Bring a tear into Max's eye

[Col Tigwell]

When I joined the air force in 1957, a lot of our equipment was left over from WW2.

Real jeeps, that we used to do major repairs and service the proper way. Out would come the rubber mat, and the transmission oil drained and the battery removed, and then presto six men would lift the Jeep onto its side.

Soon the powers that be decreed that "real Jeeps" had to go and then sent us post war models, which were not well received. My old SGt had a solution and the later jeeps had their RAAF numbers exchanged with the toy jeeps, and it would be them that went to disposals.

Eventually the powers that be, worked out what was going on, and they decided to beat us at our own game.

I was sent to Dubbo, to pick up our jeep replacement, arriving there I was issued to a brand new, still in Khaki paint, and with only 40 miles on the speedo. Seems like the air force and quite a few in war reserve. Arriving back to base, almost frozen stiff, the transport officer met me and said "lets see what you can swap that one for".

Pre war Federal cranes were our normal lifting devices, and parked in the back of the transport section, I never saw it go was a Cletrac tractor, which was kept just in case.

Again the powers decreeded the weapon carrier be painted blue,
The painters used it as a training aid, and it came back with a gloss finish, that was well above the finish on new cars.

I was transferred out in 1960, and when I came back in 1963, she too had gone to disposals.

Eat your heart out Max, hope it went to a good home.

Regards

Col Tigwell

[Max Hedges]

Col sounds like you drove a lot of different vehicles during your time in the service We started off just collecting Blitz's and mainly ford ones at that but as time went on a few chev's became available and we couldn't refuse. We've reeally tried to stick to the fords owning a carrier, 1941 1 tonne ute, F15A and a cab 12 3 tonne. Then came along the ford jeep and now a dodge weapons carrier. we have a few others in various stages of disrepair, mainly blitz's. I'll probably wear out before they are all restored. It seems to become an incurable disease collecting this green stuf.

Max

[Col Tigwell]

Yes we were lucky, in that if I had joined six years later they would have all been gone.

The Dodge weapon carrier I have a soft spot for, as it was the first vehicle I ever drove that was brand new. It came complete with a great tool kit, and ran run flat tyres, first time I ever same them.

From Richmond in 1960, I went to the airfield construction squadron in Darwin, where we had three completely rebuilt Diamond T rigs, which we used to move plant on. A whole fleet of Blitzs garbage trucks, water and fuel tankers and of course fire trucks.

In those days we had no parts problems they seem to no problem in getting anything.

All of a sudden in 1970, I worked out how hard it was to find Blitzs, when I visited the Toft sugar harvester factory in Budaberg, there they had lots of new front and rear axles. They built them into their sugar harvesters, and only changed to twin disc axles, when the surplus ones were exhausted.

Either there were a lot of axles available, or Toft were buying new trucks and pulling the axles out. They told me the axles were coming from Melbourne.

Keep up the great work, it is guys like you, who preserve the past, for the future generations, who have my admiration

Regards

Col

[Lynn Eades]

Herkman was your new weapons carrier possibly a converted wc55 (37mm gun motor carriage m6) As far as I know the gun motor carriage was the only 3/4 ton Dodge to be delivered on run flat tyres( it had no spare wheel and hence no spare wheel bracket by the drivers seat)

[Col Tigwell]

You may be right, because when I brought it back it had no spare.

Examination also showed that it had no where to stow.

We had a WW2 ex army guy in our section, who straightened us out on the runflat tyres.

I am soory that I cannot advise more details.

I do know that it came out of "War Reserve" stock at Dubbo, and most of the vehicles there were very low milage. It was the o nly "weapon carrier" I ever saw in the Air Force.

We did have post war "Powerwagons" as early rescue vehicles, and they arrived if I recall early sixties. Were not very liked as they were so heavy, they would not accellerate well.

An interesting set of HGS trucks I saw at Butterworth, belong to our Mobile control and reporting units. It had a set of cabin and radar attenas, and masts etc, all fully airconditioned, and all this gear was designed to fit into the back of all these trucks, I think there were twenty in total.

These trucks looked like a Le Roy Mack, but I do not think they were. These trucks were purchased by the manufacturer of the radar sets, and they too came out of US Army stocks. LHD and Khaki. The paint job was so good, that the malaya's used to polish them to a high shine. Lovely looking truck, but we had to send someone to the USA to buy parts to back them up. I met the guy who did the job, and he got most of the parts from US disposals.

Never found out who made them, but they were a well liked product.

I am not sure if they brought the trucks back to Australia, when the unit closed, they were still at Butterworth in 1968.

Now I wonder any one seen a JEEP in a crate lately.

Regards

Col Tigwell

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally posted by Col Tigwell
Soon the powers that be decreed that "real Jeeps" had to go and then sent us post war models, which were not well received. My old SGt had a solution and the later jeeps had their RAAF numbers exchanged with the toy jeeps, and it would be them that went to disposals.

Just for old times sake Col, here's a pic of a Real RAAF Jeep.

H.