At Last! Bring on the big boys, time to drive a Centurion Main Battle Tank! The Dogs Bollocks! Now we’re talking. Fifty tons of steel, a 27,000cc Rolls Royce Meteor Engine (of Spitfire fame), a crash unmeshed gear box and a giant thirst of four gallons of petrol to the mile. Fabulous and very exciting! Delighted that I wasn’t paying for the petrol I started my Centurion familiarisation course. I was taught to drive a centurion gun-tank at Bordon by a polish guy called Ray Stopinski. He could drive the Cent second to none. 27000cc, crash box, stick changes, double de-clutching, no brakes of any use. Real proper driving. Even with 27000cc to move it about the Cent takes some skill to get moving. Particularly so in mud, on sand, and across uneven ground. Tank driver training grounds tend to be uneven, muddy places and all the mud and unevenness wants to do is stop your Cent from moving. Stick in the mud. So off we go. In a cent there are three conventional pedals, except their huge. The gearstick rises between your legs and the steering is through two tillers at either side of your seat. Pull the right one to turn right and vice versa on the left. Start the engine, clutch in, into 2nd gear and off we go. On the hard standing its straightforward. Into third gear, double-declutch, same as a lorry. Match the engine revs to the transmission and road speed. Up and down the box. Five up and down, two reverse. Gently pull on the tillers and the Cent changes direction on its central axis. Fabulous and easy, how good is this. Next day onto rough ground, ‘The ‘Ulu’’ all rough ground is ‘The ‘Ulu’’. Off the hardstanding, it’s been raining and onto ‘The ‘Ulu’’. Onto mud. The Cent becomes a strange abrasively argumentative new animal. Whereas on the road its easy and obedient on the mud it doesn’t want to go. Add a little angle of hill and it just stops. Try again, pull off, stop. Try again, pull off, change gear, just stop. Try again, pull off, build up revs, go a little faster, change up, die a death, and stop. For fucks sake! Ray Stopinski waves his red circle traffic lollipop. Try again, same thing starts, try. Stop. For fucks sake. Have a fag sitting on the gun barrel. Ray explains that the mud and the wet and the angle all serve to stop the vehicle moving. I can’t get it from 2nd to 3rd. Ray explains I need to ‘stick-change’. What is a stick-change? He explains that stick change is a simultaneous three-way action involving the clutch, the gearstick and a steering tiller that must be done super quickly. So that the next gear is selected before the speed attained in the 2nd gear isn’t lost before the clutch is re-engaged and the engine power re-applied. Oh! Why didn’t you say so. It’s as clear as the three feet deep mud we are attempting driving in. It’s a complicated thing to explain to a relatively inexperienced driver. It’s even more complicated if it’s explained in a thick polish accent, with a wet fag in your gob, while gesticulating wildly with a red traffic lollipop and sitting on a centurion tank barrel in the rain parked in three feet of sticking mud. But it worked and I got it. Once you’ve got it you’ve got it. It’s just suddenly there. A fabulous feeling of achievement and strangely enough the more you practice the slicker you get. A real skill. I’d go so far to say If you could drive a Centurion properly you were the 'creme de la creme' of drivers in the entire British Forces. Much better than 'any' other drivers, there was more to it. No automatics, no synchromesh. If you can get one of these fifty-ton steel beast moving quickly, especially when towing on ‘The ‘Ulu’’, then you are a master and can drive anything. You were the 'best of the best'. www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CM3X4SC2
Great video Joe! I used to have a few hot rods back in the day, hence my fascination with your channel. Gear heads love watching gear heads I guess. Anyhow, back in the day we would tune our straight pipe exhaust system by spray painting the extra long pipes black and then run the engine up for a while. Where the paint stopped burning, we would cut the pipe and add the glass pack there. Sounded great. I also had a big block Vette that would cut out at high rpm’s. Problem turned out to be an old piece of rubber fuel line that was getting sucked flat by the high volume fuel pump. I chased that problem for awhile. LOL Oh yeah, pat Ted on the head for me.
