Roy Larkin

Nowhere near big enough for a French wine flask!

OK. I've got ammunition parks still to do. Will get onto those when the DSCs are done.

I don't see a problem with mentioning the word 'b*s' , they are really just lorries with livestock bodies aren't they?

I'm working through Divisional Supply Columns at the moment. They rarely, if ever, mention Battalions, usually only the Army or Corps and then only sometimes. The DSCs I've found working that area so far make no mention of Beugny, though do mention nearly every surrounding village or town. Still got plenty of DVCs, Ammunition Parks etc. to work through, so I'll let you know if I come across anything.

I'm in contact with a chap who drove lorries on solid tyres for a living and he recalls that when new tyres were fitted that it was essential to run them in at reduced speed otherwise they 'blew out' just as Richard described. The quoted Dunlop Warranty is interesting as the War Office stated that gearing should not allow more than 16mph when in top gear. I wonder what the tyre manufacturers thought about that!

If you know what company Private Jackson served with then I'll check my records. I've had a quick check through companies that worked in that area and they mention railheads in the surrounding villages and towns, but no mention of Beugny as yet. Still got a lot of detailed checking to do though.

Major supply depot ay Beugny? Not sure there was one, or at least not a permanent one. It looks a bit too close to the front line for there to be a base there. Possibly a railhead, which would have been emptied as fast as it filled up. I'd need to check more, but Beugny doesn't ring a bell at the moment, although surrounding villages and towns I do recognise as haveing railheads.

Tim, I think that 10,000 miles is a bit over optimistic. In fact, I think 5,000 also very optimistic. ASC Mobile Workshops had tyre presses that did nothing but change tyres 24/7 and the Repair Bases changed them in their thousands. Damage seems to have been a major factor rather than wear, although at least one company needed to change tyres en-route to Italy, despite leaving Flanders with new tyres fitted. I'm curious about the Repair Base you mention 'south of Paris'. Do you have a more precise location? I've not come across a British base south of Paris, was it French?

Hello Richard, Good to see you on here. I'm sure your knowledge and experience will be very interesting and welcome.

The War Office subsidy specification states that a 1 gallon water tank be fitted and that a drip feed to the transmission brake be automatically operated from the brake pedal. I'm not sure that a drip feed of water would be sufficient to comfort me if descending a long steep hill, or that a drip feed would do much for cooling. I'm also not sure what effect mixing water with dust would have over a period of time either - probably create a right mess as there was plenty of dust at times. Like many things in those early days, what seemed a good idea on paper didn't always work in reality, so might well have been abandoned from an early date. At least the War Office continued trials right up to August 1914, which were mainly to establish the viability and reliability of new ideas. Would the transmission brake have been used much? My recollections of the Leyland Chivers was that it was a waste of time and the handbrake was the primary braking.

Looking at the list of machinery, my gut feeling is that you would do well to look for a specialist machinery carrier. It will cost more but the risk of damage will be much reduced and they will be used to handling that type of load, have sufficient straps, chains for security etc. Don't forget that what looks like good load security for the road can be woefully inadequate if a stormy ferry crossing is encountered.

Whatever the manual says about 'good quality' or specifying the viscosity, it has to be remembered that the 'quality' was determined by the standards of the day, and oil or petrol was nothing like what we expect today or even 50 years ago. I would think that even the cheapest nastiest oil you can find today is still a hundred times better than what was available nearly 100 years ago. There are plenty of instances where engine bearing failure during WW1 was attributed to poor quality thin oil. War Office specifications demanded that engine sumps were of sufficient capacity to allow 200 miles of fully loaded running, which says something about either the engines capacity to retain oil or the quality of the oil itself. Changing the subject: has the Dennis got a water cooler for the transmission brake? I don't recall ever seeing one on a preserved lorry.

Even if they had wheels and not feet it looks expensive, but actually quite cheap compared to other stuff in his shop.

Excellent, Steve, coloured ends would likely make more sense than having to find rolls of lead in the correct colour, whether today or in the 1910s.

Excellent use of a few minutes, or maybe hours if you keep repeating it.

Tim, The War Office, particularly the MTC were well aware that maintaining anything in the field rather than workshops was a totally different situation. They were also well aware that if war broke out that many mechanics and drivers would be unskilled, so steps were taken to make mistakes by unskilled men less likely, hence the colour coding and the largely standardisation of lorries regarding pedal layout, position handbrakes, gear levers and controls on steering columns. There was much more thought given to the detail of design/specification than is often credited. My gut feeling is that even if the colour coding was ever enforced or applied then it probably didn't last very long. I imagine the manufacturers wouldn't have been happy with needing 4 different colour leads, and the War Office did need to keep the manufacturers on board. Different coloured leads is great in theory, but if nobody makes leads of different colours, it's probably easier to not bother.

Tim, Tony and Steve, Don't for one second I was having a pop at the wonderful work you are doing with the Dennis and have done in the past. It was intended as tongue-in-cheek about the War Office specs - though come to think of it, an awful thing with a strange box body does come to mind! In fact it is so awful, I can't even remember the make of it.

