Noel7

Thanks, Wally. There seem to have been a few in RE as well. In view of the 17xxxxx number this one must have been rebuilt before the 1949 series came into use.

On 3/24/2024 at 12:08 PM, wally dugan said:

it's wartime number was H1760933

Photographs show Matadors in the series H41xxxxx to H49xxxxx, so is this a post-war rebuild number? It looks as though it was rebuilt at some point after WW2 ended, either before the introduction of the 1949 VRN series, or after the RA - RH series was no longer being used.

2 hours ago, John Sgwar said:

When the time comes to register etc(hopefully next year) will I be able to register with the old army number.

As far as I know this is not possible. 1949 type military registrations, such as 66YY23, are only used by the UK armed forces, although the format of their numbers has changed over time; when such vehicles are disposed of by the military they have to be re-registered with a civilian number. Given that it's a 1945 vehicle it was presumably sold some time ago, which should mean that it has already been given a civilian number at the time of the original disposal sale.

Chassis number 0853248 was the subject of a previous enquiry; if you aren't aware of the background to Wally's response then https://hmvf.co.uk/topic/43600-aec-matador-census-numbers/ may be helpful.

13 hours ago, 10FM68 said:

again, has anyone a photo of any 'X' reg after XH?

https://www.flickr.com/photos/britishjeep/34600442961/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/britishjeep/33944654393/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/britishjeep/33944654683/

If the links don't work [I always have trouble with Flickr links], search "britishjeep" on Flickr, they're all RMP VW Beetles, on pages 27/28.

2 hours ago, 10FM68 said:

It is interesting as this vehicle clearly isn't being used in Berlin or by the Berlin Brigade so, I presume, as this predates the end of the 'Occupation' of Germany - pre-Bundeswehr, etc, then, if a vehicle was bought locally it received an --X?-- ERM.

The Berlin Brigade existed until 1994, after the reunification of Germany in October 1990. I can't read the final two characters on the car in the picture, but 21XB42, 21XB43 and 25XB36 were apparently Opel Kapitan cars used as escort vehicles [on the East German autobahn to Berlin?] by the RMP.

So far as I know [it isn't my particular area of interest] XA to XF had initially been used for, mostly Canadian built, miscellaneous vehicles in the UK, with XG onwards used for Berlin Brigade. Gaps in the earlier series were also filled in over time by Berlin vehicles. The Berlin series eventually ran from XA to somewhere in XK.

3 hours ago, 10FM68 said:

I enclsoe below a photo of one in Korea showing it in-service - so it wasn't a post-war civilian refurb.

In service, but Hong Kong 1954-56 according to the website of the Military Vehicle Trust South East Midlands Area/Archive pictures/ China Station.

3 hours ago, wally dugan said:

On the question of the ERM  CL only two contracts were issued  to land rovers  6/v/27756 For car utility light 4x2 and KL/H 0100 GS cargo 4x4

From BMLR again:

17CL48 to 20CL22   Land Rover Series 2 Mark 6 ½ Ton 4x2   6/VEH/27756

25CL50 to 25CL99   Land Rover Mk 7 Station Wagon FFW  6/VEH/28020

35CL21 to 35CL40    Land Rover Mk 7 cargo with tilt  KL/H/0100

9 minutes ago, Richard Farrant said:

GS was allocated to 'A' Vehicles, although not sure if it was actually used.

I have a reference which shows some Spartans carried nnGSnn series low numbers. It's not entirely reliable though and not a period I know anything about otherwise.

According to Taylor and Fletcher "British Military Land Rovers", contract KL/H/0252 covered:

66AA27 - 66AA36     1410-00049-58      RHD Airfield Lighting

66AA37 - 66AA47     1410-00392-402    RHD GS

They show the 1410 code as being for the period 9/59 to 7/60.

Their only comment on colour for the 1,138 RAF Mk.6 is "the majority were delivered in the service's Blue-Grey livery, there were also examples in Bronze Green as early as 1959." [They include a photgraph of 14AA84 in Blue-Grey with a blue soft-top and a yellow bonnet.]

I hope this is of some use to you.

The signs are very neatly done, presumably by a professional signwriter, so there would seem to be an implication that their presence has been agreed, and possibly paid for, by the vehicle owners. The battalion was a TA unit, so possibly there is some formal connection between the unit and the vehicle owners?

32 minutes ago, wally dugan said:

SP is listed as special project and is found on prototypes

It seems to have been used for for trials and testing of 'production' prototypes as distinct from the manufacturers' development prototypes which usually seem to have had civilian registrations. "British Military Trucks of the Cold War" shows, for example, 00SP44, a Militant FV11047 with sides and tailgate removed to carry containers, 00SP62, one of four prototype  heavy recovery tractors 00SP60-00SP63 based on Militant 3 chassis and tested at FVRDE, and 01SP16, a Land Rover 1 ton forward control prototype.

