AKA Cambridge carrier

[Peter Duggan]

Guys,

Had the opportunity to participate in a very well managed MV recovery. The vehicle was a cut down FV402 Armoured Observation Post. The new owner is Jonathan Bradshaw. From what I can gather this was an unsuccessful trials vehicle based on the Cambridge carrier.
Mike and his FV432 made short work by dragging out the carrier and with a good steel sling and sheaves the carrier was pulled onto the trailer.
To cap off a great day, Mike brought out his Canadian built six pounder AT and some black powder rounds were fired off to commemorate the event.

Peter

IMG_0903.jpg IMG_0907.jpg IMG_0911.jpg

[charlie fitton]

Where was this recovered from?

[rob love]

Always nice to see the teamwork within this forum.

Congrats to Jon.

[Robin Craig]

In my humbe view that vehicle has some historic significance and I can only hope that something good gets done by Jon with it, I realise there may be a slight interval between acquisition and start of work.

Here is the thread over on HMVF which is worth reading

http://hmvf.co.uk/topic/12460-where-...comment-427578

[Peter Duggan]

Charlie,

Should have included that in my thread. The FV402 came from Mike Calnan’s ‘Sword and Ploughshares’ museum near Kar, ON.

Rob,

You are quite right, the camadarie and Team work within our MV community is it’s strength.

Peter

[Jon Bradshaw]

As Peter said the recovery was a success. We brought every thing we thought could possibly be needed. A lot of the items we brought were used. The carrier will be put back to "original" or as close as I can make it to a copy of the one at Bovington.
Is there a person on here who is the contact commonly used at the Bovington collection? If not then is there someone who can point me to the collection's contact? I expect there are people who live near Bovington and have the ability to visit at will. Has anyone seen or do they have pictures of it that are not already posted?
Detailed interior layout pictures are going to be very important to me as well as detailed pictures of the roof and the layout of the side bins.
If this is truly one of only two in the world then I will do my best to bring it back to life.

Jonathan

[wally dugan]

A quick check on the FVRDE FILES shows a number of the early FV401 been sent to ranges in the late 1950s to be used as targets these include P3 wing number 4283 P4 4328 60 BA 00 4901 RGX 893 which had the vrm 60 BA O5 wing number 5591 . The lists cover both FV 401 and FV 402

[Peter Duggan]

Guys,

I had the opportunity on Wednesday to participate in Jonathan Bradshaw's trial run of his Cambridge carrier. The mating of a modern drive train to the Cambridge is very well done and won't be noticeable once the engine covers are rebuilt.

For a maiden run it was remarkably trouble free and the subsequent jaunt through farm fields was a blast.

Thanks to Len Neal for the video.

Enjoy, I certainly did, Peter

https://youtu.be/MHWVRMMl_Ec

[Bob Phillips]

Congratulations to Jonathan on a great bit of work! The machine looks great and certainly seems to operate well. The use of a more current V8 diesel seems a reasonable concession to operation and probably also to the budget. I look forward to future reports and videos showing us what you have accomplished.

[Bruce Parker (RIP)]

Tell me again how something as rare and one of a kind as a Cambridge came to be in Canada? And is the plan to restore it as a Cambridge?

[Jon Bradshaw]

To Bruce and the rest of you with interest in the history of this hull.

I was told this story by Mike, the guy who I bought this old hull from. As with all oral histories, take it for half truth and supposition.

The vehicle was a prototype and was being shown around by the company making it, trying to find buyers. This particular hull was shipped to Canada for presentation to the Canadian army. Presumably this was done in the Ottawa or Borden area around 1950-52. The vehicle was not impressive to the reviewing officers and was not accepted for further trials.
Presumably the vehicle was at the end of its life already since it was not going well finding a buyer. It was cheaper to leave it here in Canada as scrap then to ship it home to England. It went to a scrap yard. It was bought by an unknown party and chopped of all armor, then used as a bush machine. At some point they blew the transmission and it was a dead machine.
It was taken to a scrap yard outside Perth ON and dropped there for destruction. The owner of the yard didn't destroy it he just kept it out back.
Around 1983 it was rescued from the scrap yard by Mike Calnan, (of the Swords and Ploughshares museum) a fellow collector of old iron. He brought it to his yard where it sat beside many other old rusty pieces of treasure. There is a picture back in the previous posts of what it looked like when I found it.
I bought it in Oct of 2017. Brought it home and parked it for future consideration. I finished my Vickers reproduction and then a CMP water truck. Now I have gotten around to making this old machine work again.

That's how it came to be mine. There are no hull numbers that I can find, only part numbers. It is interesting since this was a prototype you can see how they welded different parts on for different trials. Stuff isn't square and isn't event the same thickness. Instead of nice drilled holes for the horn wire they torch cut it through the armor. In one spot they doubled up the armor with just some shitty stick welding. The fire wall isn't even square with the hull!