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saracen acv penthouse


haybaggerman

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Hi All

 

Got the old girl out today for a cleanup and airing, and also put up the penthouse extension which also needs a clean up.

 

At the entrance to the tent there is a roof and sides to make up a "porch" area. Would there have been an additional 2 poles in the CES to hold up this porch or was there something altogether more substantial used?

 

Cheers

 

Paul

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Hi All

 

Got the old girl out today for a cleanup and airing, and also put up the penthouse extension which also needs a clean up.

 

At the entrance to the tent there is a roof and sides to make up a "porch" area. Would there have been an additional 2 poles in the CES to hold up this porch or was there something altogether more substantial used?

 

Cheers

 

Paul

 

What you have in the pictures looks complete to me. The extras beyond what is obviously penthouse are probably (it's well over 30 years ago) sheeting so that when two, three or four ACVs back onto one another (back-to-back, T or X), the joins can be covered up to keep the light from getting out, creating a single penthouse for the entire FHQ.

 

As Command Troop (RHQ) of a Recce Regiment we had three Saracen ACVs, two (Alpha and Bravo) were alternate HQ vehicles and the third (Charlie) was the Intelligence and NBC cell. In a location, it was normal for Alpha and Bravo to back up and link penthouses abd work as one, but it was usually impossible to get Charlie in position without undue compromise (like for instance the West Germans didn't like us cutting their trees down: it was illegal even to hammer a nail into their trees). During a move, either Alpha or Bravo would step up while the other retained control. When the step-up assumed control, main would close down and move to rejoin.

 

Under the battlegroup system of the 70s and 80s, the only extra ACV we might acquire would belong to an artillery battery, but it never happened on our watch.

 

Recce Squadron FHQs had two ACVs, Alpha and Bravo: no Int & NBC cell. Again I never saw the combat team system of the time give us a third ACV. I only recently learned that Armoured FHQs didn't actually get ACVs: the OC had a choice between a tank or a rover (which would be a Ferret on paper, but always swapped with the SSM's Land Rover) but no ACV.

 

Higher formation HQs (with a lot of ACVs) would be the most likely to arrange ACVs in cruciforms, but my understanding is they invariably had FV432 ACVs.

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I second what Alien said. I was in the R.Y. (T.A.) and when we had Saracen ACVs they were quite often backed up to each other, with those penthouse extensions of yours overlapping.

(Your pictures, and Alien's remenisces really jog my memory - thanks lads!)

'Chas.'

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I hadn't thought of that, thankyou for the info and recollections, although I'm tempted to rig it into a porch area of sorts for shows for the extra room undercover.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

 

Of course if you really want extra under-cover space, "acquire" (that's that word we usually used) a Chieftain lean-to bivouac tent to attach to the side. In our recce regt, there were no bivvies issued with the Saracens, but having recently been armoured, Command Troop had buckshees (everybody had buckshees of one sort or another) that had come with them from Fallingbostel via Omagh and Tidworth. Then we got issued brand spanking new still-smelling-of-new-paint Sultans with a dozen miles on the clock. They came with a standard CVR(T) bivvy, also new and waterproof and good for the usual three-man CVR(T) crew. These however were frankly a bit of a squeeze as (for example on Bravo) Regimental Signals Officer, commander, control signaller and driver had to hot-bed).

 

The good news was that the Chieftain bivvies cascaded down to the Rebro Ferret crews just as guess who became a Rebro Ferret commander. Sweet. Four-man Chieftain bivvy for two. On Ex Spearpoint 80 Davy J and I would erect the bivvy facing away from from the Ferret so that we could have our scratchers at opposite ends of the bivvy with two folding chairs and a coffee table in between. Great way to watch the sun set with a bottle in hand. Sadly this was not normally possible because of the operational exigencies. But a whole lot more comfortable than the two-man bivvy I seem to recall from my time previously as a Rebro Ferret driver.

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  • 4 years later...
Does the Saracen have boiling vessel outlet?

 

No. AFAIK the only FV600 series vehicle that supported a Boiling Vessel was the Saladin. This was due to the fact that it had a substantially bigger generator than the rest (70A?), that was only just able to supply the BV. It was an unusual round one too and not the much more common square unit issued with later vehicles. The plug was under the turret basket somewhere.

 

Cheers,

Terry

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No. AFAIK the only FV600 series vehicle that supported a Boiling Vessel was the Saladin. This was due to the fact that it had a substantially bigger generator than the rest (70A?), that was only just able to supply the BV. It was an unusual round one too and not the much more common square unit issued with later vehicles. The plug was under the turret basket somewhere.

 

Cheers,

Terry

Thanks Terry, in my infinite wisdom, I bid on a bunch of BV's selling at sealed bid auction, so now I have to hope that my bid is not going to win!!

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i used to have one of those penthouses went away for repair and haven't seen it since that was about 10 years ago,the stitching had rotted away and it was falling apart.

 

mine is off being measured and copied by another forum member, so there might be some available soon.....

 

 

edit: I mean my penthouse tent btw

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