54 minutes ago, 10FM68 said:

I had a wry smile about your comments about Pat Ware and his knowledge of Centurions, last night. I have most of his books on 'Antars' 'Quarter Tons' 'Ferrets' and so on and have been pleased with them.  Just recently I bought 2 of the series of 4 bookzines by him for Kelsley Pubs on the subject of soft-skinned vehicles in British military use.  They're terrible!  Although most of the photos come from The Warehouse Collection, the captioning is dire and many are completely irrelevant or of preserved examples with all the problems of detail they bring.

I don't know about the others, but there are issues with the ERMs given in "Quarter Ton" for both Jeeps and Land Rovers.

The Minature Armoured Fighting Vehicle Association used to have lists of VRNs on their old website, which are no longer on the current one, at least when I last looked some time ago. They seem to have been fairly accurate, although I have found more than a few errors. Their 'Pre-1950' vehicle listing included 00SA01 to 00SA99 as Cromwell 6pdr Mk 6,7,8. This was the only entry in S, apart from the previously mentioned SP [Special Projects]. I assume this range would have become extinct in the early 1950s, but have no information as my interest is B and C vehicles only.

12 hours ago, ruxy said:

NB note use of words flashing indicators  , not trafficators - that I believe semiphore were worded , so I am uncertain just what the author was getting at  ?

I don't know about military vehicles in this context, but new build civilian cars started to change from semaphore trafficators to modern type flashing indicators around the end of 1954, presumably as a result of a change to C & U Regs. Semaphores were usually fitted into the central body pillar on each side, and were quite short, so although they were illuminated [rather feebly and they didn't flash] they were not particularly easy to see, and were not commonly fitted to larger vehicles because of visibility issues. Flashing indicators were fitted in pairs front and rear, as currently, so were much more versatile and more visible.

Hope this helps.

28 minutes ago, LarryH57 said:

this one showing dark sea blue on two tugs, but it looks to be on land, with a two prop aircraft in the background?

The aircraft could be a Sea Hornet, which was carried by a few fleet carriers for a short period circa 1950. The image is too out of focus to be sure, but I can't see anything which would positively exclude the possibility.

1 hour ago, LarryH57 said:

I have seen the one with for gun turret and wonder if it was a gunnery trainer.

It looks like the Frazer-Nash turret off a Boulton-Paul Defiant, which was hydraulically driven and with belt feeds for the guns. Quite a few lost their turrets in 1942-3, converted for target towing and so forth. Might it be for airfield defence? It seems somewhat excessive for training on the ground and could not reproduce the sheer speed of reaction required for aerial combat.

It looks as though the front of the mudguard and the adjacent bodywork have been recently painted over with something that has only partially obscured the earlier markings - there appears to be a roundel on the mudguard, as well as the partially obscured bridge plate [which I think is actually 9/2] and possibly something under the 49/41, although I'm not too sure about that. The 49/41 and the bridge plate on the mudguard have then been applied over that. I think the later bridge plate [if that is what it is] is blank - it's difficult to be sure because of the lighting, but about half of the disc is visible and does not seem to have any markings.

BAe show the Series II C19 as introducing the metal wing, so Series I would seem to have had wooden wings - see https://www.baesystems.com/en-uk/heritage/avro-anson, which also states that late production MkXII, identified as Series II, had an all metal wing, presumably implying that Series I didn't. TX214 apparently dates from early 1946, but I can't find out whether it's Series I or II.

C-407 was an Israeli built one, it seems?

23 minutes ago, Adrian Dwyer said:

From its numbers, the bike seems to be an early Meriden 3HW from '42; and my assumption is that it went almost straight to Italy

The invasion of Sicily started 8/7/1943 and was completed 17/8/1943, the invasion of the mainland started 3/9/1943.

An A license was for public carriers to carry goods belonging to others for reward, a B license included the ability to carry own goods as well, and the C license was for carrying own goods only. There were various, different, restrictions (which varied over time) on each type of license, including distances over which they were valid, hence the '25 miles from base' on the disc. The licenses applied vehicle by vehicle, so a vehicle owner might have vehicles with different licenses, and their issue was restricted. The system came into existence 1/4/1934 under the Road and Rail Traffic Act of 1933 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/Geo5/23-24/53/introduction/enacted. I don't know when it ceased; early 1960s possibly?

The lists which the Miniature Armoured Fighting Vehicle Association used to have on their website, before they changed host a few years ago, included 19ZR11 to 19ZR91 as a Comet sequence.

The cab and bonnet [so far as it is visible] look to me to be that of a civilian 1939 Bedford design.

This may help:

https://hmvf.co.uk/topic/20626-what-colour/

There are colour cards on the internet for BS 987C, but colours displayed on screen may vary somewhat owing to differences between monitors and the difference in presentation between an electronic medium and actual paint.

According to Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DD_tank it's a M4A1, but the turret is not original. It does not state why the change was made or when.