Best Birthday Present Ever
Warren Vos was given several Series I bits for his eighteenth birthday. The challenge was to build himself one by the time his twenty-first came around
Warren Vos’s 18th birthday present was a pile of Series I parts. If he could build it, he could keep it
Turning 18 in South Africa is a pretty big deal. It’s the age when you can legally order an alcoholic drink at a bar or drive a car without your mum or dad in it. Provided you have a licence, of course. It’s also the age when you leave school and go to the army, university or take up formal work. It does not matter whether you call it adulthood or the coming of age, what does matter is what you do with the grown-up challenges that life will inevitably throw your way.
Africa in the 1950s was very different to the rest of the developed world. Large parts of it were still pretty wild and undeveloped. To explore these bits, you most definitely needed a Land Rover; they say that the first vehicle seen by most rural Africans in those times was a Land Rover. Obviously over time this has changed, so while the Land Rover was once the king of the African jungle, today Jap crap vehicles and Chinese road builders are slowly but surely taking over the continent. The one positive of this is that
“This SI is definitely not a show pony and was meant for off-roading”
there are loads of Land Rovers left on the dark continent, just waiting to be saved and restored.
Warren Vos’ Land Rover ownership story began on his eighteenth birthday when his uncle Rob Leimer, who ran a highly respectable garage called Leimer’s Land Rover, took him to a tree in the yard of his workshop. Lying underneath it was a Series I chassis, bulkhead and two axles. “Happy Birthday Warren,” said Rob. “If you can rebuild this Series I by your twenty-first birthday, it’s yours. I will supply everything that you need, but you must do the hard graft.”
Rob, a Series I fanatic, obviously wanted his nephew to follow in his successful footsteps.
Warren’s first Land Rover experiences were of family holidays in them with his Uncle Rob, but now he was going to be building his own.
He is quick to admit that while the chassis and axle matched up, he did not have an engine or gearbox for his project. So he found the correct 2.0-litre engine and borrowed a gearbox from a Series IIA. Problem solved. He now had the main bits for the rebuild of his 1956 Series I 86in.
This was Warren’s introduction into the frustrating and wonderful world of Land Rover ownership, also sometimes referred to as Mechanics’ 101. For him it was literally a case of trial and error. He had to rebuild the front axle three times because after the first attempt the wheels were not standing at the right angle. Eventually he got the front axle right with a little help and advice from one of Rob’s mechanics.
As with most vehicles found on the warm, dry, Transvaal Highveld, the chassis was in tip-top condition except for one of the crossmembers, which was a little mangled after an unfortunate encounter with a large rock, but this was a pretty simple fix for Warren.
Starting a Land Rover project is pretty easy: you strip it all down until it is in lots and lots of little bits. Sometimes this can be overwhelming and make you lose interest. But not so for Warren, who had a deadline to meet – and that was his sole source of his motivation. “Each week I made sure that there was some sort of progress with my project,” he recalls. “If you are undertaking a massive Land Rover project then you need to set yourself weekly goals and make sure that you do everything possible to achieve them.”
Once the project was finished, Warren planned on driving his Series I from Johannesburg to Cape Town (a distance of 1000 miles) and so he made a few changes to ease his passage. He installed a 45-litre fuel tank underneath the front passenger seat. This included an easy-to-reach fuel tank change-over switch so that he could switch between tanks while on the go.
Except for the bleeding of the brakes and the front axle issues, Warren was able to figure out the rest for himself. Then, because spray painting is not one of his strong points, Warren sent it away to be painted British Racing Green, his favourite automotive colour.
As this Series I is definitely not a shiny show pony and was meant for off-roading and fun, Warren installed parabolic springs for a more comfortable and capable ride. He refused to do what he calls ‘bastardise’ it by adding a winch and spotlights. He feels that with something so capable, those