Great update as always. Feeling the enjoyment as well as the niggles there but further on that it was, especially with some of the cosmetics getting sorted as you go; smoke dischargers, vice mount & so on. Bloody good to see it coming together piece by piece
Brilliant! good to see the old girls running! I use to work with a lot of heavy tracked machinery, in those days (early -mid-seventies) Spraging was the term used for turning the tracks left or right. and it must be fifty years since I last heard the term! I hope you get all the winches and so on up and running!
I'm a trained heavy equipment operator from back in the late 1970's. Interesting to me to see theses young guys confident and knowledgeable in making repairs too.
Very nice to see it driving around after so long spend idle! Six fish tails on either side like a Merlin powered aeroplane would look cool xD Love how you can see how the metal changes colour after running... must be getting a bit warm! If you can get her to start without the help of Foden, that will be one hell of a useful vehicle!
Fit up the tracks with some negative camber, get Jack to wear his baseball cap backwards and head for Sainsbury’s car park / McDonalds (other commercial retail / drift parks are available) on a Saturday night. Have a gentle word with the muppets that are giving it “me nan’s Micra is a drift machine”
I would like to put my hand up and volunteer and polish the vehicle, on condition you teach me to drive it😯 seriously guys another great video, bedt rebards a Kiwi living in Australia 👍👍👍👍👍
Now all we need is a video at night of the Twin stacks SPITTING flames with a spot light on the Union Jack flapping in the wind all to the glorious sound of "God Save the Queen" blasting away. ;)
Great work as always !! With them twin stacks and the old girl poping and farting shes starting to sound like them cars on a demolition Darby lol Ooo can you imagine the carnage 😊
@@johnnunn8688 Yeah that sounds like the video I'm thinking of, a different engine then. To be fair, if hes done it on one he probably does the same on others.
Hey Joe, Awesome video! Just curious why is there just a random BAC Jet Provost out in the grass? It looks like it isnt even on the landing gear either. Just kinda curious why it is there and the story behind it lol.
I think it’s much noisier in the flesh. You missed Joe saying that he was going to shorten the stacks and the stacks being much shorter at the end of the video?
I like it a lot :o) I wonder what zooomies would be like? Anyhoo, sounds like my 58’ landrover last week when the fuel pump was cocking about. Half an hour outside screwfix trying to diagnose that fault :D
I thought that left hush puppy was gonna come off it was spragging that much, but then you finally tensioned it 😂🤣. The pipes looked a lot better cut, first thing I thought was hot wheels tank 🤣. Sounds goooooooooooood.
There has been coverage in the press of tanks in the UK being bought privately and sent to battle in Ukraine. I was wondering if you could talk about what would be involved in getting a tank of the typical condition you work with and making it reliable for real world battle use?
I absolutely love the sound of that RR but I just can't get past it needing a big diesel like a big kta or c19 but yeah love the sound bet it's loud as fuck
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
One day someone will leave a beautiful handprint on them stacks. They will only do it once.
🤣🤣🤣🤣👍🏼
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Love that he pined this😂
🖐🏿🤬
they should cover them with exhaust heat wrap
At Last! Bring on the big boys, time to drive a Centurion Main Battle Tank! The Dogs Bollocks! Now we’re talking. Fifty tons of steel, a 27,000cc Rolls Royce Meteor Engine (of Spitfire fame), a crash unmeshed gear box and a giant thirst of four gallons of petrol to the mile. Fabulous and very exciting!
Delighted that I wasn’t paying for the petrol I started my Centurion familiarisation course. I was taught to drive a centurion gun-tank at Bordon by a polish guy called Ray Stopinski. He could drive the Cent second to none. 27000cc, crash box, stick changes, double de-clutching, no brakes of any use. Real proper driving.
Even with 27000cc to move it about the Cent takes some skill to get moving. Particularly so in mud, on sand, and across uneven ground.
Tank driver training grounds tend to be uneven, muddy places and all the mud and unevenness wants to do is stop your Cent from moving. Stick in the mud.
So off we go. In a cent there are three conventional pedals, except their huge. The gearstick rises between your legs and the steering is through two tillers at either side of your seat. Pull the right one to turn right and vice versa on the left. Start the engine, clutch in, into 2nd gear and off we go. On the hard standing its straightforward. Into third gear, double-declutch, same as a lorry. Match the engine revs to the transmission and road speed. Up and down the box. Five up and down, two reverse. Gently pull on the tillers and the Cent changes direction on its central axis. Fabulous and easy, how good is this. Next day onto rough ground, ‘The ‘Ulu’’ all rough ground is ‘The ‘Ulu’’. Off the hardstanding, it’s been raining and onto ‘The ‘Ulu’’. Onto mud.
