RAFMT

The lads up there kindly reassembled her after she returned from Maple-land. And now I can't find the stop-motion footage of the work, typical 🙄

At The National Archives here: http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/results/r?_col=200&_cr1=AIR+27&_hb=tna&_dt=SQ&_no=139&_p=1925&Refine+dates=Refine

Simon King has already put the serial number up TK620. A Mosquito B.35 that was only ever on the strength of 139 (Jamaica) Squadron, who themselves only converted to the B.35 (from the Mk.XVI) in 1948. Based at RAF Coningsby, but the photo is likely taken somewhere a little more tropical.

Not a Harrow, firstly it's too late for them and secondly the aircraft in the photo clearly has the wing join the fuselage low down, whereas the Harrow is a shoulder wing aircraft.

Bill Millin wasn't a Lovat Scout as far as I was aware; he was HLI and Queens Own Camerons before joining 4 Commando. Perhaps the confusion is because he was Brig Simon Fraser's (15th Lord Lovat) piper when we was the commander of 4 Commando and later 1st Special Service Brigade? Fraser himself was also not a member of Lovat's Scouts although it was founded by his father the 14th Lord Lovat.

Wow, you go away for a long weekend and everyone has fun without you! 😉 I agree with the mobile kitchen trailer. As for what ASPs handled, it was "aircraft equipment and spares".

On top of that, with the RAF (and i guess the Brown Jobs?) different letter combinations were used to denote the role/type of vehicle so AA contains cars, light tenders and ambulances (as well as a few trailers i believe). The easiest way to date it would be to see if the Record Card survives.

I have to agree, i started looking into it a while back but didn't get far before having to put it on hold. The Mk5 trolley acc doesn't seem to have been produced earlier than 1945. I might have another look on my lunch break today and see what I find.

Alan, there were a few models of tractor made by David Brown during and after the war. Are there no clues on your tractor? The one in the photo above is potentially the right model for wartime although they carried on in production post-war. http://www.dbtractors.co.uk/ the VTK1/VIG1 were the wartime production, the Taskmaster based model (listed as Aircraft Towing Tracor) are the clearly post-war version.

Trolleys turn up every now and then, depending on which type you are after. Bomb casings are much less likely to turn up - it was far easier and safer to detonate or dump them than try and remove the filling. If any do turn up in a hedgerow you can guarantee EOD will be right round to ensure it goes off with the least amount of risk! And if you are aiming for WW2 please, please, please try to get the colour scheme approximately right, not the postwar scheme shown above.

Whether it was 2 or 3, it was certainly tinted by somebody who wasn't there at the time.

Richard - the WOT1 had vacuum brakes "on certain chassis only" according to the databook Lauren references above. The Austin K3YF 6x4 had vacuum trailer brakes as standard. For reference the Dodge VK62B 4x2 had a turning circle of 68ft. The Cheverolet 1543 4x2 was 60ft The Austin K3YF 6x4 was 57ft. The Fordson WOT1 6x4 had a turning circle of 64 ft to the right and 62 ft to the left.

As i said before, as this is an SDF, i'd be very surprised if it wasn't a TRE vehicle for transporting/maintaining the gizmos. Also as a rough calculation, rounding the turret height up to 6 foot, gives a rough vehicle height of 8-9ft. Larry, is there a chance of getting a higher resolution scan of the image? Just so that it doesn't pixelate quite so soon when zooming in.

I've changed my mind about the rear, i think that that is an upwards hinged door; the engine for the Whitley is more inline with the vertical tail surface. But the "block" to the rear of the vehicle is likely something coming out from inside rather than a door as there is no gap between the object and the curve of the vehicle's rear near the roof. As an aside and to give a better impression of size, the top of the rear turret of the Whitley wasn't very high!

At the end of the day, identification aside, if this is one of the Special Duties Flights, it's very unlikely to be an RAF vehicle. The SDFs were RAF aircraft and Aircrew lent to the TRE and it would have been their specialists who dealt with the equipment aboard the airframes.

