These photographs are from John Bamford's website located here. These have been reporduced with permission of John and hopefully we will see this collection added to in quality and quantity in the future.

These photos were taken by John over a number of years. The first set of photos are from the testing and trials of the first two prototype Land Rover Ambulances in 1960. The second set are from 1960 and 1961 and are of the rebuilt Ambulance prototype on trials around Australia.

John was also able to shed some light onto the reason why the Australian Army Land Rovers adopted the square cut guards instead of retaining the normal rounded ones.

I can tell you exactly why the mudguards were changed, because I was responsible for the change.

During the first ambulance trials we experienced heavy rain on black soil roads on several occasions.

What happens with black soil is that it first gets very slippery, then soft and boggy, followed by a period when the black soil is so sticky that it will stick to the tyres, increase the effective tyre diameter, and then build up to completely fill the mudguards. If left to dry it then goes very hard, and can need something like a fire hose to get it out.

At various stages on the trials the mudguards completely filled with sticky black soil so that the ambulance could not drive on or even start off in first gear low ratio. Every few miles we were forced to stop and dig the compacted black soil out of the wheel aches, before we could continue in low ratio. Getting the soil off the tyres and out of the mudguards was far from easy.

The idea of the cut away mudguards was to make it much easier to get around the tyres and into the mudguard recesses to dig such soil out. The cut away mudguards were then introduced in all the Australian Army Land Rovers.

Pictures of the first two prototype Army Ambulances on trials around Australia in 1960

Route for Tropical Trials 1960 and 1960/61 (excluding occasional excursions)
Copyright John Bamford

Hann Highway, between Mount Garnet and Hughenden, Queensland
Copyright John Bamford

Ever had that feeling when you see a trailer (just like yours) cartwheeling end for end all on its own?
Copyright John Bamford

Re-built prototype Army Ambulance on trials around Australia in 1960/61.

Before Camooweal, Queensland, near the Northern Territory border
Copyright John Bamford

Alice Springs, Northern Territory
Copyright John Bamford

Copyright John Bamford
FV1119 recovering a Saladin Armoured Car

John Bamford recalls information about the 1966 Year Trials.

Photograph 2A is in 1996 following the decision to establish a permanent tropical trials establishment at Cowley Beach near Innisfail. No-one had decided where the exact boundaries should be. The photograph is when four of us went out, stuck a post in the ground for the first corner, and then sent the engineer officer off to survey exactly where the post was.

The other photographs are from British hot dry trials in 1966 between Cloncurry and Mount Isa. The photographs are 1D Stalwart, 2B Light Mobile Digger, 2CAbbott, and 2D Heavy Wheel Tractor. In the planning stages for these trials there arose the question of where the trials could be conducted, bearing in mind the need for accommodation and support facilities. I suggested that they "borrow" Mary Kathleen Uranium Mine, which was then in a caretaker mode and not working, and where there was vacant housing, catering facilities, and operational buildings for several hundred people. So one of the trials was run from a uranium mine.

Copyright John Bamford
Locating the first post!

Copyright John Bamford
Heavy Wheel Tractor