Great War truck

Nothing was wasted. Every vehicle coming into the workshops was totally stripped down and the components used again. The aim was for new rebuilt trucks to come out of the Heavy Repair workshops. If a chassis was damaged beyond salvation then all components would be removed repaired and made ready for reuse. I would think that all but the few totally destroyed chassis could be repaired. The Heavy Repair workshops must have been an interesting place to work.

The trumpet thing is a spotlight to assist recoveries in the dark. There is indeed a second axle. It is to assist the recovery of those vehicles which have lost theirs in an accident. The BL marking indicates that it was photographed during the Italian campaign as no doubt does the original caption which I did not reproduce. if I get some time later on I will post up some more pictures.

Not sure what that is. Double tyres (as per the Crossley discussion)on the front wheel may have caused it to go over. © IWM (Q 8882) Leyland mail truck having received a direct hit © IWM (Q 10118) Maudslay. No doubt the driver is trying to explain what happened. © IWM (Q 8860) Not certain what that is, but parked in an interesting way. © IWM (Q 2918) Rebuilt Thorny with a leaky hub. Photo reversed. © IWM (Q 10111) Mobile repair unit changing axle © IWM (Q 10414) MRU in action again © IWM (Q 26245) Repair park. Loads of toys to play with. © IWM (Q 26214)

These photographs are copyright of the Imperial War Museum and are published here with their permission under their non-commercial licence. This Thorny has fallen through the wagon floor: © IWM (Q 49877) Direct hit on this poor Thorny © IWM (Q 10659) Dennis slid off the road © IWM (Q 10395) Repair park in Italy I think © IWM (Q 26238) Dennis again © IWM (Q 10394) Not quite sure what that was © IWM (Q 88677) Albion on fire at Salonika © IWM (Q 32811) Another Thorny. Hit by a train this time © IWM (Q 10117) Well mangled Albion © IWM (Q 10118) Half a Dennis © IWM (Q 5877)

I found some more pictures on the IWM website. The first one does describe it as tanks on the train ferry. A bit hard to say but could be. The rest are of the landing stage. These photographs are copyright of the Imperial War Museum and are published here with their permission under their non-commercial licence. © IWM (Q 20619) © IWM (Q 10011) © IWM (Q 10012) © IWM (Q 10016)

Does he say what a conversion of a DD to an amphibian entails? Sounds like this has no basis in historical fact.

Yes. They are filming "Fury". Do you want to get on set?

This proved to be a very secure method of fixing them and the turning process was quite straightforward. Steve left a clearance on the diameter of 0.005”-0.006”. Then came the tricky bit, the cutting of the grooves. Steve was very concerned about this as he could just see the crown falling off into the swarf after the last cut! Fortunately, all went well. He used a tipped parting tool to cut each groove and then took further cuts to a known depth until the rings just fitted smoothly into the slot. The scraper ring slot was most concerning as the casting is locally thickened underneath it. What Steve hadn’t spotted until now is that our replacement scraper rings are wider then the originals and he hadn’t allowed for this in the pattern. Fortunately, after some very careful measuring to get the slot in the middle of thicker section, it all worked out OK. It only remains now to drill the radial holes in the bottom of the scraper ring grooves which Steve hopes to complete this week. Success!

A few weeks ago, we received the pistons back from our good friend Andy who had kindly bored and reamed the gudgeon pin holes for us. They were just too big for our machinery. He has done a super job and the holes are a firm fit for the original pins. Unfortunately, up until now, Steve has been unable to get to Devon to finish the machining on the Colchester. The first task was to set up the means of holding the pistons to machine them. As we discussed here a while back, we decided to follow Barry’s lead and pull them back onto a spigot using a draw bar through the headstock and a dummy gudgeon pin. Steve asked Adrian where he might obtain a large chunk of steel for the purpose. ‘What, like this one?’ he replied reaching into the back of the car! Thanks Adrian. This was drilled and tapped and bolted onto the faceplate. After facing it off, Steve drilled a hole through it for the draw bar and then machined a spigot to locate inside the skirt of the piston. The last picture shows the draw-bar with the dummy gudgeon pin resting in it.

That looks interesting. It is now on my Christmas list. This thread has attracted lots of interesting information. Many thanks to everyone who has added to it.

The job tackled today was the removal of the nuts on the King Pins. There was the usual problem of rust to deal with – especially around the locking split pins – but dealt with as usual with heat, Plus gas and persistence. The bottom parts of the two Thrust Bearings are firmly stuck and those will be dealt with tomorrow.

I wonder what the thinking was behind going from two funnels to just the one.

Today, the Track Rod – or as Thornycroft describe it – “The Cross Tube connecting axle arms” had to come off. The usual fight with rusty nuts and bolts and again, heat and this time, a cutter blade in the angle grinder on the nuts did the trick. Not unexpectedly, the ball joints are quite heavily rusted – but they are not deeply pitted as we have seen other ball joints, and perhaps they will polish up and be fit to use again............... We shall see. I think that we may have another Track Rod somewhere which may be in better condition. It must be looked out! Next job now is just to loosen all the nuts on the shackle pins and on the springs, ready for the “team” when we are all together. to get the last big bits off.

