Shitefest take two

A dirty weekend

Remember the amazing spectacle that was Shitefest about six weeks ago? We descended on Chris and Claire's field from all parts of the country, wreaked havoc and churned up their land, but far from being put off by the experience, within a week he had decided he wanted to do it again once the field had dried out as the poor weather and ground conditions meant we couldn't do a lot of things! So it was that this weekend the now bone-dry field of dreams once again hosted a small gathering of shiters and much mayhem ensued...

Saturday: digging, scything and tractoring

Because of the short notice, there were only four visitors in attendance but that didn't stop us having a good time. We arrived on Saturday afternoon to a game of find the JCB dipstick, which was eventually located deep in the bowels of the engine and showed it to have enough oil, a relief as when working hard it can burn through five litres in a day and spit red hot embers out of the exhaust! The battery was flat though, so Chris headed home to fetch another and left us with the dismantled carburettor of the Allen Scythe, a fearsome machine for cutting long grass, crops, weeds, legs etc. Having never even seen such a thing before and without any instructions, over the next couple of hours my dad proceeded to work out how it all fitted together, and soon the carb was reassembled and the machine fired up.

Crazy guys on farm machines

Operating an Allen Scythe is a truly terrifying experience, but is still much safer than being a bystander. On the front is a completely unguarded three-foot long blade that is connected directly to the engine and starts thrashing away as soon as the engine fires up. The clutch lever operates backwards and has to be released to engage drive, so instead of stopping if you let go of the handles it just keeps going and cuts a swathe of destruction through everything in its path. With the throttle open the whole machine vibrates so much that it's very difficult to release the clutch, then it will suddenly go so the machine takes off and you have to chase after it! Health and safety clearly wasn't in Mr Allen's mind when he designed this contraption, yet a quarter of a million were made over a near thirty-year period. Sadly the stress of being awoken from a long slumber caused the cutter drive arm to break and put an end to any further scything shenanigans, but a new one has been ordered and the Allen Scythe will live again.

Mr Allen's lethal motorised scythe

Next on the agenda was Claire's beloved tractor (yes, she's just as crazy about machinery as the guys), a 1959 Ferguson FE35. This is a good runner, albeit a bit reluctant to start, so nothing needed doing except to give it a run. I'd never driven a tractor before but it's surprisingly easy - just choose your gear, set the hand throttle, release the clutch and away you go, and all you have to do is steer it. I felt very vulnerable though, sitting on top of the machine with nothing at all surrounding me as this one doesn't even have a roll bar. It was scary yet oddly compelling and I kept going back for another run.

It's tractor time

While we were playing with the tractor, Chris had fitted the charged battery to the JCB and fired it up so I could have a drive of this too. It's pretty similar to the tractor except that opening the throttle seems to result in no increase in speed and just makes it produce more noise and smoke. That's probably a good thing given that this one's brakes don't work and it has to be stopped with the clutch. Time flies when you're having fun and by now the sun was starting to go down, so we called it a day and agreed to reconvene in the morning for more mechanical mayhem.

A very well-used digger. It still does the job though.

Sunday: dumpers and a self-fixing Metro

Sunday began with a Metro (okay, it's technically a Rover 114 if you want to be pedantic) that had been overheating. Being a K-series, the obvious diagnosis would be the dreaded head gasket failure, but it was still doing this even after a head rebuild so there was clearly something else amiss and we feared the worst. However, after several minutes of idling the temperature gauge remained firmly normal and it didn't throw out any water, so we all gave it a good thrash around the field and nothing untoward happened. We concluded that it must have had an air lock in the cooling system that had cleared itself, and the engine now seemed to be in fine fettle.

The amazing self-fixing Metro

With the Metro having fixed itself, we turned our attention to the 'tiddly truck', a three-wheeled Martin horticultural truck with a Villiers petrol engine under the driver's seat. All went well at first: the various seized linkages were freed off, the tyres pumped up and it was free to roll, but then the clutch cable broke and attempts to fix it didn't succeed. It is normally started with a handle but this was missing so it would need a tow start that was impossible without a working clutch, and we were disappointed not to get it going. This was our only failure of the weekend, but with a new clutch cable it should run so this is a job for next time (I'm hoping there will be a next time as it was so much fun!)

We came close to getting the tiddly truck going but it didn't quite make it

Last but not least were two dumper trucks that had been standing for a long time with things growing through them and looked like piles of scrap, but flushed with success we decided to have a go at them anyway. After freeing off the handbrake with a bit of brute force, the little Petter quickly fired up with a tow start from the tractor. This is the scariest vehicle I have ever driven: it has a conventional three-pedal layout (all of which work!) but has rear-wheel steering and the driving seat is right at the back corner directly above the steered wheels. It's very prone to oversteer and difficult to keep in a straight line so off I went on a rather haphazard zig-zag route across the field. Incredibly this machine was road-legal not too long ago so I admire anyone with the balls to drive it on the road.

The ever-useful tractor gives the little dumper a pull

To be honest, I thought the big Thwaites dumper was a hopeless case as the bodywork is in a terrible state and it hadn't moved for years, but such is the simplicity of these industrial diesel engines that there is a good chance they'll still run if given fuel. This one is steered by hydraulic articulation so we were worried that it would be impossible to steer without the engine running but it is possible, albeit extremely heavy. Tow starting this proved too much for the tractor and releasing the clutch caused the back of the dumper to slew sideways and the tractor's wheels to spin, so we brought in the JCB instead. It seemed reluctant but showed signs of life, and after a lot of grim determination with several laps of my dad hanging on for dear life behind the JCB the engine suddenly coughed into action and settled down to a steady idle, much to my amazement.

Looks like a lump of scrap metal but we dragged it out and got it working

Figuring out how the gearbox worked was the next challenge as it has two levers, neither of which are labelled. The Petter has a conventional three speed plus reverse, but it turned out this one has three speeds selected by one lever and the direction by the other, so it will do the same speed in reverse! Once you've got used to that, it's actually much easier to drive than the Petter and the hydraulic steering is light enough to operate with one hand. Maybe it's the fumes, but there's something very relaxing about aimlessly pottering around a field in a haze of blue smoke with the sun shining and I could have carried on for hours.

Having got it running, the next problem was stopping the thing. The brakes don't work but the clutch will bring the machine to a halt and by now we were used to using the clutch as a brake. Shutting off the engine was another matter as the decompression lever is broken and it's impossible to stall: even if you let the clutch out sharply in top gear it will just leap forward and carry on ticking over. The only way to stop it running was to deprive it of fuel by clamping the fuel pipe, and eventually the big dumper fell silent, putting an end to a fantastic weekend of tinkering.

Look at the state of that! Even the steering wheel is bent

This may not be everyone's idea of an exciting weekend but it was good dirty fun: we got filthy and there weren't any high speeds involved, yet it was bloody great and I want to do it again! Although not the safest of activities and the Health & Safety bods wouldn't approve, no one died, not even slightly, and we got to play with all sorts of fascinating old machinery in relaxed like-minded company. There's just something special about big dangerous machines with engines that make lots of noise and smoke that appeals to men (and women like Claire) and I couldn't stop grinning all weekend. Big big thanks to Chris and Claire for putting this on and letting a bunch of nutters play in their field (again!) and to Mark and Anthony for coming along too. What an epic adventure!