Options and Ideas

The first thing all my friends have said is "When are you going to paint it yellow?" I will almost certainly end up painting it yellow (yellow ones go faster), but there are more important functional things to sort (eg get it working reliably) before I do it. Click on the thumbnail to get an idea of what it could look like. I would of course also paint my black doors yellow!

If a Tomcat is the home made version of a Bowler Wildcat, I actually need to make my own version of one of these support trucks.

While looking for a support vehicle I was seriously considering buying a nice, low mileage, ex-RAF (not a knackered ex-Army) Land Rover 127 ambulance.

For many years Landrover ran a series of adventures called the Camel Trophy. Landrover used specially designed and built Land Rovers, Range Rovers, Discoveries and more recently, Freelanders incorporating years of experience. So I think I will see what I can copy from these famous expedition vehicles for my support vehicle.

These Camel Trophy Land Rovers are not museum pieces that only come out to park at shows. See below for some photos of a Defender 110 Station Wagon, Defender 110 Hi-Cap Pick Up and Landrover Discovery having fun in the mud. A Camel Trophy Freelander turned up just as it got too dark to take decent photos.

Land Rover is no longer involved in the Camel Trophy. Land Rover now organise the G4 Challenge. Instead of driving across difficult terrain in one place, the G4 Challenge is for sporty, outdoor people and take place in a number of countries for more publicity. However it does involve a fleet of Land Rovers (Range Rover, Range Rover Sport, Discovery, Freelander and most interestingly, Defender 110).

I think this Landrover is excellent. It is the Landrover driven by Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie) in the Tomb Raider film. It was made by Landrover Special Vehicles and I may have to use some of the their ideas.

I got another opportunity to see Lara Croft’s Landrover from the first Tomb Raider film. This time I took a load of detailed photos so I (or anybody else) can copy some of the design ideas.

One reason I wanted a large (110, 127 or 130) support vehicle is so that it can carry lots of stuff. I looked around for ideas of how other people safely carry lots of stuff in their Land Rovers.

As the main role currently for my Support Vehicle is to carry stuff, stowage is very important. I think fire appliances are good examples of excellent stowage.

Matt Savage sleeps on the roof of his Land Rover in a roof tent. There are also all sorts of ideas, features and details on his Land Rover that are a result of lessons learnt whilst travelling.

The King Trojan is produced by Trek Overland and is based on a Defender 130. It is a very well equipped Land Rover camper van for 6 people operating away from other facilities.