A Royal day out in London.

The Plan, take the JB van to London. Park as near to Buckingham Palace and await the 7 am booking in time slot, then drive into the Palace.

What could be simpler than that?

So this would mean an early start, not a problem I never like to panic and be running late, lets go early and have an easy drive into the heart of London SW1.
Alarm set for 4am, a quick breakfast and I'm off, picking up the M4 motor-way at Langley. Already speed restriction signs flashing but these were for the M25 intersection maybe an accident or over running road works, I'm not bothered I'm not going that way!
A very easy drive in, to show how easy, no problem changing lanes as and when I needed to, something that a normal drive in an old van is not an easy manoeuver.
Along Knightsbridge (A4) to Hyde Park corner, sailed around that and turned into Belgrave square, home of many Embassies. I had checked out the area via Google maps and road view and also a few websites to check out the parking restrictions. Free parking till 8.30 am, ideal location.
Current time it's 6.05 am, my booking in time 7.00 am on the dot, location Constitution Hill. Lets go for a walk and check out the area.
Looking back, a rather lonely sight, a small JB van lost in a vast London square.

On route I found a coffee shop, I needed that, burnt fingers and the take away cups always leak no matter how slow you walk.

 I walked across Hyde Park corner, I won't try that later! Then down the north side of Buckingham Palaces security wall to the magnificent front facade.

 Not much going on here, not even soldiers on patrol.

But wait, out the front of the Palace were this wedding couple, doing the new "fad" thing, there own wedding in their own country and then for a honeymoon (strange word?) to go to other parts of the world and be photographed in front of iconic buildings and locations, or so one of the gun carrying police officers explained before he moved the happy couple on. Maybe not so happy now.

 No sooner had the area been cleared and three cyclist turned up and got in my way, you can tell by the long shadows it's still early in the morning. By mid morning this area will be swarming with sightseers. Time to retrace my steps to get back to the van.

 So back up Consititution Hill road, empty apart from the cones put out for the festival traffic.

 On the way I met up with Simon Pegg lookalike who was my contact from R G Jones,
( the firm who were hiring my van for 6 days) he explained he had his pass to get in to the Palace grounds but the paperwork for my pass was not going to happen and that I would have to just tag along as far as I could. A bit of a shame but not a big problem after all they were hiring the van, my job for the day was to get it to London.
While we waited there one of his team passed by with one of their modern vans so an "old and new" picture was taken.

 Also as now I did not have clearance "Simon" would have to drive the van in. So could I let him have a test drive of the van? Not a problem but the other change of plan was that the booking in time had now altered to 9 am.

So into the hot seat and around and around Belgrave Square we went, some of the Embassies have Police officers on their steps and slowly they seemed to get amused and bemused as this old van kept going round and round with gears crunching at every change.

Soon "Simon" was use to the high biting clutch pedal and long "pudding stirrer " of a gear lever and all was going well.

At 8.45 am we set off to the check point, around Hyde Park corner we went, extremely manic traffic now, rush hour, more like slow jam packed hour!

Still we got into the coned off festival traffic line. Passes to be checked, vehicles to be searched, sniffer dogs to check us out and a nice airport style "PAT" down.

Each officer placed a sticker on our vans security pass, each officer told me I could not go into the Palace gardens but sit in the van I did. Security had expected to deal with each vehicle in about 8 minutes but already there was a massive backlog. It was something to do with emergency gas works on the other side of the Palace where the vehicle entrance was. So it was decided that a batch of vehicles would be allowed through the main gate to make up a bit of time. At this point I was thrown out and had to let  "Simon" drive the rest of the way on his own.

 Some of the army horses out for their daily exercise, they passed us by then the van was allowed to go to the next check point in front of the Palace.

 I had a quick word to "Simon", please drive in slowly so I can get some shots I asked.

 OBL's turn to enter and a nice slow take off allowed the assembled spectators a good view.

 OBL going in and at a rate of knots! ( maybe it will get an OBE).

Too late, within seconds the van was in and the gates were already closing.

Once inside the van had to wait again with some vehicles trying to get out, the organised exit route was blocked by an articulated lorry, the side gates were just not designed for 42 ton,  12 wheeler trailers or so I was told by one of the many yellow vested marshals.

 Awaiting the OK to enter the Palace gardens.

There she goes, into the unknown. Out of my sight till Sunday.
What happened to me? Well I'm on my own now, it's 10.30 am and its time I went back to work. So a nice stroll in Hyde Park pass the Serpentin pond and up to Paddington station.

With my ticket purchased its off to work I go, the cost of the day? An early start, coffee, a £9.30 ticket, the congestion charge to pay (£10), and an unpaid morning off work, was it worth it? I missed out on the drive into the palace but at least I was there to see the van drive in and I do have the first of many pictures of the van within the gardens.

Now the next problem, how the heck am I going to get the van out of the Palace?

Sign written today in Wimbledon.

 Took the van to the head quarters of R G Jones in Wimbledon SW19 to have the sign writing carried out. I'm glad the tennis had finished but it was still a nightmare journey.