The Cent becomes a strange abrasively argumentative new animal. Whereas on the road its easy and obedient on the mud it doesn’t want to go. Add a little angle of hill and it just stops. Try again, pull off, stop. Try again, pull off, change gear, just stop. Try again, pull off, build up revs, go a little faster, change up, die a death, and stop. For fucks sake!
Ray Stopinski waves his red circle traffic lollipop. Try again, same thing starts, try. Stop. For fucks sake. Have a fag sitting on the gun barrel. Ray explains that the mud and the wet and the angle all serve to stop the vehicle moving. I can’t get it from 2nd to 3rd. Ray explains I need to ‘stick-change’. What is a stick-change?
He explains that stick change is a simultaneous three-way action involving the clutch, the gearstick and a steering tiller that must be done super quickly. So that the next gear is selected before the speed attained in the 2nd gear isn’t lost before the clutch is re-engaged and the engine power re-applied. Oh! Why didn’t you say so. It’s as clear as the three feet deep mud we are attempting driving in.
It’s a complicated thing to explain to a relatively inexperienced driver. It’s even more complicated if it’s explained in a thick polish accent, with a wet fag in your gob, while gesticulating wildly with a red traffic lollipop and sitting on a centurion tank barrel in the rain parked in three feet of sticking mud. But it worked and I got it.
Once you’ve got it you’ve got it. It’s just suddenly there. A fabulous feeling of achievement and strangely enough the more you practice the slicker you get. A real skill. I’d go so far to say If you could drive a Centurion properly you were the 'creme de la creme' of drivers in the entire British Forces. Much better than 'any' other drivers, there was more to it. No automatics, no synchromesh. If you can get one of these fifty-ton steel beast moving quickly, especially when towing on ‘The ‘Ulu’’, then you are a master and can drive anything. You were the 'best of the best'.
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CM3X4SC2
Great video Joe! I used to have a few hot rods back in the day, hence my fascination with your channel. Gear heads love watching gear heads I guess. Anyhow, back in the day we would tune our straight pipe exhaust system by spray painting the extra long pipes black and then run the engine up for a while. Where the paint stopped burning, we would cut the pipe and add the glass pack there. Sounded great. I also had a big block Vette that would cut out at high rpm’s. Problem turned out to be an old piece of rubber fuel line that was getting sucked flat by the high volume fuel pump. I chased that problem for awhile. LOL
Oh yeah, pat Ted on the head for me.
The Foden looks on smirking that it has all its gears and doesn’t need any help to get started 😂
Brings back bordon/ white hill, SEME/REME days
That lump sounds good! Love the stacks..cutting them down unfortunatly was a good call. Tree's and their poxy branches are boring but there you go.
Great update as always. Feeling the enjoyment as well as the niggles there but further on that it was, especially with some of the cosmetics getting sorted as you go; smoke dischargers, vice mount & so on. Bloody good to see it coming together piece by piece
Right track could do with a tighten Joe!! But looks and sounds great mate. I took my track driving test on a AVRE. Loved Cents, adored Chieftains.
Brilliant! good to see the old girls running! I use to work with a lot of heavy tracked machinery, in those days (early -mid-seventies) Spraging was the term used for turning the tracks left or right. and it must be fifty years since I last heard the term! I hope you get all the winches and so on up and running!
I drive excavators and the term sprag is still used, in Context like try not sprag about on that finished road too much. 😂
I'm a trained heavy equipment operator from back in the late 1970's. Interesting to me to see theses young guys confident and knowledgeable in making repairs too.
I don't know what it is, but I like to watch people who tinker on tanks.....🤗
Very nice to see it driving around after so long spend idle! Six fish tails on either side like a Merlin powered aeroplane would look cool xD Love how you can see how the metal changes colour after running... must be getting a bit warm! If you can get her to start without the help of Foden, that will be one hell of a useful vehicle!
