Antony

It looks a bit better with good wheels!.

I am a friend of the new owner and will help in a small way with the restoration, and also make progress reports.

Thanks Ted, I am impressed with the speed of your response, and particularly your picture! I hope someone may have a suggestion about aircraft type. Antony.

I hope these pictures are reasonable, the Gyral Winch plate under Type reads, 500 LBS. Whilst the AM plate reads under Type 600LBS, with a date of 11.9.44. Antony.

I was wondering if anyone has any idea which kind of aeroplane this winch was used in. I assume it would have been used in an aeroplane rather than a bomb truck. I hope to take some usable pictures of the plates on it to post later. Antony.

Who would lend you a B17? Antony.

I thought this might be of interest, the B17 was from Rattlesden, Suffolk, and crash landed at Sudbury. It was too badly damaged to fly again. Antony.

I think this is the one.

I decided to learn to fly when in my mid twenties, ( thirty six years ago ), and turned up at one of the flying clubs at Ipswich Airport, which is no more, Ipswich Borough Council having planted houses on it. The CFI told me that as I could drive crawler tractors I would have no problem in learning to fly!! He proved to be correct, I proudly gained my PPL after two years of weekend flying training and evening classes during the week, this was at £10.00 an hour when I started. The CFI also told me that a Plane was a piece of equipment used by a carpenter, and that " We fly aeroplanes ". Advice I have allways kept in use. Club flying was great fun, going on trips locally and on the Continent, seeing how many WW2 airfields we could ' bag ' during an hours flying in East Anglia, even having to make an unscheduled landing on a couple of them when caught out by bad weather. Flying seems to attract characters, such as the club member who navigated by straw stacks! being an agricultural type, he knew where most of the stacks were in Suffolk, and could find his way around the County. Sadly, I have never flown in anything exciting, just the usual Cessna, Piper, Rockwell types, as well as the occasional Microlite, but had a great deal of fun doing it. I don't fly these days but still maintain an interest in aviation. Antony.

Here are a couple of pictures of the finished article! Antony.

Thank you for you kind words 6X6, I have known about the other trailer for a long time and the interest in these trailers generated on HMVF just induced me to go and investigate. I still had time to play on sunday! Having seen the other trailer I am even more convinced that both of them are more or less as built in the factory, and not heavily modified by an agricultural engineer or farmer. I took a very knowledgable and well respected military vehicle restorer with me on Saturday, whose opinion was the same as mine, that both trailers are ex WW2 British army. Antar Mikes suggestion is a good one, but there is no sign of a centre pivot arrangement on either trailer. Richard Farrant found a similar trailer described for use by The Navy, which gives strength to my thoughts, but what could these things have been used for? I think a clue is at the rear of both these trailers, they both have a heavy duty flat bar edgeways up for hooking ramps on to, and with evidence of jack fixings on the rear corners and indeed a screw jack still on mine, I think they were for driving a vehicle up, and very likely something tracked. Possibly a crawler up to the size of a D6 or TD 14 or dare I suggest a small Tank the size of a Stuart. By the way N.O.S, I will bare all when the dodge is finished! Thanks to everyone who has responded. Antony.

I have been to see the 'other' Trailer, allthough I could not find a data plate or any clues to its manufacture, it is very similar to my Dyson. It is the same width, and just 2' longer, but of an allmost identical design, having its full compliment of sixteen wheels. The axles again sit above the springs, with brakes on the rear, as on mine. The drawbar is not original, and the braking has been converted to hydraulic to suit a farm tractor I presume. I include two pictures of the drawbar in my Dyson, showing the remains of an overun braking system. Antony.

Regarding the 'other' Dyson Trailer residing on a farm, I have made contact with The Farm Manager, and gained permission to go for a look on Saturday afternoon, and will post a report in the evening. Antony.

Thanks to everyone who has commented on my Dyson Trailer so far, there are some interesting theories, but no hard evidence for convincing answers. Unfortunately I havn't been able to find a data plate, and I am assuming that it is a Dyson because it has Dyson hub caps. Instinct tells me that the next sensible course of action is to go and look at the other trailer I spoke about, and do a comparison. If I am successfull in finding it I will report back. Antony.

Hello Richard, Thanks for your in depth reply about my trailer, I am fairly confident it should have dual wheels on each hub, apart from your observations regarding the offset of single wheels, I have been told of another trailer which sounds identical to mine with sixteen wheels. It is on a farm not too far away, so I will have to go and have a look. Antony.

The reason for my belief that this trailer is ex military, is simple, it has traces of olive drab paint, and looks military! With regard to the 969, I have the remains of three, from which I can build one, after I have completed a Dodge WC 62 which I am halfway through restoring.

Diamond T 969.....................

Now that Howard has started a blog on the Dyson radar, or possibly searchlight trailer, I thought I would raise a question about the Dyson Trailer that it was sitting on. I am sure that it is an ex British Army trailer of WW2 vintage, is only 15' long, and 7'6 wide. It has individual axles with two hubs, mounted on each set of leaf springs, giving it eight wheels but I believe should have two wheels per hub. The trailer is of incredibly heavy construction, and looks like a mini Rogers trailer it had been used to carry a Caterpillar D6 on a farm. My question is, what would a trailer of this size with sixteen wheels have been made to carry?