15-CWT, 2K1, WIRE 5 Body Details

[David Dunlop]

Rob Love.

You mentioned these 15-cwt penthouses were not covered in the Design Branch records, but do your references covering the 30-cwt penthouses provide enough information to get a good idea of how the 2K1 penthouses would have looked?

I am thinking there must have been a large number of design/construction similarities and the 15-cwt items would essentially be shorter versions of the larger ones. Trying to figure out in my mind if they were one piece of canvas, 2 or more. They were probably interchangeable on either side of the 2K1 Body. A left and right version would be overkill.

I suspect they had two support poles for the outside corners at the very least, probably wooden, but would they be one piece or sectional?

The hem at the roofline for the 2K1 should probably have a line of grommets fitted tofasten to the hooks installed along the roofline and this hem may also have had some sort of weather strip to minimize the elements getting in. Don't know if the 30-cwt and other vehicles would have used the same hooks on the roof attachment method or something else.

Does it say if the penthouse came with it's own Storage Bag for all the pieces?

I am thinking the penthouse might not have been a standard issue for all WIRE 5 Trucks, but was more likely issued on an as needed basis. Not sure if that makes sense.

Can't help thinking of all the piles of canvas that used to be lying about at Tuelon and Westbourne many years ago that looked like bits and pieces of tent and wondering now if some of it was penthouse canvas. They would probably only ever have sold on the civvies market to anyone looking for bits to cut up and sew into something the customer needed. Can't imagine them ever flying off the shelves for what they were, although if they were stencilled with an ID and NOS today, they might attract a lot of attention.


David

[David Dunlop]

When I was working on my 2K1 WIRE 5, the wiring diagram on the inside of the fuse panel lid was intact, but very badly water stained. I eventually took the time to draft a 1:1 copy of it and had a local shop that specialized in printing blue prints make several copies for me.

Poking about in the basement today and ran across these diagrams. Photo attached of one.

They have now taken on a nice old patina to the paper after 30 odd years. Less than a handful still available and I will try and get out to the local PO this coming weekend to see what they have in the way of small mailing tubes. The prints need to be trimmed back to leave the right amount of white paper outside of the black border before gluing on the inner door panel of the fuse box. The notch in the diagram is to clear the spare fuse holder on the inside of the door.

PM me if you are interested. Postage is all I would need for them. First come first served.

David

[David Dunlop]

Been thinking more about the twin terminal pass through on the 2K1 Body under the Cypher Clerk's desk and I am beginning to think it might be a very well thought out multi purpose fitting.

So far, Rich has observed there is a copper shorting bar fixed on the outside set of terminals behind the little pull out cover. With this in place, you lose all electrical pass though ability for the terminals, but you gain a grounding point for the entire WIRE 5 vehicle. When would that be a useful thing to have? My thoughts are when you have one of the steel masts set up on the roof of the wireless box as a vertical radiator antennae. It would probably be prudent to have the vehicle grounded and when those terminals are in shorted mode, that would make an ideal location.

Second option for the terminals would be a pass through for a 12-volt DC or even 110-Volt AC power from the generators or batteries on board to drive equipment in the penthouse..

A third possibility came to me yesterday and I have a question out on the Wireless Forum to check the validity of the idea. Basically, if you need to run your 19-Set remotely, you need two Remote Control Units: a nearby unit close to the 19-Set and a remote unit X meters away, the two remotes connected by communication wire. There is a steel frame fixed to the top of the spare tyre box on the left side of the 2K1 body directly across from the wireless desk. I have long thought this was an ideal location for the nearby RCU to be located. An identical steel frame can be found on the sheet metal 'shelf' mounted on top of the right side wheel well, directly in front of the two Enfield Butt fittings. A great place to store the remote RCU when not in use.

Could it be possible, one could take a short length of D3 comm wire and connect the two terminals from the nearby RCU to the two passthrough terminals on the inside of the body. Go outside, remove the shorting bar from the outside terminals and then connect your big reel of D3 comm wire to the exterior terminals and off you go to wherever your remote RCU is being set up. This form of connection would be a lot simpler than trying to figure out a way to run the comm wire through a window or out the back door where if the door or window was closed suddenly the comm wire could be damaged.

Just a thought but a number of viable options seem to be available for this simple looking set of terminals. so probably worth tossing out there.


David

[Robert Bergeron]

David,

I agree with your third hypothesis and even just finished discussing it with Richard, the restorer of the box..literaly minutes ago.

A good connection point for field telephone wire.

Maybe also for feeding 12 VDC outside the box to operate radios on the batteries inside the box.

DEFINITELY not for 110 VAC . Too much danger of electrocution i figure.

Can you image the result of shorting 110 VAC on the aluminium and steel body and everyone in contact with it ?

The high voltage low ampereage current generated by the field phone ringers his sufficent to make a man'S HAIR TURN WHITE can you just imagine imagine 110 VAc ?