This tank would look good in the Berlin camo scheme
Definitely would look good 👍
Yeah and we all know how Jack loves masking off.
Jack wouldn't agree
We need to see more of the work done by your fine young ladies, that work behind the scenes
‘mARVin Gaye’ is looking better than ever Mister Hewes !
It is a "Pick Up" so the straight pipes are spot on.
Now that, is what I call a useful bit of kit. Another great video folks.
Fit up the tracks with some negative camber, get Jack to wear his baseball cap backwards and head for Sainsbury’s car park / McDonalds (other commercial retail / drift parks are available) on a Saturday night. Have a gentle word with the muppets that are giving it “me nan’s Micra is a drift machine”
I would pay to watch that.
Fun times ahead. Nice work. Ted for PM.
I would like to put my hand up and volunteer and polish the vehicle, on condition you teach me to drive it😯 seriously guys another great video, bedt rebards a Kiwi living in Australia 👍👍👍👍👍
As Nick Moran (The Chieftain) we need to check the track tension on the Centurion ARV. I know I'm bit late. Excellent job.
The twin stacks make it sound like an old hot rod.
And if the welds hold and make it work, appearance doesn't matter...😎
Now all we need is a video at night of the Twin stacks SPITTING flames with a spot light on the Union Jack flapping in the wind all to the glorious sound of "God Save the Queen" blasting away. ;)
*King.
Stack flappers face front so the wind holds them open. Look at the Reo Tractor Unit's. Faces forward.
Use are the best man, and that's that. Gerald Ingram. New Zealand.
I would rather own the ARV than the turrets tank. It's like a Foden on tracks.
"I do not need to identify as a FODEN!"
Watching these videos makes me want to go and work on my own stuff.
ARV pops and bangs edition, love it .
Lots of great stuff laying around there!
Loving the old Krone RoundPack baler in the yard. How many times i've changed pick up tynes and chain bearings on those!
Me too 😂
Yesss, full yob spec ARV, Ted for PM?
As always, very entertaining video. Team, that tinny, little, small air filter will be causing all sorts of breathing, fuel running issues. 🙂
Wow, that's the first tank engine with a hot rodded exhaust system.
7 minutes of just loud pipes BAAARRRRRHHHHHH BRRGHG BERRHHHHHHRRHHH 😂😂😂
Them stacks look like they were added by a farmer. They really need chrome shields; something to make them look fancy
Adds at least 200bhp and also deflects heat-seeking missiles which now go over the tank cause of the heat plume :)
Looking down where the gear linkages are, I just wanted to get a hoover out 😂, then soak it all in oil, WD-40, whatever 😅 sad aren’t I ?!
Great work as always !!
With them twin stacks and the old girl poping and farting shes starting to sound like them cars on a demolition Darby lol
Ooo can you imagine the carnage 😊
That’s no way to talk about his missus 😂
14:42 A proper "gary boy" revving the open pipes outside your mums house 🤣
Great vid joe As always 👍😉
Would love to come spend day with you guys love these videos top job guys
You’d have to work and on the whiteboard would be written ‘bully Vinnie’. 😂🤣
@John Nunn ye your probably right lol🤣🤣
Do you visit events like tiger day or else with your fabulous gear?
If the uk ever went to a major war ide pick you as my engineer keep up the grate videos dude I had to sub 👌❤️💪🏻
When are you going to put tracks on that cool plane you got!
Is one bank on the engine running super lean, appears to be alot hotter than the opposite bank
Mad max tank before mad max looks awesome, has it got both mags on it or is that why its popping and banging?
Not 100% but I think I remember Joe saying he was going to start with just the one. in a previous video, or was that a different tank? not sure.
@@ChullsterOG thats what i thought too.
@@ChullsterOG, I too wondered but think the tank with one mag is the gun testing one 🤷♂️.
@@johnnunn8688 Yeah that sounds like the video I'm thinking of, a different engine then. To be fair, if hes done it on one he probably does the same on others.
It may be a mistake but I have taken the plunge and subscribed. Hope I do not live to regret it :)
Mud flap girls on mud flaps behind the rear sprockets would nicely complement the two exhaust stacks.
lovein the tops, can u do some merch with Tank Hub please.
