CMP tools photo thread

[Tony Smith]

Tyre pump, socket for front hub nut/ sump drain plug (cast), socket for rear hub nut (tube), handle for both sockets.

[Keith Webb]

Not quite a tool, but part of the equipment of Australian gun tractors, the holdfast kit. The two large parts were stored at the rear of the No9 gun tractors behind the spare tyre on the rear right of the vehicle, while I assume the pegs were carried in the narrow box behind the crew seat.
The whole kit is very heavy.

This set belongs to another collector... does it look familiar to anyone?

[Tony Smith]

Post #24:

Originally Posted by Keith Webb

Not quite a tool, but part of the equipment of Australian gun tractors, the holdfast kit. The two large parts were stored at the rear of the No9 gun tractors behind the spare tyre on the rear right of the vehicle, while I assume the pegs were carried in the narrow box behind the crew seat.
The whole kit is very heavy.

This set belongs to another collector... does it look familiar to anyone?

Same as the WW2 items, made for the 6x6 International F5 Wreckers:

https://www.graysonline.com/lot/0187...l-lifting-bars

https://www.graysonline.com/lot/0368...35-x-tent-pegs

Group buy?

[Lynn Eades]

Or ground anchors over here. Each pin holds half a ton in good ground. The ground anchor plate with 8 pins equals 4 ton. More required? just keep pinning another ground anchor plate on and drive in more pins. Some were cast as per pic. some were pressed steel. The pressed steel ones had male / female ends that came with a pin, that enabled them to be strung together. Those are the good pins. We had a lot that had eyes formed by welding rod on, which could fail when trying to extract them.
Man those are expensive. They must have gold in the bits we cant see?

[Tony Smith]

Originally Posted by Lynn Eades

Man those are expensive. They must have gold in the bits we cant see?

Price is not each, it's for the whole lot.

[m606paz]

Large BO Tin

[Bob Moseley (RIP)]

Thanks again Max.
Bob

[Jon Skagfeld]

Originally posted by Keith Webb
Not quite a tool, but part of the equipment of Australian gun tractors, the holdfast kit. The two large parts were stored at the rear of the No9 gun tractors behind the spare tyre on the rear right of the vehicle, while I assume the pegs were carried in the narrow box behind the crew seat.
The whole kit is very heavy.

This set belongs to another collector... does it look familiar to anyone?

Keith:

Those pins at the top of your picture look to be exactly the same pattern as in current use in the Canadian Forces.

They measure 20" long and are marked "SLATER" just below the eye.

They are used for anchoring the arch frames of modular tentage.

[Bill Mulholland]

Keith; As a "recy mech"(towie) of many years experience, what is pictured are ground anchors and pins. Plates may be coupled together by the "D" shackles at each end. Each plate when pinned will support a load of 7 tons pull. Used for anchoring snatch blocks, or recovery vehicles during a pull. I have them as part of the kit on my Diamond T. When pins are properly driven into the ground, especially clay, you need a bloody wrecker to pull them out.
Cheers, Bill

[Keith Webb]

Thanks for the info, Jon and Bill

I'll have a look at the pins to see what markings are there tomorrow.

I suppose "holdfast" was the local name given to them - it's used on the drawings for the gun tractor.

[Stefan Leegwater]

black out shields, not excactly a tool, but nice to keep in the truck!!

Cheers,

Stefan Leegwater

[Stefan Leegwater]

water bucket C broad arrow, made in Ottawa, 1942

Cheers,

Stefan Leegwater

[Rob Fast]

Anyone seen this one marked 1944/No.18 before?

[Max Hedges]

Do you fellows find manny of these in Canada?

A mate down in Victoria found a few in his local shed.

[Jon Skagfeld]

Max:

Kindly send extra grease gun up to Matt & Tabitha, so they can bring it up to me.

[Neil Ashley]

I have recently purchased an inspection light for my C15TA which was sold to me as an American half-track example.

It appears to be identical to the example pictured on this thread apart from the hanging hook which is handel mounted rather than shield mounted.

Is this the only difference between Canadian and American production? I note there is a hole in the shield where the Canadian type hook would mount.

There was no plug on it when I purchased it.

[Neil Ashley]

Hopefully attached is a photo of the Inspection Light I am talking about.

Apart from the hook position it would appear to be identical to the CMP pattern.

[Gunner]

Hi Guys:

My 43 Ford LAAT has a pair of holdfasts with picquets in its' toolkit. The Picquets are nearly 30" long and have a handle of smaller bar stock welded on as opposed to holes built in "a la" Canadian modular tent style. They look sort of like a sword with a hilt.

We used the same things on my artillery driver wheel course 27 years ago when we were taught winching and rigging. The grouchy old RCEME Sgt always referred to them as "engineer picquet holdfasts" or just "holdfasts". We also trained with "deadheads" long before I learned about the Grateful Dead slang. Our deadheads were usually the spare tyre from a gun tractor buried in a four foot deep hole with a chain sticking out to which we hooked the winch cable. Pulled you slick as goose grease out on the prairies when trees were scarce! Alternately we chained the holdfast or deadhead to the tractor's arse end to anchor it when pulling out a heavily bogged gun.

If all that didn't work, then we called the twins: Arte and Marte; more commonly known as Bluebells! Cheers, Bill!

Of course when they weren't listening we called them blue b*lls! More Cheers, Bill!

All kidding aside, like Bill says, the hardest part was getting the damn things out of the ground after the recovery job was done!