Here is a link to the wreck dive on HMS Daffodil http://www.divernet.com/Wrecks/wreck_tours/1034869/wrecktour153_hms_daffodil.html Quite interesting I thought. More photos on the Kent history forum. The map shows it to be a massive complex. http://www.kenthistoryforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=8154.0

I think that Red Bull modified several Dodges like that. Optimistic selling price, or poor choice of sales site. They would have been better off selling it on a custom car site/magazine.

I have not got the exact prices, but am told that everything made about double the estimate.

Are you planning a new garden feature. I will warn you now. I tried it at home but the wife did not like it one bit!

I have no idea. I was hoping someone else would come in with the answer which I could then agree with. I have referred it to a higher authority.

The War Office commissioned the manufacture of three train ferrys (imaginatively named train ferry 1, train ferry 2 and train ferry 3) to speed up the supply of materials to France which travelled from Richborough to Dunkirk. Vehicles were usually embarked at Avonmouth docks but as you can see from these photos the TF’s were ideal for carrying trucks. TF 1 was taken over by the Royal Navy during WW2 and was renamed HMS Princess Iris. It was broken up in 1951. TF2 was sunk off Dunkirk. TF3 was renamed HMS Daffodil and was lost to a Mine in 1945 off Dieppe. Both TF1 and TF3 had been converted into landing craft carriers which were launched from a ramp at the back of the vessel.

Similarly, the end of the “X” stretcher are also in poor condition and whether we will ignore this, cut out the wasted part or replace the whole part is yet to be decided. Fortunately, the ends of the longitudinal parts of the chassis frame are in good condition – as are the Hooks. The small rectangular piece of steel visible on the lower part of the frame channel in this picture is the remains of the original Tail Light Bracket and has to be removed. Next job, we will move to the front of the chassis and have a go at the Track Rod. After that, loosen all the remaining nuts and await the arrival of the “Heavy Gang” from Leicester and Oxford to get the axles, wheels and springs off!

The objective today was to finish dismantling the rear cross stretcher – which also meant taking off the rear hooks as they share some of the same retaining nuts and bolts and the rear part of the “X” shaped cross stays situated in front of the rear stretcher, also held in place with the same fixings. Four of the nuts and bolts were taken out yesterday where they had already been loosened and came undone comparatively easily. We would normally have hoped not to have removed these parts at all but there were very obvious signs of heavy rust in the corners and they had to come out so that we could see just how bad it was. The nuts were again very tight on the bolts and normally, we would put some heat on them to loosen them, but they were too near the wall and the storage jars to entertain doing that, so it was just a case of “heave-ho” and Plus-Gas. The bolts were very tight in their holes and after the nuts had been removed, they needed to be hammered out. The condition of the corners of the rear frame stretcher was as we anticipated – very wasted and they will require some of the old metal cut out with new welded in.

I think the tractor might be an Alldays and Onions, but as always I am happy to be corrected.

After a final struggle in a constricted space, the final parts of the Compensating Brake Gear were removed from the chassis so that the chassis is now completely clear of it. It was then time to look at the two levers fixed to the Brake Tube to see how they were attached. The Parts Book indicated that they were attached by Pinch Bolts – but if they were there, they were so corroded as to become invisible in the rust. These two pictures show the expected position of the Pinch Bolt – before and after being cleaned up with a file. The threaded hole is for a Greaser. But there was no sign of a Pinch Bolt ever being there – nor a hole where one would have been situated. From the pictures taken yesterday, it did appear that there was a line of brazing around the joint of the arm on the shaft. Some work with a file revealed a brassy colour in that position which became further evidence of brazing. The short remaining part of the tube was sawn off the arm and further work with the file revealed a complete ring of brazing. Now we have a problem to solve to recover the arm. The remaining part of the tube within the casting could be bored out – not an easy job because of the difficulty in holding it – but if we do that, how are we going to attach that arm to the new tube? Braze it again? And the other puzzle – it does appear from the Parts Book that the arm were originally attached to the tube by a Pinch Bolt – but could this have proved unsatisfactory in service with the lever eventually twisting on the tube – so brazing was introduced to stop that. But was that a Factory introduction – or by the owners in service? The other choice that we are faced with is that we make completely new arms – they could easily be fabricated – but we always like to use original parts as far as possible.

Here are some more from the same source. These are almost certainly not ex military but some are of a type which were impressed:. Knox Austin Locomobile in the USA being fitted with rail wheels:

Thanks for those. Some really nice paintings there. Whereabouts is the mouse in the Cuneo? He did a painting of the D Day landings once and the mouse in that was wearing a steel helmet. Any more favourites gentleman? If we don't get more interest I cant see Jack getting the Heritage Lottery Grant for the new art gallery on the clubhouse!