Inside the Chieftain's Hatch: Ford Mk VI

During The Emergency (WW2 to most of the world), Ireland realised it needed to suddenly expand its armed forces, and it turned to local industry to meet the needs. Originally intended merely for airfield defense, the first series of conversions from civilian truck chassis proved to be surprisingly capable, and orders went out for additional armored cars to be converted. The MkVI was the last of these, with a surprisingly long service life.

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[donlavery]

My dad fought in these antiques at the Battle of Kipushi, Congo 1962. His section of two Fords fired 48, 000 rounds in support of Irish and Gurkha troops. He won the DSM for his bravery and leadership in that action.

[Firedad]

The correct term for manual steering is "Armstrong Steering".. If you don't have strong arms when you start, you will after you're done.

[keab]

I love the ingenuity of using the bicycle brakes for the ball mount. Sometimes a simple solution just works.

[michaelbevan]

The Americans who shipped these to the Congo were utterly amazed at this junk being brought out that far. The Irish were offered better vehicles and the Govt refused. Our troops went out with no artillery or anti aircraft cover and paid for it, because of penny pinching by the State.

[oldmangimp]

If that was, in fact, a fire extinguisher mount by the Commander's seat, it was quite the thoughtful gesture. Since the Commander would have to wait for the driver (or possibly the gunner) to exit the vehicle first, he would have a means to combat the fire while he waited.

[ianmckay]

Thanks Nick, as usual, you're sense of humour shines through. Oh, happy fathers day to all the dad's out there.

[HappyDuude]

Also, giben the contortions the chieftan does, he really should consider starting a 'Chieftan does Yoga' series - so you too can contort yourself into your local 1930s ergonomic Dali masterpiece

[cmck]

8:00 A Colles Fracture (a specific type of wrist fracture) was known back in The Day as a chauffeurs fracture. I remember the phrasing used back in the 80's by older colleagues.

[NemoForever]

Go back in time, make a tracked variant so we can have a track tension segment

[jonathan_]

A vehicle where the engine and reliability may be somewhat more bulletproof than the (not armor grade) armor :D
Really enjoyed seeing this

[TX-biker]

Thank you for the “unusual vehicle” walk around🤠
This is a unique example

[davidhansen]

Oh this is awesome! I love seeing these oddball vehicles.

[Colinpark]

At 5:30 the image of the front drum brake shows a bolt head in the upper right corner of the brake backing plate. That is the brake adjustor, on the other side is a snail cam that interacts with a post on the brake shoe. as you rotate the bolt, the cam engages the brake shoe post and push the brake shoe out, till it locks against the drum. Same system as on my series Landrover. The handcrank is very useful for setting valves

[ptonpc]

Definitely. better than nothing. I noticed the driver's seat has an adjustable back, so you may find that the driver can slide in and out of the seat and adjust it to suit.

[scottremish]

Cool to see how much of the original truck was used. Looks like stock fenders, lights and running boards.

[justforever]

So this is essentially the same thing as a Soviet BA series armored car, which were built on GAZ chassis, which were just Ford AA truck chassis. Except they used the heavier three-axle varient. The layout and concept is almost identical. Or rather it's similar to the BA-20, but on a heavier chassis, without the heavier cannon turret armament that the Soviet truck-based armored cars got).
Although you could say it is similar to the FAI-M armored car, in that the chassis is longer than the hull and sticks out behind it. Which is interesting because the FAI was based on the Soviet copy of the Ford Model A automobile, while this is a truck chassis like the later BA-3/7/10 (although really a Ford AA or AAA truck is pretty similar to the car, it just uses thicker steel for the frame, stronger springs and different gearing in the axle and transmission). The FAI-M ended up with that shelf because they switched to the newer generation car chassis when Ford came out with the 32 Ford chassis, which was a bit larger, so they just took the valuable and expensive hulls they already made off of the old chassis and adapted them to the new, longer ones (which makes you realize just how amazing the amount of equipment they produced during the war really was, when a few hundred armored cars was considered a major expense a few years before that, and the US was building tanks by dozens, not thousands). So im curious if something kind of similar happened here, they designed the hull to fit a car chassis, and then someone decided it really want strong enough, so they just switched it to a truck chassis without changing the design at all.
Anyway, if you just want a vehicle to patrol the roads and guard convoys, these work quite well, and are much cheaper than purpose built off-road types.
I like to speculate just how miserable it must have been trying to drive something like this in snow or mud. Two wheel drive, skinny tires with not much tread, no modern snow tires, and it has the weight of a fully loaded truck. I have to assume they used tire chains, because that just wouldn't work well.

[stanislavczebinski]

This thing is evidence of "you fight with what you have - not what you want".

For fighting light infantry or paratroops with no heavy weapons - this ain't too bad.

The water-cooled Vickers keeps going as long as it has ammo to shoot - and some water in the jacket to cool. If you run out of water - some other readily available body liquid will do....

The armor isn't great - but to stop some small-caliber bullets or light shrapnel - it does the job.

Plus: In an environment with some cover (like buildings in a city) and with quite good mobility - it's a lot better than nothing.

If you as a commander know and understand the limitations of your gear (in WW2, the British in particular were very good at that) - and use it accordingly - it will be a lot more effective than most people give them credit for.

[olpaint]

"I've been in worse Irish vehicles..." Oddly specific--and restrictive--categorization. 😀

[jacqueshickley]

The oil on the floor confirms that it is a Ford.

[Alan-hbpd]

I absolutely love armored cars from the interwar and ww2. They have a cool style and are so interesting. I really hope you have the opportunity to make more videos about armored cars