The Scout proved able to drive through thick thorn bushes as high as 10ft tall to the shouts of those in the back who were getting lashed by loose thorn branches. A back wheel arch got folded back on a rock that I didn’t even see and eventually we were on the bottom of the last hill with night falling. Half way up the two incline the steering column popped out of the steering box and as the brakes disappeared again it was time to yell “abandon ship”. They all leapt out but the Scout veered sideways along a hill contour and stopped on the hand brake.
It turned out that if you only applied very light pressure to the steering it could be persuaded to work, so after a ten point turn and the crew on loft behind, we made it to the end 38th out of 50. It felt like a victory. So, now the Scout sits back on the ranch in a pretty sorry state. However, so keen was the man from Peking on his experiences in it that he decided on entering it for the LONDON-PEKING classic rally in June next year. He has paid the £25,000 entry fee already so it has to be fixed to a very high standard and shipped to London by then.
Hence my phone call to you and my need for spares. Can you ask your reader-ship about the steering problem? I can see no way to make the assembly properly safe. The column simply doesn’t seem to be properly secured to the steering box. If anyone has any experience of this problem and a solution to it, I would really like to hear, as I am worried about the safety implications.
Best regards,
Chas Holt.
Original colours and decals
