Great War truck

Well, no one has responded so i guess no one has seen it. It is available on Amazon UK on a European format. It had a number of reviews, but this negative one i found quite interesting - which was incidentally written by an American. "Shallow, dull, and unnecessary, this documentary fails even to live up to its title. To consider WWII's impact upon American life, this misnamed series starts at Pearl Harbor, relegating three years' European and five years' Asian warfare to the vaguest of backgrounds. The Nazi invasions of Poland and Russia get about a minute apiece. The Rape of Nanking is barely mentioned, in context of American newsreel consumption. Okay, fine, but don't call it "The War." Call it "Our War," or "Homefront" or "America's Americentric View of the War and How it Affected Americans." Don't insult the rest of the planet, which had already been fighting for as much as 50 months before December 7. "The War" makes gestures toward a smalltown motif, but after a lot of talk about focusing on 4 towns, we spend time with soldiers from elsewhere. And the homefront imagery tells us nothing new: women joined the workforce. Rationing, victory gardens, no new cars. Blacks joined the workforce, racial confrontations ensued; Japanese-Americans were interned in cheerless prison camps. Guess what, Ken - I already watch PBS! Wait, wait - black and Japanese-American soldiers were segregated and under-appreciated, though they were just as heroic as everybody else. Betcha didn't see that coming. One surprise: uber-liberal public television makes exactly zero references to the experience of women in uniform. (I'll tell you an exhaustive documentary miniseries we really need: a worm's eye view of how the troublemakers gear up to cause one of these awful world wars. This is the insight we could use, not "how did we defend ourselves?" but "how could we have been so ill-prepared as to not see this coming?") A pretentious, plodding structure makes it worse. No single campaign is delineated beyond generalizations - "The siege of Saipan had only just begun;" "Bastogne would not be liberated for weeks." The first few hours especially contain a lot of rough, disorienting transitions. And the narration is redundant and occasionally nonsensical, as when Keith David tells us that Carlson's Raiders and Japanese Marines were sometimes "only a few feet" apart - this during hand-to-hand fighting. Who's signing off on this stuff? This Ken Burns film needs among other things a Shelby Foote, a lively historical authority on whom the viewer may hang his faith and attention. Instead, somebody reads from contemporary journalism: Ernie Pyle, who already fumbled his own movie (a dog starring Burgess Meredith) or Al McIntosh, channeling Horton Foote. The veterans and civilians interviewed in talking-head format are charming, some of them, though only one or two show any real storytelling flair, and they do it late. Wynton Marsalis, who might have supplied our voice of wisdom, instead seems to have imagined Aaron Copland scoring a funeral of Norman Rockwell". I will get round to watching part two sometime. Tim

Thanks for that. I have been presented with an either/or situation. The or is the Patton Museum at Fort Knox: http://www.generalpatton.org/ Anybody been there? Thanks Tim

Now known as the National Military History Centre (a bit PC), this was the Victory Museum in the Netherlands, bought lock, stock and barrel a few years ago. I have an opportunity of going there in a few weeks time. it is a 12 hour round trip from Illinois. Is it worth the effort? I know the Humber Hexonaught is there which i would really like to see, but is there anything else to get me excited? Anybody been? http://www.militaryhistorycenter.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=73&Itemid=60 Tim

Has anybody seen this. I was given the DVD set last Christmas and have just watched the first 2.5 hour DVD. It is a set of eight i think. Fantastic stuff. Comparable to the series "World at war". Ken Burns was the guy who narrated that brilliant series on the American Civil War. No one i know has ever mentioned it so i wonder whether it was just a US thing. Tim

Excellent job. Tim

Yes, a very interesting site. I remember going to Oakhill about 30 years ago. Is it still open? As your job involves restoring things, can it still be a relaxing hobby? Tim

Sorry Jack. Just noticed your question. They are about four to five inches long except for the International harvester one which is about 6 inches. Tim

OK. So how original do you rate this one: Somewhere in between not very original and totally ruined. My personal thought is, on crikey, goodness me (or something like that). What have you done to it. Tim

I agree with all of that. I started writing because i wanted to read the sort of articles that i now write. Started with an offering to Windscreen which was published and then something more elaborate for MMI. Cant add much more to what has already been written apart from write over a period of time. Proof read. Proof read. Proof read. Get someone else to proof read. It is amazing how you keep finding mistakes. Write something, then e-mail a magazine to ask them if they are interested. Dont offer it to more than one magazine as that just puts peoples backs up. Send it in and then wait. Good luck Tim

