• The AEC Mandator shown in CM earlier this month
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may look like an absurd. contraption now but at the time it was a serious piece of Ministry of Defence-inspired kit. (CM16-22 September).
A vehicle had to be created to ferry the Blue Streak rocket around the country with the self-contained ability to pick up or set down the rocket in a store or on to a bomb trolley at any nuclear dispersal site. In peace time it would be painted yellow for safety reasons.
It was designed at AEC by a senior designer, Walter Hillary, and some 10 or 12 copies built. The first four were built in the experimental shop at AEC Southall. Later work was done at the AEC subsidiary, Thornycroft, at Basingstoke.
The project was beset by problems, the first being that the weight of the rocket was classified so Hillary had to assume it was very heavy and design everything accordingly. This led to the vehicle having the traditional AEC 13-ton rear axle normally used for continental exports making a 19-ton gross vehicle.
Another hitch took place when the first loading and unloading trials were carried out and it was found that the vehicle was not stable enough for the thin skinned delicate rocket. Hillary had to add a hydraulic system which would lift the axles off the ground so the vehicle was solely sitting steady on the four powered outriggers, one of which is shown in your photograph
We in the AEC experimental department at Southall always knew them as the firework carriers. I was very pleased to
see an example at the RAF Hendon Museum when it opened many years ago, another piece of history preserved.
Peter Baker, Darlington, County Durham.
Services available
• As we approach the second Roads and Road Transport History Conference, to be held at Ctich Tramway Museum on Saturday 6 November, your readers may like to hear of a further archive service.
The organisers of the conference also give advice on preserving papers and other items of historical interest for owners or executors who want to ensure their property is retained in a suitable library or archive.
Enquiries should be made in the first instance to Gordon Knowles, 7 Squirrels Green, Great Bookham, Leatherhead, Surrey KT23 3LE.
Last week late in the evening I rang Hytec Tippers to ask for some replacement seals for the air control which I needed urgently.
I had never spoken to the firm or had any contact with them before then when I left message on Hytec's answer phone.
It dispatched the seals by first-claqs post the following morning together with a compliments slip.
That is what I call service. Brian Symonds.
Swaliham, Norfolk.