CMP buses in Australia

[Keith Webb]

We've seen the famous CMP based bus fleet in Burma, and also the occasional pic of one in Europe, and there is one in Sydney, but although there must have been quite a few, there don't seem to be many photographs of CMPs converted as buses here in Australia.
I just came across this potential blitz bus, but the wheels aren't right.



Source

[Keith Webb]

This is fun finding new pics!

[Keith Webb]

Quite a good thread here.

[Keith Webb]

Yet another

[Private_collector]

Keith, that first photo of yours has to be one of the greatest concentrations of ugly I have ever seen in one place, (and i've seen recent photos of Donatella Versace) so that's saying something.

Do these qualify? Mostly disintegrated now, but once these vehicles were operating as tour vehicles, on Fraser Island, in Queensland. likely retired in late 1970s, they would have carried up to a couple of dozen tourists each, in........er......comfort?? No comfort about it. If my memory serves me correctly, I recall seeing at least one of these at work, when my family visited the island in late 60s or early 70s. Constant exposure and driving through salt water & sand didn't bode well on them.

On the island, there was a location that we stopped at where WWII commandos were trained. Certain features were still visible then, including a rotting jetty, concrete pads for ???, and a pit which was supposed to be used for some training activity. Maybe they were training to climb out of a latrine! Wouldn't have been the biggest s__t pile they operated in, thats for sure. I tried to slip away to snoop around, but was spotted. Guess there's virtually nothing left there now. Tour guide told us it was a secret commando base, and I remember thinking it wasn't much of a secret by then.

The owner and tour operator was a friend of mine, who passed away in October. I expect these vehicles and a number of other CMPs, will have been scrapped by now.

[motto]

I went over to Fraser Is and with Ross Prince some years ago not that long after the logging was stopped. He showed me the remains of some Studebaker US6s that had been used by a tour operator and were going the same way as the Blitzs in the photos. In one area there was a line up of trucks abandoned by the loggers that included a couple of International 2-1/2 ton 6x6s also showing the ravages of their job and the environment.

We had a look around the commando training area but there wasn't a lot to see.There was a large cylindrical object that may have been a boiler down on the shore line that they had been attaching explosive charges to as part of their training.

Another leftover was a V8 side valve engine laying on the ground with the heads off. Taking a close look at it I noticed what appeared to be some poly-rope in the water jacket - And then it moved! A snake had taken up residence and I bet the b*****d was of the poisonous variety as well. We didn't contest ownership.

David

[Tony Smith]

"Tuit's Tours" - Geez, they get around, don't they?

[Mike Cecil]

I don't have an image (it was many years ago), but on the approach to Omeo, Victoria, on the Hotham Road heading into Omeo, there was a Blitz-based bus on blocks being used as an extension to a house or building. It was in pretty poor shape.

I seem to remember the locals telling me it was THE bus between Omeo and Bairnsdale for many years, before it got pensioned off.

I assume it is no longer there. It was a grey or light blue colour, I think. The front was pretty original, with the bus body grafted onto the cab frame, windows along the sides, and so on.

Mike C

[lynx42]

Mike, it is still there. Now painted Mission Brown. A Ford F60L,it belongs to the father-in-law of a mate of mine. Originally it was constructed to carry people to the Victorian snow fields at Mt. Hotham. Not as the Omeo to Bairnsdale bus. The last time I looked at it, it still had the Ford drivers book on the dashboard. My mate keeps saying that we should bring it here and get stuck into it. (I keep putting him off.)

The first photo in this thread looks to me like the bus is based on an MW Bedford.

Regards Rick.

[Mike Cecil]

Well, B****r me! Still there? Must be a real croc by now.

Yes, Rick, your post prompted the memory cells to work a little better: it was the Omeo-Hotham run as you said.

Talking of buses, the Australian Defence Force runs a pretty swish fleet of buses. On an EX I observed in the Northern Territory, we all, filthy from several days in the red dusty scrub, boarded these nice, clean buses for the 200 od miles trip into Palmerston. There was red dust everywhere by the time we got off.

The military has had a fleet of buses ever since WW2: small numbers then. There were even a few sent to SVN, plus more hired from the US Army. Not blitzes, though, so off thread, as they say....

Mike C
Collection:
*just lots of piles of paper these days...

[Keith Webb]

Based on a CMP chassis, B-14047, was an emergency bus, used just post war in the village of Steggerda, in the south east of the Netherlands province of Friesland.

Link to original on Flikr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nichola...n/photostream/

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Another Dutch bus, travelling all the way down to Africa!

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

Here's a picture of a rebodied CMP truck, I think it is a HUP. Sorry for the bad quality picture, it was printed in a newspaper as a mirror image.

It was used in the 1970s by a Dutch travel company called Baobab for overland trips into Africa.

From HUPs IN STRANGE PLACES