Kit and Equipment page - main site

(Quote....... Sheldrake

"They are issued with Duvets and 4 foot beds beds, now" )

Not very long for big blokes..... Reminds of complaints about the size of sleeping bags....
Board of Enquiry came up with the findings that in 25% of cases, bags were too small and in the other 75% soldiers were too big.

But back to reality......... Reckon that " 4 foot " should be 1200 mm, Sheldrake ! No duff, this one, it happened......... bit of background first. The MGB the REs played with (not an antiquated sports car, but the Medium Girder Bridge ) came in 6 ft. long panels which were clipped together. When ordering the kit for a task it's vital to get the no. of bits right or, if there weren't enough, the gap wouldn't be bridged. If there were too many some other poor sod could be short of bits.

The Army followed the building trade into going metric around the early 1970s. A directive came down from on high........... Something like :-

" For simplicity the SI Metric System is to be adopted. For instance, in the case of the MGB, instead of measuring the gap in feet & dividing by 6 to determine the required No.of panels, the gap is to be measured in metric and divided by 1.829 ". So much easier !

To advantage, pocket calculators could be used with a decimal system, but we didn't chuck our Imperial measuring tapes away.

Even after all these years, i still have trouble with the metric system.Thank heaven for the tapes with both metric and imperial on them.Saved me a few quid over the years.

You should worry Gordon! I'm still baffled & I had to churn out drawings in the new stuff. It was akin to learning a new language...........

What makes it worse is that the trade , & SI System don't recognise centimetres.
And, though there's good reason, a metric door, for instance which in Imperial is 6' 6" high , or near as dammit 2 metres, has a metric equivalent at 2040 MM high...... And don't get on to pressure & floor loadings....... pounds per square foot I can visualise , I can add up a string of feet & inches in my head. With metric dimensions apparently being such big numbers, it's more difficult. It's rotten being out of date, but I do speak metric occasionally!

And what became of florins & half dollars, bobs & tanners ?

And what became of florins & half dollars, bobs & tanners ? [/quote]




Now your talking my language, I used to go out on a Saturday night with 10 Bob in my sky......................

Not BAOR but in the vein of metric. While in Cyprus (1955/6) I was invited to a buddy's wedding, new suits were in order. We got the camp tailor to measure us up and he in turn took the measurements to a tailor friend of his. The camp tailor naturally measured us in inches as that is what he was used to in dealing with the Brits .. his pal the tailor read them in centimetres .. he turned out the weirdest pair of suits you ever could wish to see. Needless to say my buddy and I turned up for the wedding in KD's.

Len (Ciphers)

Back to beds, though, and to paraphrase another book which is closer to home, it took some time in basic trg. to realise that the main function of that piece of furniture with the toe-cramping, tubular steel bottom rail, was not for resting a weary head, but rather it was provided to form a display area for all the goodies generously donated from the QM's store.

But no matter what prior instruction a recruit may have had in the visual arts, there was no scope for individual expression. Each and every bed layout had to conform strictly with the diagram fastened to the back of the barrack room door with a Bluebelled * drawing pin. To ensure this was so, drill NCOs were issued with a swagger cane, an accoutrement specially sized to enable them to dispatch an offending kit layout from bed to scrubbed floor boards without stooping...........

Oh Happy Days! Bet they'd have trouble now in making a blanket roll & pulling the duvet down to form hospital corners !

* Bluebell........ Army's name for Brasso, but, just once, I did come across a tin
called that. Must have been Boer War stock.

cartav wrote:

Back to beds, though, and to paraphrase another book which is closer to home, it took some time in basic trg. to realise that the main function of that piece of furniture with the toe-cramping, tubular steel bottom rail, was not for resting a weary head, but rather it was provided to form a display area for all the goodies generously donated from the QM's store.




* Bluebell........ Army's name for Brasso, but, just once, I did come across a tin
called that. Must have been Boer War stock.

Anybody remember how the barrack room wag would "unhook" the bed springs from the bed legs then rest them back on top so that when you slumped wearily on to your bed the whole thing would collapse in a heap ?

Oh, such merriment !

(bastard!).

I remember "Bluebell" Cartav. It was deemed to be not as good as "Brasso" though.

He would be the same guy who made an "Apple pie" bed? Hold on, I think that was me. I thought Bluebell was a Batman in the REME.

Oh yes........ The collapsing bed ! Great fun if it wasn't you that was caught. And the drunken revellers who would nudge you awake to enquire if you were in mind of acquiring a battleship......

Used to get back at the pranksters though. Put an early call in at the Guardroom, have them prodded into an upright posture at 0530 hrs to sign the Early Call Book.........Or when they were in a Pils induced slumber, have their bed & person quietly removed into the corridor. It was one big laugh & strange that we trusted these immature souls to have access to nuclear fireworks & suchlike.

Don't know if you're serious Shelldrake......... Bluebell was sigs speak for REME
Batman retired to Gotham City when the new Army employed civvies to sweep
billets & polish squaddies' satellite TV screens.

In the RAOC we issued Inch, BA, Whitworth, UTS, UNC & UNF (and I am sure others) as well as ISO Metric.

