RattlesnakeBob

especially with the huge rise in scrap prices over the last few years I'm really surprised to see such a stack of 'heavy iron'... .mind you I guess there is a bit of a spares market ??...having said that though... ....I've driven 'old kit' and its horrible to try and use for a 'proper' job.......especially an 'old' dozer I was sat on for about 6 weeks not that long ago...she was a very willing old girl and maybe ok still for a demolition job or maybe for pushing a tip over but......for anything else she was a nightmare... ..there was slop in everything from the door handles to the blade and back again three times over.... it was an absolute devil to drive well so I wouldn't have thought a lot of those old earth movers were 'saleable' as 'useable' and I wouldn't have thought there was a great market for their parts either except to the odd restorer........ ...but ....having said all of that I'd hate to see them all lamped up, there is some grand old things in amongst it all by the looks of it.....

I don't know if anyone has ever seen this web site or perhaps knows of this old contractors plant graveyard?...its on the dis-used airfield at RAF Folkingham apparantly..???? ..anyways....scan down the page and have a look at photos 7 and 8 ..crying out to be saved..... http://www.28dayslater.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=62261

Absolutely wonderful photos...many thanks for sharing them! They're very reminiscent of my ol' Dads photo album from the same sort of time and his days in Korea and Malaya with the Royal Engineers....I'll head over to see him tomorrow and ask if I could possibly share them with you all...... ..watch this space! and once again many thanks !

absolutely agree!..........to be fair I know the factorys (both here and in the US) did a sterling job in the dark days of the war but some of the vehicles have gotta be restored to a far better condition than they could ever have possibly been when delivered back in 'the day'.......???after all... quantity and basic function was the order of the day rather than pristine finish and quality wasn't it???........... whilst I love to see any vehicle beautifully restored and gleaming.... I'd personally love to see more trucks/tanks/jeeps etc displayed in a 'battlefield condition'.....smashed headlights, ripped canvas...mud splattered maybe even a few bullet holes......can't see that happening though!

here's one I've always struggled with.... any survival manual/book will say something like.. "if ,when tasting a tiny bit of an unknown plant/berry/fruit etc it is found to be bitter or sharp... it is almost certainly poisonous and should be immediatley disgarded as a possible food source......." so....when it was first found..... who the hell persevered with the onion then ? did they give up on it until someone invented cheese....did some caveman say something like... " hey dave...go and find me one of them horrible things... I'm gonna try it with a bit of this stuff"...........:cool2:

as someone suggested earlier your 'separating' problem is very likely to be down to the clutch plate and or thrust bearing being proper seized on the shaft.....grunt sweat and cussing is the usual answer to that one... regards your steering relay ....they are relatively cheap but just try freeing your first ...mite save a few quid....remove 2 of the small bolts ..one from the front and one from the back and stand it up firmly in a vice in a corner somewhere and squirt it full of diesel or a petrol/oil mixture through the 'front' hole until it bubbles up out of the back one.... ..leave for a few days whilst continually attempting to turn it it backwards and forwards.......it'll be proper stiff but persevere......keep squirting your release mixture in as you do so which wil flush all the muck and crud out ....if its gonna work.... after a few days you should notice its getting easier to turn....eventually when its proper free ...re fill with lube oil....just keep squirting till you see nice clean oil coming out instead of a mucky mix.....bit of a hassle I know but its the kind of little job you can do every time you wander into the workshop whilst yer 'busy' with everything else.... PS: and if you decide to strip the relay fer christ sake be careful of the viscious spring lurking within !!!

I could take a Jeep apart a lot quicker than that.....medium size lump of PE....a detonator.....and...

believe or not but I once had in my possesion a brass sledge hammer and a brass road workers pick.......both acquired from a demolition job on an old ordnance depot.......mind you...the pick I could sort of understand....for gently excavating around a un-exploded bomb maybe?.....but I was proper confused by the sledgehammer...I wouldn't have thought you'd want to use a sledge hammer at all on or anywhere near explosives.... no matter what it was made of!.... .......I have to smile and echo the thinkings on the female shopping method though... Now I don't know about you lot but my shopping method goes like this...go to town to purchase new boots......go into shop that sells boots...find boots I want in first shop (thats why I went in there, cos I knew they would have them)....ask for relevant size....pay for them.....return to car and go home. job done.....

