Found MkI carrier

[Justin Pollard]

Hello all,thats a good looking carrier you,ve got there Ralph,good luck and look forward to more pics.

[Ralph Volkert]

I have been going over the hull and cant find any numbers in any of the usual places. Some of the armour has been removed.

BUT! I found the number 801 stamped into the angle iron on the outside rear of the hull (on the gunners side.) Would anyone else have something like this and does it relate to either your S/N or Hull Number?

On the plus side I found it still has the Literature Case under the front hull in front of the gunner.

[Ledsel]

There should be two more numbers there. It should have five. That is your lower hull number. There is one more hull number right behind the gunners head on the angle iron there. That is the hull number that is on the data plate. It should be fairly close to the other maybe about 100 or so higher.

[Ralph Volkert]

What is the range for the serial, uhull, lhull numbers for carriers made in Canada. Is there a registery for UC's?

Will the casting date on the tracklinks be any indication of when this MK I carrier as made?

[rob love]

Track dates would not be a good way to get a build date as track replacement would have been likely. You should be able to get a year on most of the brackets, it will be stamped near the area of the FMoC marking.

Serial ranges for the mk1 carrier range from around serial number 1 to, I believe, around 18000, when they switched over entirely to mk2 production. Earliest carriers I have seen were 1941 production. Lowest serial number I have seen on a carrier to date was 48.

If your hull number is indeed in the 800 range, then yours would have had early features like the horn, the baffle type air cleaner, and possibly the ratchet type track adjusters. It may have also had the large brass plate on the right fender with all the serial numbers on it, although I am not sure of when the cut-off was for this. If your carrier did have this, then it would not have had the serial numbers on the front armor. Yours, unfottunately, has the typical book size cut out for the driver which gets rid of many of the numbers. As was suggested by Ledsel, check the angle iron behind the co-drivers head and you will get another serial number which, on the early carriers, should be relatively close to the other number you have already found. On earlier production, these numbers tend to be relatively close....as production went further, the numbers could be several hundred apart.

[Ledsel]

All I can tell is that your carrier is a mark I. That piece of flat iron that is laying in the battery box is the latch that holds the rear seat in the up position. So don't throw anything away that you mite think is garbage till you have finished the restoration. I just had an auction sale at this place I bought and now I have seen some military pieces that were here and I thought was junk and sold for next to nothing so watch it. Good luck, it's a fun hobby even if you aren't necessarily the military type. I did mine last year and it's in our town parade this July. It's nice to see the vets that remember them tell their stories. My interest is that we have always had a few carriers around for fun and work. So they are sort of sentimental in that respect. Mine I purchased when I was 16 from a farmer in St.Charles Ontario. (39) years ago.

[Ralph Volkert]

Rob Thanks for the info. When I found the lower hull number on the rear yesterday I soaked the iron with rust solvent. This afterrnoon I checked again and another digit is now visible. So it now appears the hull number is 8015. I checked around the gunners position and nothing was visible. The angle iron there is pretty crusty. I will spray it down and check it later.

I have gone over the carrier and spayed all the linkages, nuts, bolts, rods etc. So I have determined the Steering is not siezed There is some movement to the brake rods. (The cam to the cross hull tube has been disconnected from the steering linkage.) But over all it is beginning to look pretty good.

Ledsel, thankyou! I am so glad you said that about the flat iron I thought it was just some trash that had been thrown inside! I guess the moral of the story is go SLOWLY at first! I will take lots of pics when I start to take things apart.

I will probably have to start a post in the restoration area when things start getting interesting!

[Ralph Volkert]

Finally have enough rust cleaned and can read my hull numbers.

Upper Hull: CB 8075
Lower Hull: 8105

Only 30 apart so from what I have read that seems reasonable.

Would any one hazard a guess a ball park production Date for these numbers?

Is there any where to back track the S/N given the Hull numbers and determine the the reall production date? Archives of Canada ie?

[Jordan Baker]

Mine never had the asbestos heat shields and it never will. I don't have any problems at all with heat. I know of a few others who have also removed them while restoring and never put them back on. I would keep them for reference purposes down the road instead of throwing them out.