Hi Phil Yes, i thinki saw that. That particular Holt has been rescued and restored to running condition and in a British military colour scheme. it looks fantastic in the photos i have seen, but i have not seen it in the flesh yet. So there are two WD ones running in the UK. Tim

In defence of MMI and CMV it must be very hard to find enough good articles to fill them every Month. You either have to rely on contributors which will of course cost you money, or write the articles yourself. However with the wealth of knowledge available and the number of knowledgable people ever increasing, it must be impossible for the editors to be the most knowledgable on all these subjects. With forums such as this, the Monthlys can immediately come in for a bashing. With W&T, Bart was probably the worlds most knowledgable person on his subject and wrote all the articles himself. Then, there was no medium like this forum to analyse his work or discuss it. It makes a tricky situation for the Ian and John. Tim

The Windscreen is very good. The magazine gets the balance of articles just right and has some very knowledgable contributors. I did find the rant about the book review, and following letter a bit amusing though. It is very easy to start a rant by e-mail, becuase you write what you think at the time and click send (or post) and it is gone. By letter it is less common as you generally reread the letter a few times before sending it and can "cool off" so to speak and tone it down. Not in this issue it seems. Tim

Rather fortuitously, i have just finished reading the last of the stack of books i got for Christmas last year. I am now reading Lynne Macdonalds "To the last man", and the exciting named "Service Station Manual", which if you are unfamiliar with this was published in the mid 1930's and gives you every snippet of information necessary to run your own garage/petrol station. It is really interesting. No, it really is. Tim

Dear Santa What i want for Christmas is "Permission". "Why?" You dont need to ask why! Tim

There is no doubt about it, the prices have really jumped up in recent years. I wonder whether this might be as a result of the "price guide" in CMV. Admittedly, the guide is only an average of the ones placed up for sale in the last Month or so, but are people looking at that, then adding a couple of thousand thereby constantly upping the value? Just a thought. Tim

The latest Windscreen and calendar came today and i was very impressed. I know that last year the calendar came in for some criticism (a bit unfairly i thought), but this one is really good. I particularly like the one of the Jeep in the snow. Tim

Whilst we await the Water Pump Castings to machine, we have set our minds about making up the clutch and universal joint assembly which we have never had - it was not fitted to the engine in its previous use. The metal for this was purchased for Steve and Tony to machine - three pieces of Steel were the very hard EN24 which does not come cheaply! The one piece for the Clutch Centre measuring 6 1/2" in diameter by 8 1/2" long came out at £73 alone! This was to be a very complicated machining exercise for our Home Workshop and Tony did not fancy doing it - so it was pushed out to a Professional to do for us. He has done a wonderful job - it is sad to say that most of the piece of bar that we had to pay so much for has disappeared in swarf! We are again fortunate that we have original drawings to work from - mainly thanks to Ben.

Sorry about that. Me being a bit too cryptic.

Sorry, the truck is actually called a "Light Aviation", and was made specifically for the Air Service. I am not aware of there being any survivors, and photos of them are quite rare as well. Here is the grill: I am not aware of any other truck having an identical one. Simialr yes. Identical no. Tim

Steve has now finished pattern number five so only one left now. That will be the next step. He intends to make a trial spline for the pump spindle before Christmas too, just to prove it before cutting our precious stainless.

No, not quite. I think i will have to tell. I am certain that it is off a WW1 US Light Aviation truck. The number of bars in it does not correspond with any other US truck except for that one. Thanks for having a go guys. Tim

Here we are. Same lamp for sure:

Taking a quick look through my photos it appears that they all had twin forks. The reason for this is probably two fold. It presents (as you suggested) a need for "handing" the lamps and will provide a much firmer grip on the lamps thereby preventing the fatigue which would be caused by a single prong. Not sure of the corresponding KOTR tail lamp number. I will consider that further. I have several poor views of the rear lamp on the crossley and by and large they are very poor quality and all duifferent types, except for this one, which appears to be a KOTR:

Here we go. Sorry about the drunken scanning. Hope this makes sense. Tim

Rick I have sent you an E-mail. These bonnet muffs appear quite often on new trucks. They seem to dissapear when they have been in active service for a while. They would probably make quite a cosy blanket for the driver too. Tim