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Old 27-08-03, 16:44
David_Hayward (RIP)'s Avatar
David_Hayward (RIP) David_Hayward (RIP) is offline
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Default Mystery GMC Tractor/Trailers

http://clubs.hemmings.com/clubsites/...ysterygmcs.jpg

This mystery is really killing me it seems and the mystery gets deeper. Note the 1940 Model GMC Tractor-Trailers, but none were ever offered like that on the civilian market and none were apparently on the census list either. A close up I have seen shows these to be civilian registered at the time. Note the Caterpillar?? ex-tractor unit fixed to the trailers with some form of generator by the side?

I wondered whether these were demobbed units, as obsolete and the suggestion was that they were used by the Ministry of Food. This shot was circa 1943-44 so these were not new outfits.

However this combo was used at least as Chevrolets assembled by GM Continental, and I wondered if these were diverted orders or prize seizures [there were we know seizures of GM trucks meant for Denmark and Norway, in 1940]. The following information may help. The top is a census listing for an odd contract whose format I have never seen before, for SUPERIOR COACH trucks:

L 6245464 to 6245493 - SR/31211/1 Lorry 6 ton 6 x 6
2 ½ Ton 6 x 6 Workshop (for Radar A.A.)
The next sequence is for GMCs to the same contract:
L 6245494 to 6245523 - SR/31211/1 Lorry 6 ton 6 x 6
Generator (For Radar AA)

Could the GMCs be the latter....by then obsolete? There never was a GMC 6 x 6 6-ton...could it have been 4 x 4 -2?

Superior Coach I think built bodies on GMC chassis, but not trucks themselves. The chassis could be ACKWX-353 6 x 6, ex-French. I had thought at one stage that the tractors were 6 x 4 AFWX-354 as per the flatbed in the extreme background, with the rear chassis chopped and fifth-wheel added.

Any thoughts please?
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Old 27-08-03, 21:57
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Default GMC's

I take it the hood side signs say GENERAL MOTORS TRUCK then? it's difficult to make out.

The parking lights on the wings say 1940 model, before that they had running lights in the headlights, so seized or re-routed stuff that was going to France or the like would be favorite.

Crismon has one shot of an ACX 453 dump on p147, described as a 2.5 ton 4 x 2 with a 256 cu in engine, and your featured trucks just look like a tractor version of that, though without hood side signs.

Superior and Yellow Coach did big-style tin-bashing, bus bodies, workshop trucks, DUKW hulls, and would have nothing to do with these trucks, which are plain 4 x 2 tractors.

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Old 28-08-03, 00:27
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Default GMC truck/tractors....

Hi there

These trucks are finished in glossy paint . That would seem to indicate civilian as opposed to military use.

It's not so much the engines mounted on the trailer that interest me as the gizmos attached to the right side and rear, that big pipe and the silo to the rear.

Some sort of construction plant?

Is it permanently attached to the trailer or is the equipment just being transported? If it is some sort of pump or sprayer, where does the operator stand?

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Old 28-08-03, 00:39
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Default General Motors Truck

Yes they say General Motors Truck on the sides and have GMC badges on the top of the rad grille. I always think, as do others it seems, that the '39-40 GMCs look very much like the equivalent Chevrolets with a similar but not identical grille.

The US Army used ACX-453 Models in two chassis lengths. The British Army used diverted French order ACK-353 4 x 4 158" wb trucks, very similar to the Tractor units. However can anyone add anything please about the diesel sets on the trailers? Could they have been AA radar set generators? It appears that the Census lists are wrong and that the Superior Coach trucks were in fact bodied by Superior, on GMC chassis..the GMC Parts Book listing suggests that these were the same as the US military 1940 Model AFKX-352 "Superior Arms Repair Body" so Forward Control/COE 4 x 4. There is a drawing of one of these trucks in the Parts Book. It was a chassis-cowl unit. Support for this suggestion has come from a photo of a cab-less short wheelbase COE GMC with an apparent "home-made" pickup bed, with no roof that was used by General Motors Limited in 1941 at Cleckheaton just after they moved from Southampton. This was apparently used as a towing cum fetchit truck and I have often thought that it was a transit-damaged truck. The Searchlight trucks with the crewcab however had the GMC chassis and front screen so that it could not have been one of those [AFWX-354].

Note that although the Census list quotes 6 x 6 drive, I have seen a photo of a GMC 4 x 4 say ACK-353 towing a van-type trailer with fixed coupling.

I have never seen the contract style "SR/XXXXX/Y" format before...DDs was Diverted Deliveries, and so I a would be grateful for any thoughts on that aspect as well please!

I should add that the 1940 Model AFKX-352 was the only BRITISH order for GMCs before the CCKW-353 etc as all others that were landed were diverted FRENCH orders.
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Old 28-08-03, 02:16
Alex Blair (RIP) Alex Blair (RIP) is offline
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Default 5 Ton .....

David
Some time ago I sent you some ident pages from the GMC master price index from 1940,41,42...
Look at the 5 ton GMC Model AC 723 1500 Cab..
The wheels are right..the fenders are right..the GMC Truck sign is right......
The only other ones that had that GMC Truck sign in that position is the 1 1/2 ton model AC-305 but the fenders are wrong and the 5 ton model AC-725...again the fenders lights and signs are right..
The other models had louvers in the GMC Truck sign location and completly different fenders and lights..
Check it out on page 12 of the little manual I sent you..
Any records of AC 723(160"wb) Or AC 725's(196" wb)..?
The generators of that size would need a 5 ton chassis ..
APU's for search light or Radar would get my money...
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  #6  
Old 28-08-03, 13:56
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Default Reply to Alex

Thanks Alex, that was the book I was referring to. There are no records of any AC700 series being used by the British or French forces. That is not to say that there could have been PRIZE seizures or even diverted civilian orders ... The Census list quotes 6 -ton 6 x 6 for the Generator trucks for AA Radar...and the flatbed Tractor-Trailer would have such a capacity. GMC produced trailers certainly pre-war. Thise diesel units appear to be bolted down with flanges both sides so were not just being shipped around...thanks for all the inputs.
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