[Robert Dabkowski]

JD, I think that your friend Dave has found another of the (6) M152/43 that were converted by Workshop 202/Montreal into mobile field darkrooms.

Each truck was attached to a 25pdr. field gun battery and would develop air recon photos taken by Cessna L19 "Birddog" spoting aircraft. The film canister was dropped via a small parachute and allowed a "shoot" within 15 minutes of the film being taken instead of the usual 1 day taken to fly back to base, develop the film, analyze the photos and finally radio the targety location to the gun battery.

If you look at the right side photo of his "hovertruck" you see a rectangular rust mark about 6'x4' which is the trace of a bottom hinged worktable bolted to the side of the darkroom truck. High on the rain gutter rail are two clips used to attach blackout tent frames to the side of the truck thus prviding photo analysis workspace. The rear box of the truck was indeed airconditioned and mounted two of the Southwind 978 heaters instead of the usual one under the storage box behind the passenger's seast. (continued)