Sadly Fred Dibnah is no longer with us after losing his battle with cancer at the age of 66, but his legacy lives on in the BBC programmes he featured in and the memories of his many friends and admirers.

We were privileged to meet him and visit his extraordinary workshop and the local pub where he regaled everyone with his legendary anecdotes.

Here is the story of Fred and his trusty Landrover.

Think chimneys, think steam power, think celebrity, think Dibnah, Fred Dibnah.

The Bolton steeplejack made famous by a series of BBC Documentaries, renowned for his talent for felling chimneys without using explosives.

Land Rovers have been an integral part of Fred's trade and have been pressed into service in a multitude of different ways.

Sadly perhaps in these modern times we have little use for the colossus chimneys of the past, those smoke stained icons of the industrial revolution, and Fred Dibnah has been called in on many occasions to reduce these ancient architectural landmarks to rubble.

However Fred believes in traditional methods of demolition, none of those new fangled explosives for him. His preferred method is to knock out a section at the base of the chimney, depending upon the required direction of fall, and to use sawn telegraph poles and large baulks of timber as temporary props.

Once Fred is satisfied there is a sufficiently big hole to fell the chimney he sets fire to the wooden props and with his famous traditional hooter sounds the alarm as the chimney starts to topple.

If these industrial monuments have to be felled at least Fred carries it out with greater dignity and sense of occasion than electronically detonated explosives.

Steeplejacks need ladders, more ladders, even more ladders and then some. Fred had improvised a heavy duty ladder rack for his Landy using industrial scaffolding, no small weight in itself, couple this with half a dozen ladders a compressor and road drill and his poor old Landy can truly be called a workhorse.

All this hard work takes it's toll on even the most robust of vehicles, Fred's choice has always been what is probably the world's best known 4x4, the Land Rover, over the years he has used and some might say abused several of Solihull's finest, from an old Series II through a multicoloured Lightweight to his most recent Series IIA.

Unfortunately Fred's Land Rover was getting a bit worse for wear; the newness had well and truly worn off.

After years of hard work and tiring celebrity appearances it was time for some serious therapy, for the Series IIA, not Fred.

Luckily Chris Crane at specialists engine builders RPi stepped in with the initial offer of a V8 LPG conversion and travelled up from Norfolk with an ex MOD 109" as a temporary courtesy vehicle.

Following a good coat of looking at, it rapidly became apparent that nothing short of a major rebuild would be sufficient and it was at this stage that Marsland Chassis volunteered their help.

Taking into consideration the workload and some of the more hostile environments the Landy would be exposed to it soon became clear that only the best would do.

It was unanimously decided that a heavy-duty fully galvanised chassis would be the top option, so a build list for the specific options required was drawn up and work started at Marsland Chassis immediately.

As with all chassis the main components are punched from high quality British steel sheet blanks using the computer controlled Amada punch press.

Many sub components are common to different chassis builds and are produced in batches and then supplied to the Production Area where the complete chassis are assembled. Fred's Land Rover required a conventional short wheelbase civilian build Series chassis with standard fittings, each variant has it's own specific checklist.

All the staff at Marsland Chassis were very keen to get involved with the production of Fred's replacement chassis and work progressed at a rate of knots.

After a full quality assurance check the chassis was despatched to the Galvanising Plant for its protective zinc coating, complete with celebrity customer identification label !

Once the chassis had been returned to the Marsland factory it was rechecked and fully prepared for fitting, at the same time a phone call was made to Chris Crane at RPi to arrange collection.

Chris arrived bright and early the next day by LPG powered Range Rover complete with trailer to transport the shiny new galvanised chassis back to Norfolk for the rebuild to get under way.

More pictures of the rebuild in progress can be found on the RPi web site in their special projects section.

Some weeks later Chris called to say he intended to return Fred's Land Rover the following weekend and everyone involved with the project was invited to Fred's place in Bolton.

On a grey Saturday morning the brothers Marsland set off for Bolton with a hastily scribbled map.

Unfortunately the inertial positioning detector (nodding dog) in their Land Rover was playing up and they ended up in the grid locked town centre one-way system.

 

Help was on hand however when the driver of the next car noticed their confusion and proceeded to direct them in the general direction of Fred's abode, everyone in Bolton appears to know where Fred lives !

The Marslands arrived just in time to see Fred's reconditioned Land Rover being unloaded from it's trailer and to meet Fred himself supervising operations, whilst being photographed by John Bolt from the LRW Magazine for their feature.

A sign of how impressed Fred was with his rejuvenated Landy was the fact that he actual hurried off to find a rag to polish away the dust that had accumulated on the paintwork on it's journey up the Motorway.

The quality of the sign writing was admired by all, and Fred regaled everyone with the story of one poor sign writer who had more equipment than talent and had actually painted some lettering for someone with the vehicle parked on a slope, with predictable results !

The galvanised chassis was also a surprise for him, he'd been expecting a standard plain steel replacement, always ready with a quip Fred revealed he'd recently done some after dinner speaking for the British Association of Galvanisers.

The keys were duly handed over in ceremonial style and the only thing left to do was a quick test drive, and what better place to take it a spin than down to Fred's local.

With photographers in pursuit Fred raced off to the Pub in his shiny new V8 Landy to get the first round in. Minutes later when everyone else had caught him up he admitted it was pretty nippy for a Land Rover, especially with an Overdrive once you're in "big wheel".

Fred, the genial host that he is, showed his guests around the steam powered workshops at his "Head office" and of course, the piece de resistance, Betsy his beloved Aveling Porter roller.

No time was lost in putting his "new" Land Rover to some serious work; its first mission was, unsurprisingly, a chimney demolition job, just down the road at Horwich.

Loaded up with a jackhammer, compressor and a set of sticks (sawn down telegraph poles) Fred headed off to knock the bottom out of another chimney. The following weekend, with full hospitality and dignitaries in place, Fred lit the fire that collapsed one more industrial monument.

He did however park the Land Rover at a safe distance to avoid too much brick dust on the pristine paintwork.

Fred seems to be getting rather attached to his Landy, another good example of the preservation rather than modernisation of Britain's industrial heritage, it could almost be called a Magnificent Monument !

Marsland Chassis would like to thank everyone involved with the restoration project.

More about Fred himself can be found on the BBC web site with more information on his series "The Industrial Age" and his latest programmes about "Magnificent Monuments".

www.bbc.co.uk

RPI web site: www.rpiV8.com

 

© 2007