Samage
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,467
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Dec 16, 2006 11:03:51 GMT
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...yes folks, after many months of inactivity, I've resumed my hobby of scrabbling round the countryside unearthing long-forgotten vehicles. This morning, I discovered a whole heap (literally!) of retro tractors...       (I say 'retro', but can the term really be applied to farm machinery? The stuff here ranged from 50s to 70s...) In addition to Farmer Giles' finest, there was also a Sherpa flatbed and a Renault van of some sort...   Plus, lying about, automobilia of various sorts, including rusty tractor parts, petrol cans, foglamps, axle stands, ramps, and even this...  According to the Land Registry, this place hasn't had an owner since 1998. And there was nobody about (I thought someone may live in those caravans, but they were full of rusty metal). This is what you get when you live in what used to be a heavy farming community, equipment dumps like these. I also know the location of a similar place full of 70s quarry trucks, due to the quarrying which goes on here. Interesting, innit?  |
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Dec 16, 2006 11:17:17 GMT
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that blue and white van is cool
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qwerty
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 2,417
Club RR Member Number: 52
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Dec 16, 2006 11:23:34 GMT
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I'm glad I don't know of anywhere like this local to me otherwise I'd be down there literally all of the time!
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Dec 16, 2006 11:31:36 GMT
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Same here...I could spend hours crawling all over stuff like this.
The Renault is a rebadged Dodge, ex-British Gas.....they were a common sight at one time, most of em have rusted away now, they had a big 4-litre Perkins diesel.
Top spotting :-)
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Dec 16, 2006 11:36:42 GMT
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So if no-one owns the land.. who owns the stuff?
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Skyline: 1963 - 1973 - 1983
Sunny: 1982
450SLC: 1973
Navara: 1992
Gloria: 1992
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Samage
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,467
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Dec 16, 2006 14:17:30 GMT
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Same here...I could spend hours crawling all over stuff like this. The Renault is a rebadged Dodge, ex-British Gas.....they were a common sight at one time, most of em have rusted away now, they had a big 4-litre Perkins diesel. Top spotting :-) Thought I recognised the colour scheme from somewhere... I shall be going back tomorrow for more pics, there were a couple of tractors I missed, and I wanna get some better shots of the renault and sherpa. Hopefully I won't receive multiple injuries this time - I won't go into details, but I currently have TCP-soaked bandages on my legs!  So if no-one owns the land.. who owns the stuff? I have absolutely no idea........ ..... yet.  |
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Last Edit: Dec 16, 2006 14:18:19 GMT by Samage
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Dec 16, 2006 14:38:15 GMT
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 Cool spots mate...and hope your retro-spotting-wounds heal up fast!
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Check out the big old Ace caravan (green/white one) !
Once a common site on every static site, not anymore.
My grandparents had an Ace Chieftan that got passed down to my parents resulting in cheap holidays for a good few years.
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Bioshock
Posted a lot
It aint hip to be square.
Posts: 1,861
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Nice spots!
Believe it or not,there's a massive resurgeance in old tractors.
BIg ones and model ones alike.
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Almera GTI = ugly bird who turns out to be great in the sack = Win
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nice spot! I used to live on a farm round there in the 70's (congerstone). Plenty of dodgy old machinery to mess around with... I remember some nutters going round stubble burning in a big old transit....
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'98 e36 316i lux
'97 mx5 harvard
'87 Saab 900 T16s
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Was it commonplace in the UK to put a Van's rear plate on the roof?