OK, here we go then: From 'War Department Subsidy Scheme 1912 - Technical Appendix A - Specification for Petrol Lorries' 'General Conditions Governing the Grant of Subsidy to Vehicles Suitable for War Department Purposes' 9 - Ignition 'Leads to the different cylinders should be of different colours to facilitate correct connections being made and to be coloured as follows: Cylinder nearest the radiator, red, next green, next yellow, cylinder nearest the dashboard, blue.' Oh what fun could be had by an evil minded person with the pot-hunters when armed with such a document! 'Could you lift the bonnet please? Oh dear, Oh dear, just look at those ignition leads, not at all right!'

I'm with you Tim, I've never seen mention of the need to grease leaf springs. Thinking about the conditions in France/Flanders/Middle East, if it wasn't wet and muddy it was dry and dusty, so I'm not sure any lubrication to hold the dust would be a good idea. I'm also wondering how a vehicle would handle with 3 springs with leaves separated with dust encrusted grease and one newly fitted virgin greased spring. Changing the subject, I've just found something in the War Office specifications for compliance to the Subsidy Scheme in 1912, which will be a great 'wind-up' for those who crave 1000% authenticity. I'd wager there's not a single lorry on the rally field that complies. I'm not convinced any in military use atthe time complied either, but hey, might be fun to quote official documents to the right folk now and again.

Sorry Mike, I've got an offer that trumps yours. Just deliver full of all the cash from bank and instead of cleaning it every week, I'll return it to be cleaned and fuel tanks refilled every week and wait in pub for its return.

There's always the Small Claims Court if DVLA screw up and there's a resultant loss of earnings.

Ok, we've got the tyres, where's the rest of the lorry?

From experience solid rubber tyres, on wet or muddy conditions are not good for traction. To try towing out another vehicle would be and interesting exercise with the probability of them both becoming located off the firm ground. Question still is; Where are all the photos of the WW1 recovery units? I find nothing on this forum, or is it something that has been missed to date? Doug I agree that traction with solid tyres on wet ground is a problem, one only has to think back on wet rally fields to see how easily lorries get bogged down or simply spin wheels on wet grass, whether solid tyres or pneumatics. However, there are numerous photos of columns on roads that are rivers of deep mud, or solid ice and snow, so somehow they managed. Non-skids or ropes wrapped around the tyres certainly helped and were compulsory equipment, but they only seem to have been used in extreme conditions. The idea of 'recovery units' is a bit of a misnomer. Recovery was generally by other lorries in the column, simply by a rope pull. Only if the casualty couldn't be towed back to base was the mobile workshop attached to each company called in to affect recovery. This was usually with cranes built into workshop lorries, or a spare lorry if available and built by each mobile workshop. There are photos of specialist breakdown/recovery/first aid lorries, but they are few and far between. Some of the larger companies had more dedicated recovery lorries, but that was usually with companies that had been merged into others, giving them a larger mobile workshop and therefore more vehicles, allowing at least one to be dedicated to recovery. 93 Coy is one company quoted as having a recovery team, but 93 Coy was part of the Auxiliary Omnibus Park which initially included 90, 91, 92 & 93 Coys, grew to absorb lorries from various Ammunition Parks and amounted to over 600 vehicles, so it was responsible for sufficient lorries to warrant, probably need, a full time recovery facility. The combined mobile workshops of the merged companies gave sufficient vehicles for one or two to be dedicated to recovery work. Most companies arranged their own recovery as and when needed with whatever equipment they could fashion at the time. The British Red Cross Society combined with the RAC to design a workshop lorry, usually based on Commer-Car chassis and this included a recovery crane for the recovery of their ambulances.

12 HT Coy ASC were carrying both 2 and 4 gallon petrol cans in early 1915. Apparently they were 'lightweight' metal and very prone to damage. I'd need to dig deep into the filing cabinet but from memory petrol cans were manufactured by the military in France, close to the petrol dump at Calais. Asiatic Petrol Company was a wholly owned marketing subsidiary of Shell and their distribution plant was a huge base at Rouen throughout WW1, although there was also a huge dump at Calais as well. Shell supplied most of the petrol and aviation fuel for the British war effort, although there is some doubt as to the aviation fuel, which the airmen believed was superior to petrol, although it seems it was often the same as road petrol but in 'aviation spirit' cans. Again, 12 Coy, claim that aviation fuel was no more than ordinary petrol with 'a little oil added', although where they gained that expertise or knowledge is questionable.

My untrained eye can't argue with the photos as the sump and axle do look way too close for comfort, neither would I argue with the Automobile Engineer, but I've not found any mention of broken springs damaging Dennis sumps while in France. Plenty of broken springs, as there were with all manufacturers, but no hint of broken springs being anything more than the usual inconvenience repaired without need for evacuation to Base Workshops. That could of course mean that it was accepted that a broken spring also meant a smashed sump, but my gut instinct is that if that were the case then the problem would have been rectified pretty damned quick and would certainly have been recorded as a black mark against the Dennis and the Dennis does seem to have won praise as a reliable and popular lorry. But, if you break the sump on the way to Brighton next year, you won't find me because, I'll be hiding vey well indeed!