SPTA team

John is right, We tryed to get permission to dig on the old Andover Airfield in search for a P38. It took months of investigation work mostly talking to locals to find the fire dump. When I approached the authority's we ran into a wall of silence. Even a printed letter in Flypast drew a blank. Now many years on a certain super market beginning with T have be granted permission to build a massive depot on the site. These to have run into problems, mostly when the ground workers started bigging test hole found the place to be strewn with UXBs and more. Having read the article in the local rag I think maybe its just as well we were turned down :shake:

Haven't got sproggs but the spaniel makes up for it. Merry Christmas and a happy new year to one and all. Stay safe and hope to meet up with some of you in the new year :tup: :tup: ;-) ;-) Tony

Dougy please feel free to use anything from the Plain Military web pages. I do have some walk around pictures as well, When I track them down that is. I have promised Dave p some pictures but I can't find the disks. If I happen to find some 432s out on the ranges I will keep your web site in mind. Also give Bob Griffin a shout he is the resident expert in all things FV432s. All the best with the build. Tony

Merry Crimbob from me to, I hope all your wishes come true for the new year. A great big thankyou to everyone for allowing me to join this great forum. My hopes and preyer's go out to all the service men and women serving overseas. Stay safe in such troubled times. :bow: :bow: :bow: Tony

We will put all low loaders at the rear of the camp site and park the tractor units on the car park. We are trying to keep the car park clear for some hopefully Military visitors. Because we still have five months to go we don't get the heads up on any Military movements yet so planning has to wait on that side of things. We are planning to get at least two local Regiments down for a few hours, which one's will depend on whats available at the time. I can not guarantee this will happen as a lot of REGs are tied down with over seas duties. I will give you more heads up on this matter as I get it. Merry Christmas and a happy new year to all at HMVF. Tony and the rest of the PM team ;-) ;-) ;-)

Now now Dave its not my fault somebody put the map up the wrong way :whistle: The problem was we were planning to drive the impact zone the other way round but them pesky ramblers put the brakes on that. The month running up to the drive we spent every weekend driving the route. We new every pot hole, turn and divot from Westdown to Redhorn, thats my excuse and i,m sticking to it. You can keep the dust as a little memento of the trip we have plenty more were that came from. Neil that would be great to bring them in that way. I will be posting a man on the Bustard junction and the parking area is just 100 yards from there on the right. Apart from Neil and Lee, how many lowloaders are coming? If Bob has every thing sorted there should be a Scamell commander with Chieftain on board, If it's only going to be a few we can park them at the rear of the camp site. If a whole load turn up we may need to park them at Rollestone camp. I will also be posting a menu and price list for the scram at the Bustard. By heck they do a corking Steak & Kidney pud :drool: :drool: The way to get Rambo out of the Fox is to put a Adder under the seat. If that fails lots of butter and tyre levers :rofl: Are we all still coming in full battle dress? Tony

Cheers Mark, was't sure if you wanted me to post them or send them to you. :tup:

Directions for camp site. West bound M3 come of at junction 8 onto A303, Strait on for about 25 MLS till you approach Countess round-a-bout, take the third exit onto the A345 Devizes, follow road for aprox 1m till you hit next round-a-bout, take first exit of and follow road through Larkhill Garrison, drive strait on till you find Fargo camp on your left, about 1 & 1/2 mls on you will see Rollestone to your right, you will need to turn here, follow road for about 100 yards till you see a massive parking area, this will be the place to park up. The idear is to have everyone meet up on this parkand take the track to the camp site. This way we wont need to have to drive down past the Bustard and clog the roads up. Directions for camp site. South bound M5 Gloster Junction 11A, take 417 to Swindon, cross M4 A346 to Burbage, take A338 signed Salisbury follow road to Tidworth, drive through Tidworth for 5 MLS passing Shipton Bellinger on your right, drive under the A303 and you come to a rounder-a-bout, take 3RD exit of and get onto the A303 then follow directions above. Vehicles coming in from Dorset will need to get onto the Salisbury road and then to Stone henge. Tac signs will be put out for all traffic, if anyone gets lost or are not sure then a mobile number will be at hand. We will have a vehicle that will come and find you. If you have an easyer way of getting to the camp site them please share it with us. all the best and hope you all get here I will post a post code for the bustard a bit nearer the time for SAT-NAVs. Tony

Hell the soldiers are getting younger these days:rofl:

Dave P has, and I have a Camcorder. Theres one for HMVFTV :rofl:

Sorry guys not so much a film but more a TV adaptation was Warriors. An awsome piece of work about the British Army UNPROFOR during the Yugoslavian conflict. knowing you had the fire power and not being allowed to use it because you are a peace keeper. War is hard but getting back to to civie life is harder.

