Land Rovers in the woods

We do quite a bit of work on Land Rovers here at Robison Service, and we drive them too. My friend Dave Rifken owns this ex-military D90 that you see in the woods near where we live.

Dave and I have hosted several Land Rover club events - and we are planning to do another later in May or early in June.

The picture above shows a rocy section of the Rattlesnake Gutter trail in Leverett.

It’s a fairly stock NATO truck with left hand drive. It’s powered by the Rover 2.5 diesel and runs on the standard Michelin XZL military tires, which are very good in most situations.We’ve fitted a custom bumper and Superwinch with synthetic cable, custom sliders, snorkel and other mechanical accessories. You can see the skid pans in this shot.

Inside there’s satellite radio and some extra sound deadening but it’s still pretty plain. These Army trucks didn't have any sound deadening at all. Dynamat and a set of civilian rubber mats make for a big improvement, and they don't cause any problems unless you regularly submerge the truck in deep water.

The little diesel actually get over 20 miles per gallon on the road, making this truck quite economical to run.

Dave drives this truck almost every day.

Here we’ve stopped by an old mill dam. The dam and foundation are hard to see in this shot from downstream. I crossed the stream and took the next photo from above.

The area where we live was littered with little mills in the middle 1800s. Most all have vanished back ito the woods now.

Dave and I have very similar trucks – in fact we bought them at the same time. Mine is a soft top, though, and it’s still painted in the NATO camo color. We painted Dave’s truck the flat grey you see a while back.

In this photo my son Cubby is driving up a snowy track last winter.

My truck has a Safarigard Stage II suspension, and it does not have the skid plates, as you can see here.

The next photos show some of our earlier Land Rover adventures. In this next shot, a line of Rovers makes its way through a rainy Vermont forest at Baystate Rover's fall outing. Once again, Cubby is driving my truck, which is second in line behind Alan Elliot's red Classic.

Here Main Rover enthusiast Bob Vail watches a line of trucks pass in the fog:

In this shot Richard Reavey crests a small hill in his Tonka. This is an old series truck that we fitted with portal axles and huge tires, making a supremely capable rig. This truck was on the cover of Land Rover Enthusiast last January.