...top of my list without a shadow of a doubt would be a Sherman, any model but prefer a welded hull model...with wide tracks...and either a 75 or 76mm..and..and....and.. etc!.. ........if there was any loot left (not out of 50 grand I don't guess there would be hahah!:cry:) it would have to be followed by a halftrack.......

great project !....always liked half tracks... always thought they were cracking looking vehicles... looking forward to seeing you progress with her !

I only expirienced 'issue' clothing whilst in the ATC in the early 70s...the shirts were ok and probably pure cotton but they all still had a detachable collar which was made out of specially hardened cardboard I reckon.....also the trousers could possibly have been made out of knitted brillo pads ...itchy was not the word I'd have used..a least not without an expletive in front of the word 'itchy'!..gawd knows who they were cut for but back in those days I had about a 26" waist and they were a good fit in the waist band but the crutch as someone said above, was about an inch above my knees and also I'd have needed a bum the size of a hippo to fill the back of them out....lord knows what shape of fella they were cut for.....the jacket was ok except when you got rained on and then we all smelt like wet dogs and they took forever to dry out... for some reason we had black boots with full hobnails on the sole and heel...rather akin to being on an ice rink even when it hadn't rained!:cheesy:

...also the shape of the 'doorways'...very early Jeep anyways

very sad indeed...I can only agree with the many reasons already stated. Not only the gaping hole now left in the nations defences but also as someone said....and speaking as someone that was involved for many years in the 'recycling' trade in this country... I find it absolutely ridiculous there is apparantly not a breakers yard nor company in this country now capable of dealing with our own redudant ships..... ........I have a horrible feeling that we'll regret these years soon enough.....

An absolutely amazing restoration ! very envious!That is a truly professional job your doing mate! My thoughts. ....Echoing other folk I amazed how different she looks with no track skirts or turret lockers ..anyone else think she resembles a M26-ish Pershing /Patton?..also the lessons learnt by that late stage of WW2 are more obvious without her 'bits' covering her up.......especially the front profile ...to me it's very reminiscent of a Panther ??........ ...Makes me think what a shame we didn't get them over to Europe 6 months or so earlier than we did...........I'll bet our boys would have loved taking on the Panthers and Tigers with a Centurion..... ....I'm guessing they must have done a lot of range testing against captured German armour in the immediate years after the war...does anyone have an info on such tests and how the best German armour faired when up against a Centurion?........I know a range test isn't a true test of a 'battle' ...especially given that the Cent was so very much superior in manouvrability/mobility and also (I presume?) firecontrol too...but.... I bet a few of the old tankers that survived combat against the best of the German armour would have been thinking .."oh man! if only we'd had these in Normandy!"

I'll second that! I see you have a Churchill?....many years ago a company called Jeremy Walker Machinery just off the A40 on the Gloucester side of Oxford had a very rough but complete Churchill sitting on its own equally tatty Mighty Antar & tank transporter....it was their intention to restore both abck about 1992 ish?.....would you know if they did?.... ....thought maybe Churchill owners get to know of each other?

cut to 'OA' size scrap (furnace feed....no more than 5' X 2' lumps basically) around these parts you can get £220 a tonne at the moment......if he's selling directly into a mill he could be getting a fair bit more than that per tonne....'oversize' is gonna a bit less so in one lump the guy is gonna want £150 a tonne for her I'd guess....what would she weigh? somewhere between 10 / 15 tonne?.. Its the old problem of simple arithmatic for the scrapyard.... unless the owner is a sympathetic fella towards rescue/restortion..........I've got a picture in a book somewhere of one of TW Wards scrapyards (a long gone but once massive scrap metal company in the UK) around 1947..... Sherman tanks are sitting, with one precariously balanced on top of the other in rows for as far as the eye can see.......it really is heartbreaking to think of what has been lamped up over the years....get in there and try and do a deal!

