Ugly Truck

[catgate]

 

This is one  I made earlier,  It's original purpose was to be a general run about with the ability to have enough space in it to have a nap, when we came off the midnight boat in I.O.M.

I built it in the garage/workshop at Catgate. The chassis was made out of some new left over surplus pallet racking

All the body is fibreglass with the exception of the floor and that is stainless steel. All the fasteners are "Allen bolts" into "pop-rivet" type nuts.

The biggest time gobbler was the making of the moulds. Every panel was different and had to be a perfect fit to the next door panel.

It looks like a cast off failed Landrover , but it was more or less inevitable due to the difficulty of having to make a mould for every panel, and the making of curved  panels is no fun.

 

 

 

 

[Belatucadrus]

Did you ever see it again, I ask as it looks as if somebody tried to sell it on ebay last year

Click Here

The original listing seems to have gone but the picture on this forum thread looks right and you mentioned the bloke you sold it to repainted it black.

[catgate]

Is that not bizarre.

That is the thing without a doubt.

A week or so after the man bought it he rang me and asked if I knew how to fasten "That imitation grass, like greengrocers and fish sellers use in their shop windows." over the bonnet.

After another week or so had gone by he arrived at our front door. My wife went  to deal with him, and came back with a neat plastic bag containing a T-shirt with "Ugly Truck" printed on the front. He and his mate/chum/partner were going to tour France selling "Ugly Truck" T shirts !!!! He had brought one for me.

I still have it, unopened..

As far as the ugly truck itself is concerned I have only had one expedition to try to find it. That was a bit of a blow because one chap that I spoke to, who was from "the area where it lived," said he had seen it on the back of a wagon, which he thought was a scrap truck.

 

I would dearly like to know just where it went. It had on it a silencing system that was so effective that if you stood at the back of the animal on fast tick over it was silent.

 

 

 

 

[Belatucadrus]

I was wrong, the original listing is still up, though it looks as if in a contest between your fibreglass bodywork and the black paint the fibreglass won hands down.

 

Click Here

 

It got relisted several times in 2016, this last shot was Jan this year at which point juesmith123 either sold it or gave up.

[catgate]

I have had a look at what was behind your Click Here and I am truly astounded at what I saw.

It would be interesting to know how/why the machine was butchered so fiercely.

 

Having said that, and just thought about it for a moment., I think the Ugly Truck probably had a higher IQ.

[AlanHo]

Catgate - are you going to phone Julian on 0792 992 3688 to see if he can help with information?

 

 

 

[catgate]

1 hour ago, AlanHo said:

Catgate - are you going to phone Julian on 0792 992 3688 to see if he can help with information?

 

 

 

No, I think not.

I have got the information I wanted, which was it is not yet totally destroyed .

I  am left wondering how it got into the mess it appears to be in and why.

I saw it up for sale shortly before we left Catgate and the amount of fantasy in the advert was mind blowing. I had become an aero space engineer!

I can only think that he thought I was employed by RollsRoyce (who have a factory one or two miles away).

As far as the MOT was concerned, a young fellow  from officialdom came, and looked at it, and said that it would be classed as a new vehicle, and hence did not need an MOT.

The odd thing is that only a few days ago, during that short period of a few days of sun and warmth, we debated about going across to Catgate to see our ex neighbours and also go to a nearby scrap yard for a peep around. 

[catgate]

I have had another look at the "evidence" and am left wondering what it has been through, in the last few years, to come out in such a mess.

I know, from experience, that everything the vendor says in not necessarily true, but it would be nice to hear his saga.

[AlanHo]

1 hour ago, catgate said:

I have had another look at the "evidence" and am left wondering what it has been through, in the last few years, to come out in such a mess.

I know, from experience, that everything the vendor says in not necessarily true, but it would be nice to hear his saga.

All the more reason for you to make that phone call.

[catgate]

 It might be nice to hear his saga, but, knowing what I do about him, it will be more fiction than fact,...and there has already been more than enough in this shambles.

I feel rather cross in some way that I spent a lot of time and effort making the thing and it has just been ruined. Where ever possible, fastenings were captive nuts and socket head bolts, to facilitate easy dismantling, when needed,  using  just a set of alan keys. All the fastenings were socket head and, in many places, stainless steel.

I had conceived a "different" exhaust system using a couple of cast aluminium silencer which could be taken apart for internal cleaning when needed. and if one was standing at the back of the vehicle the only thing that gave any indication the engine was running was the slight  movement of the vehicle.