The story of acquiring GYL 32C (or 32 from now on) is long, simple but slightly tortuous. Back in mid-November 2012, on a visit with a fellow group of RSOLES (the owners group for green goddesses, Bedford RLs and other ex-Auxiliary Fire Service vehicles) to the RAF Firefighting Museum at RAF Scampton, amongst their core collection was a slightly forlorn looking ex-AFS Bedford RL. It was donated to the museum and following a few years use as a support vehicle, had become surplus to requirementsa dn the Steve Shirley MBE, who heads up the museum, mentionmed that he was looking for a good home for it. In addition, as the collection grows and the museum moves up from Manston to Lincolnshire, it was taking up valuable room.
Now, as far as I was concerned, one green goddess was quite enough thanks but nonetheless, I had a look around. At the other corner, working his way around, muttering similar things was Tony Henwood. The owner of several AFS vehicles including a fantastic newly-restored RL command vehicle, he too had quite enough vehicles in his fleet. However, something was eating away at us and after a quick chat and mentions of '...maybe owning half each...', I returned back up to the museum on the following Wednesday to have a closer look. To cut a long story short, eventually an offer was made and hopefully, we will take delivery some time in February 2013. The main delay has been repairing the starter motor but now that's back, the exhaust can be repaired and fitted along with a new choke and 32 will be ready to go for the journey south for a bit of pampering before the summer season.
Why 32? Well, apart from being in good condition and ex-AFS, it's quite rare. One of only 10 AFS petrol carriers, of which only 5 were Bedfords (the others were Commer Q4s), there weren't many to start with and even fewer now. A quick DVLA check shows that 32 is the only one left taxed and on the road, with one on SORN and 3 - well who knows. These were designed to carry bulk fuel for fire columns in jerry cans held in racks in the back. A few oddities - they had very different indicators to most RLs, had a full height fire wall behind the cab, a shielded fuel tank and an extended front bumper so 2 foam extinguishers could be carried.
The bottom of the fire wall that runs between the load bed and the cab:
The shielded fuel tank:
I have already done some initial work - the chipboard partitions on the load bed have been removed in readiness for the can frames to be remade and reinstated - a long job in the cold and icey conditions!
The partitions before:
All gone - an awful lot of chipboard!
The ice knocked off the tilt....:
Anyway - more news as it happens!
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