 Some of the sign writing was not to their liking so it was removed by the guy doing the job. It still looks good, maybe a nice drop shadow on the lettering would also improve it still more.

Also had to load up with four large horn speakers, they will be mounted on a frame and then mounted on the roof to play period fifties music to Her Majesty The Queen and her guests while the van is on display in Buckingham Palace gardens.
I will have to get up early tomorrow morning, I will have to leave home at about 4.30 am to "book in" at the check point in Constitution Hill SW1.
Wish me luck.

OBL 432 has been having a right Royal clean up.

The JB van has been having a right Royal clean up and re-paint.
A very special and important event in London, means the van has been having a long overdue tidy up.

 The cleanest the inside has been in many years.

I even got around to re-fitting the "mates" seat, removed many years ago when I had to change the fuel tanks sender unit.
Further details and I hope some pictures to follow shortly.

Yet another J type Pick-up found and its in Thailand.

While trawling You Tube video's for all things Morris my friend M.P. came across a whole batch of video's from a Thailand Motor Museum.
The place is large with all manner of vehicles from around the world.
Many have there original number plates so you can see what part of the world some of the strangest ones came from.
Many sport UK number plates and I wonder what their owners would think of them now. At the beginning of this video a rough J pick-up can be spotted sitting outside awaiting its turn to be restored, in company with DC3 Planes, helicopters and host of other Morris minors, Morris Oxfords, mini's, BMW, Merc's, and even a Wolseley 6/80 etc
The J pick-up truck is right at the start of this half hour video, about 20 seconds in and again about 57 seconds.

Link to video here.

Facebook and J types?

What a combination of old and new technology.
A Facebook page has been started by some owners to spread the "word" about our old vehicles to the young out there. They after all will one day be looking after what vehicles we leave behind.
It seems that the idea of the "page" has done what was intended.
A new van, up and till know unknown to us has surfaced in North Island, NZ.
Here are some of the owners pictures.
He is into customising but maybe something he throws away can be saved and used by another J van owner.
I have already asked one of my e-mail friend to pop in and make face to face contact with the owner. (and get those all important numbers!)
Another example of a small world?
Check out further pictures here.http://www.nz-hotrod.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?8243-The-quot-I-must-be-crazy-quot-Project

The Morris 100th Rally at Cornbury Park.

About 1500 vehicles present over the weekend, a sprinkling of J vans but as we had gone to the rally in a November 1951 Wolseley 6/80, it's those cars I photographed the most.

From it's once splendid condition, the well rallied GPO mail van of C.B. is starting to look a little shabby in some places. Come on CB your trusty steed needs a very small amount of TLC.

The J type registers J van rally this weekend.

Quality vans on display.

More buses than vans in this video, it does give some idea what happened on the Saturday.

Four Australian J type van owners managed to get to Wythall, why did you miss this event?

Yet more "New" J type vans found.

With the finding of the HVP Postal van you would think the number of J vans that are still out there waiting to be discovered would be small.
And yet like buses, another two vans have been found and are now in safe dry storage.
One civilian one and one ex-GPO mail van.
We have all the details on these vans but the owner has asked us to respect their privacy and withhold this data at the present time.
In a way the restoration of these vans has already started, with the wheels being freed off to be able to move them and a full list of expected parts required has already been made.
These are both JB vans and were both on the road prior to being stored in far from ideal conditions.

GPO J type vans 60 years ago.

These interesting details taken from the GPO archives by Mr C Hogan. POVC.
On Wednesday 21st May 1952 a GPO mail van carrying HVP High Value Packets was intercepted by raiders. The 3 Post Office employee’s were violently attacked and their van stolen with a loss of £200k.
They were carrying old bank notes that were destined to be burned.
From then on these HVP vans had an alarm fitted and were followed by other GPO vans as the police were unable to provide an escort for each van.

No such HVP J type van has survived until now. (If the van turn out as good as the photographs suggest this will indeed be an interesting vehicle).
No trace of the alarm system seems to have survived but the different partition fitted (no sliding door) is a big clue to its former use.
Further details shortly.

Did you know? In 1950 the GPO ordered 3000 gents Universal bicycles and then a further 3000 in 1952.

In the 1952 Engineers-in-chief report, states the following problems with the new Morris J vans.
They were having operation and maintenance problems. 

1, Jumping out of 2nd gear.

2, Main wiring loom and starter cables had both given trouble owing to chafing at various points needing many additional clips to be fitted.

3, The starting handle brackets failed when used.

4, The battery box lids hinges needed improving to improve access to the battery master switch.

5, Many complaints about poor heating and ventilation.

From then on existing vans (whose drivers had complained) were converted to opening windscreens at a cost of  £4-12s-6d each, from November 1952 all GPO produced J vans where fitted with opening windscreens on the production line.
The first of these to be registered was MYE 100 in spring 1953.

6, Many GPO drivers complained that the driver seat were to high, a problem I’ve found, you almost have to duck your head to see through the top of the windscreen.
The GPO solution, where necessary the wooden seat base was made 2 ½ inches lower. That cured that problem.
Further interesting gems are yet to be uncovered.