Most river crossings in BAOR were pre-surveyed and a RE Engineer Park knew what kit to issue, and how many bolts, screws etc were needed per Yard/Metre

Me, serious? How very dare you, Cartav. Too many serious people in this world.

Mike_2817 wrote:

Most river crossings in BAOR were pre-surveyed and a RE Engineer Park knew what kit to issue, and how many bolts, screws etc were needed per Yard/Metre

Never met the pre- packed bridging kit, but I suppose we needed the practice in carrying out recces above stinking water courses like the Leine & in the dark. Don't remember anyone falling in, they'd have needed decontamination if they had done.

We did have some access to dems data, though, & most of the road or rail bridges were fitted out with pockets on the structure or measles shafts in the approaches in which a pre-determined pack of PE3, hayricks, or similar could be quickly put in place.

Eh up Brum ! Remember the video clip of 17/21st lot ? Can't find it now, but I recall you had a pop at their efforts to KO a Conqueror............... So I consulted my mate who was a tankie in the '60s and backed that up with Gordon/ Mike 2817 type research.....

There was a practice round for the 120mm, ( the SH-P L32A6, for one), it was ballistically similar to HESH L31, MV 670 m/sec. It had a filling of an inert HE substitute, (calcium sulphate & castor oil, or similar). There was a live fuse, a flash pellet for spotting purposes, & four tracers in the back end. I suppose it just might scratch the paint work !

Must be a bit antiquated this info........ It quotes an expected requirement of 20,000 rounds up to 1998.

cartav wrote:

Never met the pre- packed bridging kit, but I suppose we needed the practice in carrying out recces above stinking water courses like the Leine & in the dark. Don't remember anyone falling in, they'd have needed decontamination if they had done.

Did not say there was 'Pre-Packed' Bridging Kits, only that an Engineer Park knew what 'kit' (meaning items) that needed to be issued per section(s) of MGB and that sites were pre-surveyed and in a real war, time was not wasted in getting said 'kit' to its location.

Indeed both the RE and the RAOC held demolition explosives, and without going into details, knew where to put it to the best effect to slow down the 3rd Shook Army.

Indeed both the RE and the RAOC held demolition explosives, and without going into details, knew where to put it to the best effect to slow down the 3rd Shook Army.[/quote]


Were they "All Shook up" going over the bridge?

[quote="cartav"]Oh yes........ The collapsing bed ! Great fun if it wasn't you that was caught. And the drunken revellers who would nudge you awake to enquire if you were in mind of acquiring a battleship......

Used to get back at the pranksters though. Put an early call in at the Guardroom, have them prodded into an upright posture at 0530 hrs to sign the Early Call Book.........Or when they were in a Pils induced slumber, have their bed & person quietly removed into the corridor. It was one big laugh & strange that we trusted these immature souls to have access to nuclear fireworks & suchlike.

In a similar vein.

When we were in Nienburg we put a bloke, in his bed, in the middle of the square, one afternoon.

I can only imagine how he must have felt when he woke up but everybody watching from the block windows thought it was hilarious !

We put them outside the block next to the road.I remember one Sunday morning all hell being let loose when the RSM (Jolly Jack.mentioned in a previous thread) having to pass said beds on his way to mass.For some reason he was in early that morning and managed to get them inside before the church goers arrived.
Monday was a mpost unpleasant day for us all

Am looking for an RCT Sidehat, if anyone has any Idea where I could puchase one I would be most grateful

Les

You could try here Les


http://www.herbert-johnson.co.uk/index.html

Gordon

Many thanks for that my friend, I will get onto it straight away

Cheers Les

Was it me or was it widespread.

I have always loved Drill and Ceremonials, I can remember whenever I had the chance my peaked hat was polished on the peak with vaseline and the top done like a CD (or at least thats what it looked like) in my case using Daz, others used to brush theirs with a dividing line down the center from front to back, one half being brushed forward and the other back, don't seem to see anything like that these days

Les

Think it was you Les.Most people i know detested the "twat"hat"
must admit .I did the top of mine in quarters

Strange that top dressings seem to cause so much controversy. We always hated the beret but, at least , you could screw it up and stuff under an epaulette or under a belt. And there was nothing else, anyway, except, maybe, out in the woods, a caps comforter which, in retrospect, was as good and as comfortable as anything .

I think our detestation of hats came from the fact that even in civvies the universal northern flat cap worn by our dads was on the way out, something on top spoiled the carefully arranged DA. At least we were encouraged into some manner of uniformity, berets mildly shrunken, cap badges over left eyes, though one or two,self proclaimed "tickets", favoured a centrally placed badge & both sides of beret pulled down. For certain, the current individuality being expressed is nothing new. Some of those wartime shots show berets worn in a variety of ways & angles. The "Spudsack ", the peakless cap of around 1944 & formed out of half a dozen bits khaki serge sewn together must have been hated more than the rest.

Blast from the past, wayback this one...........

I've been approached by someone researching a WW1 sapper whose records show him to be

a COMPUTER (SR)

No idea what this could be & can't find anything in Google. Any ideas ?

Someone pulling your chain Cartav??/