Lee you are a star mate. I will be getting intouch with these guys ASAP. Dave like Lee has said I think the vehicle insurance will not cover us for the drive out not if some one should fall off any vehicles or trip over a tent peg. We are writing up a disclaimer to run with the insurance just in case some public turn up on the visit. As the area we are going to be driving is open to the public it will be inevitable that someone will turn up at some point. A big thankyou to all that have helped get this of the ground, with out you guys and gals this would not be possible. Let pray the weather stays warm and the beer stays cool. :tup: :tup: Tony

No probs Mark. I will be posting directions first thing tomorrow, West and South bound. Tony

Hello everyone I will start with some good news, we have the camp site. I got an email from Westdown yesterday confirming the booking. Land Marc has offered portaloos at a charge which we will be going with as they will work out cheaper in the long run. We have the whole of the center range to play in, this includes Greenlands camp which is an old farm with blown out buildings, bunkers, Grassland, woods and a new Iraqi compound. Plenty of places to park up and get some pictures of your vehicles. Also we have the Impact zone to drive around. The run will be longer than this year, just a suggestion bring so binos , some of the wreck are quite a way out. Range use............. We have been told that the ranges are going to be used by the Army on the same weekend as us but not too sure as yet which part they will be on. As we have a licence for next year we should get a schedule which tells everyone out that weekend hows where and with what. Those pesky ramblers are back again next year though they have not booked in. I have been asked if possible to park up at Rollestone camp for a few hours just to let them clear the area. This is where a cunning bit of planning comes into play. If we can we are going to try and get some modern vehicles to come over for those few hours to keep us occupied. At present we are talking to 22REG RE, 2RTR, 1MEC and 19 SIGS. I can not garantee any of the Regs will come but a few seem interested. I Will give you more info as I get it. The Bustard will be fully stocked with drink and food for the weekend and the skittle alley is ready to go. Side arms and weapons on vehicles................. It will be a case of yes you can bring them and all vehicles can carry weapons but they must be covered up when asked by the Land wardens. Even though this is a training ground some of the public still don't like the thought of non-military personnel running around with weapons. I think the idea of weapons will give that real look to the pictures.If this changes I will let you all know ASAP. Now for some bad news................... Westdown have asked me for a club liability insurance, as we are not a club as such I'm not sure what they are talking about. I know if we were running a show we would need public liability insurance in place. As you are all aware, this weekend is just a get together for the HMVF forum and a few invited guests. If anyone can shed some light on this I would be very grateful? I will be contacting Bob at Westdown on Monday to find out exactly what he means. I will be informing him that all vehicles are road requested, MOTd and all have full driving licences, but not sure if this will be enough. When I first started this I never knew that so much went into organising such events. I take my hat off to all that do this sort of things year in year out. I will be attending a board meeting at Westdown on the 2nd of April. This is a gathering for all that will be using the ranges on that weekend. The Military will be there as will the ramblers, SCOA, so I will have more news then. I know some of you may not like this but the next one we organise will be done with the plan to have a camp site off of the ranges. This will bugger up the use of the pub and skittle alley but we can get around that. We are already looking at a site 1 mile from the ranges. Again if anyone has any idea's as to what we could do to make this better then please feel free to put it forward. This is going to be a good weekend, something different. If things should take a turn for the worst then we are going to have to look for an alternative camp site. Please don't think that this is the end, we don't lay down that easily. We will be doing this event by hook or crook. We have a few friends working behind the scenes at Westdown that can pull some strings. So that's it thus far. like I said Bob will be getting a phone call on Monday to see what the hell he is on about ( CLUB LIABILITY INSURANCE ) :dunno: Tony :-D :-D

Cheers mate will do

Watch lads, if I blow down this pipe the other head light will fly of.

The chap on the rear right side of the picture is on his mobile phone: Sorry love would have been home an hour ago but chuck has lost one of his contact lenses in the engine compartment . :-D Tony

How do we sign up for the EBB 08. Will have the SER3 LWT on the road by then. Also if we can gey Pete out of bed he will bring his Dutchy LWT plus some others from around this neck of the woods. Tony

No sorry mate, still working on it. They seem to be hiding them away somewhere. I did manege to catch up with Warminsters a few months back but they were busy laying at the time for me to get a walk around. I did ask, really I did. By the time we had drove over to Larkhill they had disappeared in a cloud of dust. I need to do it soon as time is running out for the poor old Chieftain AVLBs and AVREs :cry: :cry: We are getting the new Trojan and Titan down here soon. Jazz has informed me they should be here by Feb. :banana: :banana: I will have some pics of the new Terrier as soon as Chris gets them on a disk. Will give you a shout as soon as I get them. Tony :tup:

Is it the back end of a LWT Rover 1? The Wombat type carrier :dunno:

Welcome aboard Ossie They are a mad bunch on here. I may have a few more pictures for your cool web site. Now you have joined up to the mad house have a look down on the Salisbury Plain event page, you may like to come along for this weekend. Im sure some nice guy on this forum will let you have a ride in there vehicle :whistle: :whistle:. Tony- Plain Military

Sorry guys the only showers we will be having on the Plain invasion will be the weather. We are looking at the cost of the showers but are still waiting to here back. mind you for the price of a solar shower it may be the cheeper route. As Salisbury Plain is an active training ground I would like to see everyone doing it mili style, washing that is. Cold water in the morning never hurt anyone, mind you I thing the beans and sausages might :roll: We will have porter loos and soft dungie rolls so no need to bring your own. Come to think of it, does't Ashlys caravan have a shower. :tup: :tup: :banana: Tony

He was a lucky man, I found this poor Landy while out with 6BTN. The destructive power of a CRARRV. :dunno: http://landrover110.tripod.com/id20.html Tony

Lee is the picture of a FV432 with a turret on or is there a vehicle parked beside it giving the impresion of a turreted 432.

Plain invasion is the first for us, and if the light weight makes it through the mud or dust we may get to see some more. If anyone Fancy's doing some medi cover please come along for the weekend. Paul will be there again with the TACR2 for fire cover and Dave has volunteered to represent the police. We will be in constant contact with all emergency services via West down and Land marc but fingers crossed we wont need them. I think the only medi cover we will need is the clash of the titans during the skittles night. :box: :box: Tony