hahaha I know what you mean.........the day after my lottery comes in there's a helluva lot of things gonna start appearing in my garden too....gonna be needing a lot bigger 'garden' I'm thinking! :cool2:

my thoughts the same!. ..man that M10 can shift!!..if you look at the Tiger 1 & 2 in the Youtube videos gently ambling about down at Bovington ...albeit that the guys were very probably taking them proper steady...its no wonder a Sherman/M10 could use speed to get out of trouble.......that M10 really moves!

thats grand ...thanks!....are there any like it in captivity in the UK?....got the idea it was relatively rare?......... and myabe you may know...are the ones on the beach at Biville(?) near Cherbourg being 'rescued' or are they stuck there for the forseeable?........had a look at the youtube of them and I would have thought they were worth a go at? thanks again!

hiya Dave.... they were 6x6 trucks and mighty impressive too... ..a little like a lot bigger and more modern versions of Diamond Ts or Ward La Frances but shorter in the chassis and with a more 'military' look to the cab and general design......they had flat bonnets / hoods and I remember climbing in one and the name plate said something along the lines of 'US M??? Heavy Motive Tracter' ...or words to that effect.....they looked like they were rigged to pull draw bar trailers (or guns?) ...they didn't have a bed of any sort on the back just storage lockers for I guess chains/blocks/tackle etc... I don't know if Marselle is still around or in business but this link should show you his yard.. http://www.wikimapia.org/#lat=52.4513673&lon=-1.4327288&z=16&l=0&m=b ..........it does however look like there has been one heck of a clearup compared to what it looked like in the mid 90s though!.....happy hunting..

Many years ago on the front of an edition of 'After the Battle' was an apparantly quite tidy Sherman pictured still on the side of the road .....(NB: not issue 4 ...thats the one with a Sherman pushed off a road at a skew angle in The Ardenne)......this was a lot later edition and the Sherman appeared to be almost 'parked' neatly alongside a road.. ....The mag didn't give much information on the tank in the text unfortunately so whether it had been parked up by local authorities or perhaps the US Army as a exhibit or whether it was still 'in situ' following the war I don't know.. ..so...the thing is... it had very obviously much thicker armour on the front/glacis plate....she looked like there was an extra 2" plate on the front of the 'normal' armour.....it had a welded hull and as I recall a bigger main gun than usual... (def not the 75mm short barrel and not a 105mm either..may have been a long barrel 76mm but think it was smoething else ..possibly a 17 pounder ???)....... ....the magazine made oblique ref to the idea that it was a 'beefed up' Sherman...was it possibly called a Jumbo?..and the mods may possibly have been done 'in the field'?....(it didn't look as though it had been done in a field workshop though...more of a 'factory' appearance to it I thought).........any ideas what this model was?...... ...I think the photo was taken somewhere near to the border of France/Germany?..Saar region maybe?........anyways...I could probably find the magazine in question but it will take a search and a half of mothers loft and gawd knows what lurks in there.......!...and...long shot .... ...but does anyone know if this tank and is she still on the side of the road there or rescued or ??????