Just an hypothesis again.

Nice diagram by the way. Let me be your first client.

[David Dunlop]

Sadly, when I had my WIRE 5, it was only my 2nd MV restoration and I had not yet fully understood the invaluable lesson of taking photos of everything to do with this kind of project, let alone serious note and measurement taking, so please forgive the lack of detail here. My hope is some of you may be able to recognize the pieces, if you are missing them and or better understand how they worked. If any one has an original one of these tables, please post pictures and specifics.

I have added a sketch of the general look of the Cypher Clerk's table and the two support rod assemblies for it. IIRC, the hinge at the back of the table was piano style, but don't quote me. The two support assemblies were mounted on the wall of the wireless body below and just inboard of the outside edges of the table. The upper clips for the supports were definitely U-clips. The lower ones may have been U-clips immediately below the weld for the cross brace, but I am leaning towards a socket bracket right at the bottom of each vertical rod.

The support rods folded over one another against the wall when the table was not in use and the table dropped down over them. I think a spring clip was attached to the wall that engaged the front centre metal trim of the table top.
The metal trim around the edge of the table top extended about one half inch or more below the plywood. This allowed the two retaining clips to be screwed underneath either side, just aft of the corner tapers that locked the ends of the support bracket rods in place. It struck me at the time, the metal edge trimming for the Cypher Clerk Table looked very much like what was seen on 1930's era kitchen tables, but everything was painted white.

For what it is worth, these table assemblies were in short supply in all the boxes I saw at Princess. Most had nothing at all in that location and showed signs of repaint over that spot predating being surpassed out. A few had fixed brackets and basic ply tables installed. Not totally sure the tables were popular enough to disappear for that reason, but think they may have fallen into disuse due to the progressive failure of the interior plywood walls in these bodies. The original plywood was all constructed using common animal glues. Over time, these bodies start to leak and the constant exposure to moisture is fatal for the integrity of the old plywood. My WIRE 5 body had a few sections of wall that were visibly in tough shape. The rest looked pretty good, until I removed it to use as reference pieces for cutting new replacements. Within a few weeks of drying out indoors, even though it was still close to it's original thickness, the individual plies in each sheet started to separate from each other.


David

[RichCam]

Guys,

Jim pulled the terminals apart since we needed to know just how and what they looked like from both the inside and outside.
As per the pictures, Brass stud, brass wing nuts, washer, bakelite round spacer and bakelite spacer.
So, they were insulated from each other, you could pass + current through one and - current through the other. There is a 3rd terminal, on the inside, that ties directly into a steel stud. That would be a logical ground. I agree with Robert, this would be excellent for a field telephone connection as well as an external power port.
Other pictures are of the chorehorse closet. I will be replacing some of the rusted bottom pieces with new flat bar and angle stock. We have to leave 1 leg free so it can be stood up inside the box, had to cut it to get it tipped over and out the rear door.
Does anyone out there have a spare chorehorse closet door?

[David Dunlop]

Rich.

I ran into the same problem when planning the replacement of the ply in my 2K1. Even when moved to the centre of the floor at the high point of the roof arch, no way to tip it over. Had to keep shoving it around to work around it.

I suspect they must have placed the Gen Box into the 2K1 bodies before dropping the roof assemblies down on top of the rest of the structure. Once the spot welding and all the screws were in place securing the two body components, the interior ply was probably added and the Gen Box secured in it's corner and the painting done.

By the way, with regards to the armour cable and Bus Bar running from the Gen Box, the armour cable was all painted white and all it's fittings. From the Bus Bars I was able to examine, they all showed signs of white paint on them to some degree, but when you looked at the red cylindrical stand off insulators behind it that the mounting screws pass through to mount it to the wall, you could see they were all oversprayed and the paint was always thin to non existent on the bottom edge of the Bus Bar and insulators. The insulators look like a red resin or bakelite and were probably a common electrical bits. The terminal strips and actual wire cables were the only unpainted wiring inside the body.

Boy! I would love to find an old local electrical shop that has been around for decades and see if they had any 30's and 40's electrical supplies catalogs still kicking about. Can't help but think virtually all of the stuff in these boxes was off the shelf.

David

[Chris Suslowicz]

Originally Posted by RichCam

Guys,

Jim pulled the terminals apart since we needed to know just how and what they looked like from both the inside and outside.
As per the pictures, Brass stud, brass wing nuts, washer, bakelite round spacer and bakelite spacer.
So, they were insulated from each other, you could pass + current through one and - current through the other. There is a 3rd terminal, on the inside, that ties directly into a steel stud. That would be a logical ground. I agree with Robert, this would be excellent for a field telephone connection as well as an external power port.

It's much too heavy for a telephone connection point! I'm fairly sure it is intended to supply 12V power to the penthouse when that's in use. The wingnut terminals are typically those used for slotted-lug connections on the various "Batten, Terminal" strips. Are they marked with + & -?

Chris.