OK, time to sound like a raving loony, but.... After Larry's comment, i can't actually see a windscreen- just the side window. It might be just because it's a bad quality photo, but could it be a caravan with another vehicle parked behind with the bonnet peeking out? The "front" wheels are much larger than the "rear" wheels if it is a single vehicle which should narrow it down a lot. If it's a caravan with another vehicle behind then the bonnet hasn't necessarily been removed but that vehicle behind is darker and/or in shadow.

Of course, i could be wrong! It just seems about the right distance out from the fuselage.

No, i think that "lift up" part is the engine of the Whitley. Because of the curve of the rear body, i can't decide if that is in fact a door, or if it is another vehicle behind. But i would still go with Ted, it's probably a NAAFI wagon.

Larry, the photo of the fire engine could be any colour - the colour film of the period was notoriously bad and rarely gave the actual shade. I agree with Ted, the darker colour is probably Nobel's Dark Tarmac (a dark grey with a hint of blue is the best description). And i don't think that roundel helps too much given how much light is reflecting off it. As for the Trojan, firstly it is unlikely to have been an RAF one. It belonged to a teacher who rebuilt it and used it for jollies and going on school trips in the sixties. He donated it to the Museum. As for the colour, BS381 was an attempt to codify the colours in official use, as well as introduce new ones for various purposes.

(Going even further off topic) Something to bear in mind. If anyone has any links to museums, small or large, or private/public collections then get them to have words with local colleges and universities to find out if any of them offer relevant courses. Lots of them spend a lot of time trying to find suitable places for work experience/internship that is now an important part of any course - it gives the student practical experience. Or even better, if you or someone you know is an employer think about the apprenticeship scheme. The RAF Museum has had apprentices for quite a number of years now, particularly at the Michael Beetham Conservation Centre (their apprentices have won or come close to winning a number of awards). There were even a couple of apprentice aircraft technicians at Hendon a couple of years ago, at the end of their stint one stayed on as full time member of staff. The best way to get them interested is to show off what we have to offer, a la Fred, Guy and co; but the best way to really get them hooked is to let them get their hands dirty on the real thing.

Almost all the RAF vehicles (certainly all of those i recall seeing pics of) have Middlesex reg numbers.

I've seen this more times than i care to mention. I've also been the one to stop it happening on a few occasions. My favourite was an article in the Daily Fail recently about a new book on 617 Squadron with a photograph of "Guy Gibson and his crew". The crew in question was Big Joe McCarthy's and the "Guy Gibson" which they identified (second from left or somesuch) was McCarthy's bomb aimer.

I'd completely forgotten about this tractor. I did little digging, and chassis number N244 was assigned RAF registration 63AN61, supplied to contract KM/2E/536/CB 21(c)2. It was taken on charge on 19th February 1969 and assigned the same day to Brize Norton. This is the only movement on the record card until it was struck of charge on 29th September 1987.

There was (and i presume still is) a Crossley Q type tractor unit in the Shopland Collection, and crash tender on display at RAF Museum Cosford.

Ted - the Museum's balloon winch carries the roundel on the wing (not introduced until 41) and has painted, not aluminium, RAF letters. So it's more like a slightly incorrect post-war scheme. Although at the end of the day it's splitting hairs really. As for the Khaki, G3 is not Khaki it's Khaki-Green. Lord knows why they decided to complicate matters with a name like that (I assume they used that name, it's how I've always heard it referred to). Khaki is and always was Khaki as in Khaki Dress uniforms- a sort of Light Stone colour. The RAF seemed averse to using British Standard 318 colours at this time (which is different from BS318 including colours already used by the RAF) so the stores vocabs wont get us any closer to an exact shade. Certainly the photographs show a light colour, definitely not dark enough to be KG3. Besides, the RAF liked to keep it's members busy, including hand mixing each batch of of paint; and Mr Angus knows about hand mixing paint for use in the Middle East!