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Skyline: 1963 - 1973 - 1983
Sunny: 1982
450SLC: 1973
Navara: 1992
Gloria: 1992
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Samage
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,467
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Nice spots! Believe it or not,there's a massive resurgeance in old tractors. BIg ones and model ones alike. Yea, I noticed today that WHSmith carried 5 or 6 classic tractor-related magazines. Not really my thing, but I'm trying to find out if claiming would be possible, cos there's a good few grand's worth of projects and spares here...! |
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Samage
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,467
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Was it commonplace in the UK to put a Van's rear plate on the roof? Nah, that's just where the number plate mount happens to be on this particular van! I reckon it's supposed to go between the rear lights, what with the numberplate-sized gap there... |
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Last Edit: Dec 17, 2006 1:16:28 GMT by Samage
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Was it commonplace in the UK to put a Van's rear plate on the roof? There's a big-assed step on the back of that Renault which would partly obscure the plate.....used to happen a lot with vans that had towbars fitted, most vans these days have the plate on the back door anyway. Those Gas vans often had an exhaust stack up the side as well so that the fumes from the big Perkins up front didn't asphyxiate the workers...shame on British Gas for not using chrome ones with one of those hinged rain-flaps on that flipped up when you revved it a la Convoy, BJ and the Bear etc etc ;D |
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Last Edit: Dec 17, 2006 1:19:04 GMT by briandamaged
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Dec 17, 2006 10:28:35 GMT
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Check out the big old Ace caravan (green/white one) ! Once a common site on every static site, not anymore. My grandparents had an Ace Chieftan that got passed down to my parents resulting in cheap holidays for a good few years. I grew up in somthing like that. My stepdad was in the airforce, and my mum and him weren't married at the time so they couldn't get married quarters on the camp. So a lot of the non married couples and civilian workers lived on the caravan site, it was 10 minutes walk from the base gates, and right next to the airstrip. Used to see the training flights taking off daily. The site was owned by a farmer, and at the back of the farm he had a scrapyard full of all types of cars, trucks, vans and farm equipment. And he had some woodland alongside the airstrip too, all linked by paths worn through to dirt and truck made double track. As a kid it seemed like a forest, and the scrapyard went on forever. probably was really small, but I remember disappearing into it. I daren't go back incase it has all gone. The farmer will be long dead as I played there as a kid in 1976, and he was already past retirement if he did a normal job. Hope he had some lads to take over and keep it going. Might even be grandkids running it now if he had any. |
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Dec 17, 2006 10:47:05 GMT
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I remember one similar as a kid...in fact I had a look on Google mapping and the site's still there but looks now as if it's concreted over...but back in the mid-70's Balt Metals (as it was known) was an overgrown graveyard of rotting 50's/60's tin...
Back in the days of the first fuel crisis after the Arab-Israeli war of 1973 when 4-star hit 50p a gallon (shock horror) people were jettisoning Zephyrs and Crestas even when there was nothing wrong with them because they were too expensive to run...I remember going up to Balt with my dad to get some bits for mum's Cortina Mk2 (EHM198D where are you now??) and coming home having bought a C-reg Amber Gold Zodiac Mk3 with nothing wrong with it for £15...imagine buying an S-plate Scorpio for that now! He slapped a towbar on it and it did about 18 months service pulling the caravan until he chopped it in for a PC Cresta.
Anyhow I just remember stacks and stacks of 100E's and A35's rotting away in the Worcestershire countryside, these pics bring it all back!
Brian
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Dec 17, 2006 13:59:02 GMT
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Cool finds mate...get that crash hat painted up to match your motor |
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You've been telling me you were a genius since you were seventeen ... in all the time I've known you I still don't know what you mean !
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Dec 17, 2006 14:53:02 GMT
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if it was a dump then (hopefully) its free claim and tractors are getting very collectable... |
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Dec 17, 2006 19:00:32 GMT
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and tractors are getting very collectable... Old tractors arent quite what they're cracked up to be. It's true they're built like ... tractors ... but when they die the bits tend to be incredibly expensive and in many cases less available than some of the rarer old car bits. Why? Numbers. Cars were built in the millions and 10s of millions, tractors were built in the 1000s or very rarely in the 100,000s. A good example is the BMC mini tractor. A fantastic little tractor but if you see one today the chances are it will have a knackered engine. It uses a diesel variant of the A series and bits for that engine are like unicorn p00. They may have made hundreds of millions of petrol A serieses so bits are available for them but for the 10s of thousands of diesel variants it wasnt worth the effort of keeping spares support. There are similar examples for ford and ferguson tractors, and doubtless other makes. So if you want a tractor, don't get one out of the bushes like those ones unless it is as a spares donor. Remember something went wrong with it in the first place to put it there. |
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"Jeremy Clarkson, a man we motor enthusiasts need on our side like Lewis Hamilton's F1 car needs a towing ball and a Sprite Musketeer" My motor |
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Dec 17, 2006 19:15:56 GMT
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and tractors are getting very collectable... Old tractors arent quite what they're cracked up to be. It's true they're built like ... tractors ... but when they die the bits tend to be incredibly expensive and in many cases less available than some of the rarer old car bits. Why? Numbers. Cars were built in the millions and 10s of millions, tractors were built in the 1000s or very rarely in the 100,000s. A good example is the BMC mini tractor. A fantastic little tractor but if you see one today the chances are it will have a knackered engine. It uses a diesel variant of the A series and bits for that engine are like unicorn p00. They may have made hundreds of millions of petrol A serieses so bits are available for them but for the 10s of thousands of diesel variants it wasnt worth the effort of keeping spares support. There are similar examples for ford and ferguson tractors, and doubtless other makes. So if you want a tractor, don't get one out of the bushes like those ones unless it is as a spares donor. Remember something went wrong with it in the first place to put it there.  BMC Tractor WHAT is this forum doing to me......just been looking at tractors now....SWMBO's packing her bags.... ;D |
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Cool spots mate...and hope your retro-spotting-wounds heal up fast!
