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Steve Clough - President ISOCQ
I bought my Scout from a friend about 7 years ago for $800.00 and
have been doing it up since then. When I got it, you could sit
in the passenger's seat and look at the ground through a hole about
the size of an orange. It had three bullet holes in it, one of
which was through the driver's door. The Scout was in this
condition as it had been used to go pig
hunting. The steering wheel was the size of the moon as do all
Scouts
without power steering. The seats were torn and what was left of the
carpet wasn’t much chop. Since then the old Scout Terri and I call the
Kelvinator (because it looks like a fridge with wheels) has taken us
up some pretty big hills through some deep bog holes and across the
Simpson Desert and I am sure there are more adventures to be had
yet.
Since joining the club, I have been Vice President for one year and
I am currently
in my second term as President. I will have to say it does come
with a few challenges but the other guys in the committee all do
their bit to help and it makes it all worthwhile.
My scout is a '79 model. It has the 345ci which has been bored 30 thou. I have had the heads flowed, installed a tow cam, alloy manifolds from the states with electronic fuel injection fitted. It also has twin battery set up with a Redarc management system, air conditioning, mag wheels, long range tanks, bulbar and a 10000 pound winch. I have changed the diffs to run 3:54 ratio and LSD. I also fitted a homemade drawer set, fridge slide and a swing away rear tire carrier.
Peter Cartledge - ISOCQ Member
The vehicle is a Scout II HGD, manufactured 4-11-78 on shift 2.
It was
purchased from a used car yard early in 1992. The truck looked to be
in pretty good condition but after about 18 months all of the rust
started to come out. It blew up a rear diff 3 months after buying it
and subsequently was rebuilt with new parts.
I picked up a complete engine in 1993 and gave it a thorough overhaul
and installed it into the truck.
The truck was then taken off the road for 6 months and I had all of
the rust removed, repainted it, added new sills and new steel panel
inserts, and also included a fibreglass windscreen frame. The
windscreen frame was a very
early prototype which needed heavy modification to get it to fit
properly, but it worked out fine.
After all the body work, the Scout had a complete repaint in new colours in a ‘Black Pearl’ (metallic
based) which had a dark blue sparkle. It looked excellent for about
4 years until the metal flake started to oxidise and the bonnet and
roof became ‘flat black’. After this experience, I would not recommend metallic repaints.
In late 1999, the old truck started to deteriorate badly as all of
the rust in the body appeared again and got worse. I once
again, removed the truck from the road in September 2001 and put it into a friend's
workshop for another rebuild. This included a complete body tub and
canopy from a country vehicle and 2 brand new front guards (these
had never been on a vehicle and had been in storage for 20 years).
The complete rebuild included, repainting in 2 pack enamel with custom
painted striping, which took about 9 months from start to finish.
We purchased a second Scout II JGD, manufactured in 11-9-78 shift 2.
We made this purchase from our daughter, purely for my wife's
enjoyment. Our daughter had owned it for about 3 years, in 1999. This was a country vehicle and
never been on the beach and the body was in near perfect condition
with only superficial rust but the paint-work was a bit shabby. We
installed my original engine after a full overhaul just after our
daughter bought it with a conversion from auto to manual
transmission. This one went into the workshop in March 2001 for
minor body repairs and a repaint in 2 pack enamel with custom
stripes. This took 4 months. This is ‘her’ car and never goes
off-road. So now we own two Scouts.
You might say, ‘a pigeon pair’, both painted with the same colours
but in reverse. ‘His car’ is the work-horse and has seen a lot of
off-road work. The odometer is showing around 400,000 km. ‘Her car’
has less than half this. Both vehicles are standard with manual
steering, manual gear-box and "Armstrong" air-conditioning (wind the
windows down)
You might ask, WHY bother with an old Scout? Well, I love the old Scouts and wouldn’t have anything else. They still out-perform a lot of the modern cars.
In early 2009, we sold 'her' Scout to a lovely couple in North Queensland. And in mid 2010, 'his' Scout has been converted into a hardtop Ute.
Robert Earixson - Parts Officer & Web Master
I bought my Scout in early 2009 off of the then Parts Officer Peter Cartledge. I was told it was his wife’s car and it was basically in an un-molested condition. Small spots of rust were starting to become apparent but not a major issue. My father picked it up from Jimboomba for me and drove it to Hervey Bay to await my arrival for the long trip north.
When I arrived the first modification needed was very apparent. It was in dire need of a stereo. With an 18 hour drive ahead, having no music was not going to work for me. During the drive to Townsville the next few modifications required started to emerge, comfortable seats and new tyres etc. So once in Townsville the first on the list was new tyres and why not rims as well. Once I put the new 31 x 10 inch tyres on chrome alloy wheels, I realised that they just don’t fit in the guards.
Two inches of lift later the tyres fit in. The body lift highlighted a few things I didn’t expect to encounter such as brake line extensions, steering extensions, the angle of the clutch linkages, and the fan shroud needed modification.
Once all the modifications were done, we took the old girl out on our first camping trip to the Burdekin Dam. On the way out we blew the radiator, but luckily the hole was up high enough in the core that only required topping up every couple of kilometres, rather than being towed. We finally made it home safely and we immediately removed the radiator to be rebuilt.
Now in Chinchilla, in a climate that apparently does not rain as much as Cairns, I thought it was time to give going convertible a go, but once the roof was off, apparently the drought broke and what I thought was a little rust scale turned out to be a fair bit of cancer.
Upon further inspection of the rest of the car I discovered a bit more, so time to do the body and as cheaply as possible to appease the wife. With a little coercing I convinced my boss to let me use his shed and equipment to respray the body during the usually slow winter months in exchange for a little signage.
To date the roof is still off and half in primer but a surprise is in order, stay tuned and find out how the roof goes, I bet you will have never seen one like it before!!!