Keith Brooker's Morris C8 GS
Keith Brooker's Morris C8 GS |
It's amazing what you can pick up at a boot
sale.I was walking around my local boot sale, as you
do, trying to find Military bits for my collection and came across this stall
selling a variety of Army memorabilia. To my suprise there was a board listing
other items not on show on which I noticed a WW2 Army Morris truck for sale.
Not knowing what this looked like, and being nosey, I thought I would go and
take a look at where it was stored.We arranged a date and time and I duly went along
to see the beast. It was stored in a very large chicken shed that was full of
military items, including bits of rockets, an Austin tilley and a Brengun
carrier under a lot of junk, most of it needed restoring. I saw this sad
looking Morris with lots of chicken s*** on it. 
It had been towed in and left for thirty years or so.I am a bit of an impulse buyer, fell in love with
it aand did a deal on the spot. After I had bought it and the brain kicked in
(not a lot) I thought why had I bought this funny old army truck. The biggest
thing I had restored before this was a pushbike I used as a kid. I then took my
father, an ex army RASC Sgt. to see it and he said, "what on earth did you buy
that for?"It stayed in the chicken shed for a year, as we
could not get it out because of the large pieces of junk surrounding it. This
was very frustrating, as we could not work on it in there. The only thing we
could do was clean off the chicken muck and find more information on the
Morris, aquiring workshop manuals e.t.c. before taking it apart and sorting
through the boxes of bits that came with it.
I joined the local Essex MVT club and was told
that they had a club barn that I could store it in. So we arranged a date and a
time to extract my Morris. The day came when a recovery truck arrived and we
dragged it out of the shed. On the way onto the recovery truck the winch broke
but we managed to get it on board. A few miles down the road was the club barn
where we rolled the Morris off the back of the recovery truck, having no brakes
made it a bit hairy so I volunteeered my mate to sit in it as it came off the
back and we pushed it into it's bay. Like a load of kids with a new toy we
started to try and get it going for the first time in thirty years.We did the usual cleaning of plugs and points,
replacing the oil, when we undid the oil sump it took us two minutes before we
saw anything trying to seep out. It was like porridge. Having made sure the
radiator had some water in it for the first time in years, we put a plastic
petrol can on the bonnet and connected a battery up to it and. to our suprise,
after a few turns she started.Now came the task of restoration. We began by
stripping off the rear body and my Dad's friend came all the way down from
Yorkshire and welded new panels on to it.
Rubbed it down ready for spraying at a later date,
then came the chassis, which I duly went over with an electricdrill with a wire
brush attachment on it and also by hand I spent months and months getting rust
off, using over forty cans of red oxide spray paint as I could not obtain the
use of a paint sprayer at that time, while my Dad was working on the mechanical
side i.e. brakes need a complete overhaul and some new parts. We stripped the
cab down and took the floor up, as is usual having to cut some of the nuts and
bolts off. I have never had such a crick in the neck getting into some very
awkward places to prepare for painting. I had the use of a paint sprayer by now
and we gave it a few more layers of undercoat, light blue this time.We needed to renew the water jacket on one side,
we found a guy who handmade two for me. After exaustive searching at military
events we finally aquired gaskets, points, plugs, tyres e.t.c. A new exhaust
system was made and fitted. By this time two years had flown past having worked
on it most weekends and any other spare minutes we had.My mate Frank renewed the wiring at the back of
the truck and put brake lights and indicators on. He made the rest of the
mudguards, as half of it was missing, by welding some panels onto the good bits
that were still OK.I borrowed a rusty tailgate from another Morris to
make a pattern for a new one as mine did not have one on the back when I bought
it, and also a large toolbox was made at the same time which sits between the
body and the cab.I found a front canvas cover for the truck at a
military show but when fitted it found it was 4" too small. When I had the rear
body canvas made I asked the guy to add 4" to the length of the front one (an
original Morris cover). I also found an original radiator muff with Morris C8
GS written on it - what a find! My brother Philip sponsored the making of the
canvas covers for the front seats and the gear stick.
By this time most of the boxes of
bits had been re-attached where they belonged. After two years searching we
found WD marked side mirrors in a scrapyard, which were still in there original
wrappers. The time came to give the truck the final rubdown and give it a
couple of coats of olive drab paint, refitted the back body and my Dad painted
the Div sign (3rd Div), RASC Corps sign and original Army number Z5812885 on
the bonnet.We had Colin Tebb from the Club authenticate it as
an original WW2 Morris Army Truck. The licensing Inspectorate also came and
inspected the truck and a new age-related number plate was issued - GSL 684,
which I think are good initials (General Service Lorry)As I could not find the Army service history of
the truck, its post war number is 35 YS 10, we wrote to the Museum of Army
Transport in Beverly who supplied me with both wartime and post war numbers and
when it was disposed of in 1957. It went into civilian service as a log
delivery truck until a student bought it in the 70's after which it was sold to
a farmer who collected military items and stored it in the chicken shed where I
found it!The restoration was finished just in time to go to
the Tilbury Show in 2000 ( the paint was hardly dry). Simce then it has been to
lots of shows in the UK and also to Bethune in France in 2001 where we did 600
miles in 4 days, and last year went to Arnhem. We get lots of strange looks as
we chug along the leafy lanes of Essex. It has also been used for the RBL Poppy
appeal.
Any information you might have on the history of my truck would be much appreciated. You can contact me at morrisc8@army1944.wanadoo.co.uk
 |
 |
A future project?
|
|