Mike

[Lynn Eades]

Bill, Hi! " Down under" it was/is called a "Deadman".
Arte et Marte (by skill and arms) I guess you figured the tag.
Here a deadhead is exactly what it says. a DEADhead.
Did you use "scotches" or "scotch plates" to anchor your tractor?

[rob love]

I'll second Mike's opinion on the use of the spare tire for an improvised anchor ( I never heard the term deadhead used for one; that term refers to a vehicle which has to be towed) and would add that it has saved me on a couple of occasions with a slight twist to it's use. In the winter, while stuck on a country road in the barren wasteland of saskatchewan, I used the spare tire as an anchor by digging a trench into the snowdrift and running the winch cable through the center of the tire. Under load, the cable cuts into the bank, and the weight of the snowdrift actually held while I winched myself out.

Regarding the cast type holdfasts; there is a small mountain of them still in their wooden crates out at the military salvage yard here in Manitoba, if anyone is real desperate for a couple. According to the manual, each one, once firmly pegged down, was calculated to hold 4 tons, and where a greater resistance was required, they could be laid up to 4 inline since the end shackle was rated at 16 tons.

[cmperry4]

Use of the spare tire as a deadman/ground anchor is a tried and true offroading recovery technique.

As a historical note, just down the road from where Rob Love lives, the 19th century steamboats coming up the Assiniboine River to Fort Ellice in the spring shipping season would use a series of deadman ground anchors - logs or heavy timbers, taken ashore by rowboat, buried square to the pull of the line, and then winched up to, using the steam-engine driven capstan winch on the bow. They would work their way up the Brandon Rapids winching and holding from point to point - very slow going.

Seem to have got off the CMP tools track here, though ...

Originally posted by Bill Mulholland
Keith; As a "recy mech"(towie) of many years experience, what is pictured are ground anchors and pins. Plates may be coupled together by the "D" shackles at each end. Each plate when pinned will support a load of 7 tons pull. Used for anchoring snatch blocks, or recovery vehicles during a pull. I have them as part of the kit on my Diamond T. When pins are properly driven into the ground, especially clay, you need a bloody wrecker to pull them out.
Cheers, Bill

Intriguing, received wisdom here suggests the ground anchors were supplied as a plate with 9 pins, 8 being used on the plate and one as an "extractor".

Reputedly, the pins are hexagonal to make extraction easier by using the 9th spare pin as a lever in the pin eye and rotating it to create a now loose(ish) circular hole.

I guess you're saying the theory and practice don't exactly agree. . . . .

R.

[Bill Mulholland]

Rarely used scotch plates, the chains had usually been sacrificed to hold something else in place, and were seldom avail. Quite true about the 9th pin,however a large crow bar was more efficient, but a boom winch was by far the easiest.
Cheers, Bill
(relative of the "twins")

[Gunner]

Been away a few days!

Now that Lynn has refreshed my memory; Rob is exactly right... "deadmen" were buried, "deadheads" were towed (or followed the Grateful Dead in a Volkswagon minivan!

We were taught the same thing as FV623 about the hex shape and the 9th spike... usually cheated by driving the truck right over the holdfast and winching the spikes out if they were beyond muscle power. Bent a few!

The scotches (never used the word "plates" with them) were definetely not for drinking!

Cheers! Mike

[Eric Korhonen]

I was at a yard sale today and found what i believe is a cmp inspection light but am not positive . It is has a 6 volt incondescent bulb in it . Thats what i'm not sure of , the lights posted here have smaller automotive bulbs in them . The handle is rubber and has General Motors Products of Canada Oshawa Ontario stamped on it . If some one could help me out on this it would be great . This is a very good thread , it has been very helpful to me to collect tools for my cmp's .

Eric

[Rob Fast]

but I thought I would slip this in here. Found by our Prairie Command President Gord Falk, obtained it from his father in law who was a Canadian Kangaroo. Very cool piece! Issued to Bofors crews also? Marked 1938, Cheers Rob

[Rob Fast]

ok

[Jon Skagfeld]

Originally posted by Neil Ashley
Hopefully attached is a photo of the Inspection Light I am talking about.

Apart from the hook position it would appear to be identical to the CMP pattern.

Neil, et al:

Drool...any idea where I can get one?

[Rob van Meel]

On the Max Hedges photo of two grease guns, I bought some of these from an English Motorcycle dealer, and they had just come out of a Britsih army Clear-out. Some had labels with Pompom type grease gun. Although from the same manufacturer they were made in both Chicago, USA and across the lake in Canada. I still have some left, but P&P is quite high.
My asking price is GB pounds 20 each.

There is another pattern of this type of grease gun around: slightly shorter, with a slightly thicker body and screw on ends. The type in the picture has a twist top that takes a small turn to come off.

Rob

[Neil Ashley]

Jon

The Inspection Light was a one off I found at Kemble this year.

No one replied to my question, but I think it is clear that the only difference between the American and Canadian version's is the location of the hanging hook. As mentioned in my thread there is even a hole drilled in the top to take the canadian style of hook.
One manufacturer probaly made them for both countries.

I am also lead to believe that I have the wrong inspection light socket fitted to my C15TA dash board because it has two pins rather than one. Perhaps some one can confirm this point. I am using a standard bayonet type two pin plug as fitted to war time British Trailer sockets. Even then I had to file the pins down by 50% to get it two fit.