Haven't had the time to go right thru this thread yet so some of these yards may well be mentioned...but.. ..I don't know if any of you have used a scrapyard near Hurstbourne/Andover way called J Hirst Ltd?....they're at the old Hurstbourne Railway Station....in the mid 90s they were cutting up a lot and I mean a LOT of Chieftains plus many other military vehicles.They literally had rows of Chietains...probably about 20 or 30 of them and they had devised a cutting method that meant they could reduce one to scrap size in about 3 days...they even had a massive old vertical miller machine tool set up alongside the cutting bay... they fitted the road wheels on and the attachment they had rigged up ripped the rubber tyre off the steel wheel. I bought a lot of gear off them during those years and was in the yard quite regularly...........other vehicles they were cutting included lots of ex Northern Ireland Humber Pigs and also small armoured cars (not sure what but sort of Ferret sized of one sort and another)....they also had quite a few armoured Landrovers and a couple that I recognised as (I think?) Shorlands?...landrovers with a little turret on the top of them...I haven't been there for many years so really don't know if they are still involved in that sort of trade or if there is anything left at the back of the yard these days but they also sold tonnes of military surplus kit too so they may well be worth a mooch........ Another cracking yard is up by Coventry owned by a Marselle de Moulder..(yeah I know...helluva name!).he's a nice fella and I did a lot of deals with him too.....his yard is (or was ... might be long gone now) an absolute treasure trove...mainly big heavy stuff...in particular he had some very big US gun tractors that looked 60s ish to me.....also lots of earthmovers,cranes,lorries , Landrovers and Unimogs and trucks and lots of it ex military...no armour but worth a mooch if you're up that way........ Also there's a few nice bits still around down my way ....especially 2 Matadors that I know of albeit quite rough now in a sawmill yard long disused.........

tank wise I only saw the two T55s and the Chieftain when I went up over there about 2 or 3 years ago but there may well be another one lurking somewhere....tis a big ol' lump of land!.........

Hello to everyone!.......found this site yesterday and am now hooked! A bit of background.. in love with military vehicles, particularly WW2 era and absolutely with Sherman tanks since old enough to be allowed a drive of a 80" Landrover at about 9 years old too long ago to recall...!.......I like anything with tracks to be honest but am seriously hooked on Shermans ever since buying one of the first 'After the Battle' mags way back in the mid 70s with a picture of a Sherman still on the side of the road in the Ardenne........Have travelled all over Europe since positively drooling especially in Normandy in 2004 when I had the great pleasure of escorting my old Dad for the anniverary..(he's an ex Royal Engineer...made corporal ...twice so he tells me) I don't own a military vehicle myself, all I can boast is a 1958 Series 2 SWB LandRover that I have just restored from a sad old wreck found out the back of a local industrial estate.......She's the latest in a very long line of Landrovers (some ex military) that I've owned/restored/rebuilt over the years......I did once get very close to buying a Ward La France wrecker that had lain in a field near here for many many years ...the fella wanted 250 quid for her (it was way back around 1983 by the way!) and she still ran (with a bit of fettling)....my then wife put a firm stop to the idea though..note that I say....my 'then' wife.......live and learn hey?hahah!... these days I'm a professional musican (at last!) but spent the previous 35-ish years since school in the demolition/dismantling and occasionally construction games.. can drive most kinds of earth moving plant you care to sit me in, can weld/strip/ re-assemble /fit just about anything (given tea and fags in copious quantities) and am well versed in the dark art of keeping a string of lorries runing for many years in the face of adversity / the DoT / and the police! ...so.....I know where your all coming from in a sense! Anyways!..Looking forward to meeting up with some of you with your pride and joys! (Tanks/trucks/jeeps etc.... not wives by the way)

hello to all.new to this site.....! on the subject of wrecks there are a few still up on Sennybridge Range........two ex soviet/eastern bloc T55s(?) ...the one is in a real state and more or less completely burnt out and full of ash and spent shell cases and barbed wire..the other is out the back of the fibua village beyond the MG range and appears to 'welded up'....this one still looks quite good ( to my eyes anyways!) but whether its got an engine in or not I couldn't see.. ..there is also a very rough Chieftain at the other end of the village to the rough T55 that is in a very similar state plus having some heavy damage to the suspension ... ...dotted about the village there are also lots of FV432s (?) tracked carriers in a right proper shot up state, a few Bedford lorries and a civvy pick up truck that resembles a pepperpot due to the attention of some serious GPMG action.... on an earlier thread ...are the Shermans at Biville still there?...anyone mounting a rescue operation yet???? excellent website by the way!