Amazon Thornycroft Coles Crane

[ruxy]

I knew of two of these in 1980's  ,  IIRC both Ex-RN  & still in livery. 

I used to go to Coles Sunderland (Steels)  & Darlington factories and scrounged some info.  It was the B&A stuff I was interested in ,  I used to load / stability test cranes and hated these jobs - when they had a DIY folding jib extension or a DIY manual extension .  A neighbour was chief designer for Coles at Sunderland - I always suspected he used to back-heel queries & jobs on self ,  some fall out - with a group travelling back from USA , he told be he was down the back of the plane and the rest were up the front !   , I had caught him siphoning petrol from his Co. car & putting it in his wife's car.  Within a month he was with Allen  down Oxford  ,  then a while later I learned that Allen were Grove , and then of course Coles were taken over by Grove - Jack must have then had real fun.

The  ASLI  (automatic safe load indicator)  were by B&A  (prior to Wylie)  from what I recall they may have had twin ASLI on the hoist .  One had a petrol genny engine on the deck and almost certain it was a Meadows.   I used to wonder why people did not take a interest in preservation of these bridging cranes for show display as to me they were more interesting than a bare lorry.

[Citroman]

Does a militairy Gardner engine not have the aluminum side covers with the Gardner name on it? Or is this an other type of engine?

[Dougie K]

When the weather gets better (when!)

I’ll get a good look at the plates on the engine. 

[john1950]

Pretty well settled on it being a Thornycroft Oil engine.

[Niels v]

2 hours ago, Citroman said:

Does a militairy Gardner engine not have the aluminum side covers with the Gardner name on it? Or is this an other type of engine?

War time engines, would have alu plates without the Gardner name on them (blanks) 

[john1950]

There seem to be quite a few survivors and rumoured survivors, of the Coles Amazon vehicle. Duxford, Elvington, Ainscough crane hire, Ulster Museum, yours, to name but a few. Also some in private hands.

[Niels v]

3 hours ago, john1950 said:

There seem to be quite a few survivors and rumoured survivors, of the Coles Amazon vehicle. Duxford, Elvington, Ainscough crane hire, Ulster Museum, yours, to name but a few. Also some in private hands.

There was a number in a yard on Malta, will dig out the pictures from 2012, and there are a couple in Norway 

[john1950]

We have been across today. What a great little museum, well worth a visit. Just need a bigger coffee machine. We just got to the Thornycroft when it started raining. A lot of time has been spent getting a covering of paint on it. Keep up the good work. 

[andymc]

Another users of the Coles crane were M.S.R.D usually attached to Army Aircraft Workshops.

Mobile Servicing and Repair Detachment.

They were used for tasks not allocated at squadron level e.g engine and main transmission changes.

They were also used for helicopter recovery.

They were still in use as late as 1978.