How many cylinders does it have? It sounded like it was missing on 2-3 at higher revs.
Hey Joe, Awesome video! Just curious why is there just a random BAC Jet Provost out in the grass? It looks like it isnt even on the landing gear either. Just kinda curious why it is there and the story behind it lol.
Lol. .. it’s featured in a few previous videos ( mainly it was cheap & they had space to keep it )
@@888johnmac ah okay thanks. I never saw those videos so didnt know about it.
TBH i was expecting far more noise, sounds ace though, i'd be getting the hacksaw out and lobbing a few feet of the pipes 🤣 Zoomies? 🤣🤣
I think it’s much noisier in the flesh. You missed Joe saying that he was going to shorten the stacks and the stacks being much shorter at the end of the video?
You need to double D Clutch when changing gear in a Centurion Tank. I last drove a similar model in 1972!
looking very good guys !
It looks like a very good engine 👍👍
Maybe needs some carburettor work
I wonder if the aftermarket air filter is so efficient it is running lean.
i hope this is the start of some kind of weird battle tank hot rod hybrid Spitting flames of fire hahaha
What’s the story with the jet?
What about the missfiring? Its the sparkplugs or carborettas?
I need to reset the engine timing to factory
Planning to use the original exhaust system eventually?
It’s shot
Are we ever going to ever be able to get some mr hewes merchandise?
Please tank stuff
Do you guys sand blast Tanks?
Great video as always. Think you guys need to get some mics when you can.
Sound's superb.
What a beauty... 13:43 next week you fix the airplane...right ?
Sounds amazing
What’s the purpose of the sprag on the back?
I think it drops and digs into the ground to anchor vehicle when winching, I could be wrong.
I like it a lot :o) I wonder what zooomies would be like? Anyhoo, sounds like my 58’ landrover last week when the fuel pump was cocking about. Half an hour outside screwfix trying to diagnose that fault :D
Love you'll work
Flipping ace ...why not !
in a Armageddon scenario... I really would like to live near you. Awesome!
I thought that left hush puppy was gonna come off it was spragging that much, but then you finally tensioned it 😂🤣. The pipes looked a lot better cut, first thing I thought was hot wheels tank 🤣. Sounds goooooooooooood.
That’s add 20bhp for sure
Love the sound !!
Why didn't you fit stainless mufflers as well?
Sorry boys but the angled exhausts are looking a tad silly. Better if they were straight up.😅
Silly is my thing
I would love to drive that in a uppity neighborhood at 0330 on a Monday!! Great sound!
Are you gonna put a hiab on here?
Sounds mint AF 👌
That’s 2 fingers up to Greta ✌🏻😂 Sounds the nuts, pops and farts a treat!
Plenty of room for some turbos under them stacks!
salute to the old Provo' trainer
hey how about getting the provost started ??
ARV Twin stacks , Hot Rod version.
Might want to put some coffee cans over those flappers.
You should have made an X pipe. The sound would be glorious
Nice work , nice stacks , think would look better vertical instead of cock eyed , 😂 thanks for sharing 💨💨💨👍
What is the problem with the engine? Sounds like the timing or governor? Or is that a characteristic of the engine?
Timing needs setting to factory
So cool
There has been coverage in the press of tanks in the UK being bought privately and sent to battle in Ukraine. I was wondering if you could talk about what would be involved in getting a tank of the typical condition you work with and making it reliable for real world battle use?
👍👍
Whats the story behind the Jet Provost Joe?
Last flight 1993
The right hand track has more slack in it than the left
hey mate your weld has whiskers, did Ted stop by to help
Proper shame ye old ARV didn’t buck up…thinkin the blokes will crack on with solvin it…and right quick!
Is the farting, carburation, fuel or ignition?
Timing needs setting
Wrap those exhaust stacks because as you know , there are some absent minded clots around great to see it run and drive .cheers from Australia 🇦🇺 😂
nice
Who are these people? 😂
As a crew man on a Sherman I consider the The Centurion to be a pos!
So is this what you will use in future to rescue Chieftains stuck in the wood?
I absolutely love the sound of that RR but I just can't get past it needing a big diesel like a big kta or c19 but yeah love the sound bet it's loud as fuck