Thornycroft Lorries
John Isaac Thornycroft built his first steam lorry in 1896 at his Chiswick boatyard by the banks of the River Thames. It was powered by a small marine steam engine with chain drive to the front wheels. In 1898 as the Steam lorry business grew they transferred to a new factory built at Basingstoke. In this year Thornycroft built one of the Worlds first Articulated Lorry. By 1902 they had started to build the new petrol engined lorries and by 1907 they had finished building Steam lorries at Basingstoke, although a subsidiary Stewart and Co continued building them in Glasgow until 1910. World War One brought about a boost in production as the companies J type 3 tonner was adopted by the War Department. Some 5000 of these lorries powered by the 40hp 4 cylinder petrol engines were produced. This model was followed by the X type 3 tonner in 1920, the 2 ton A type followed in 1923. The A type had pneumatic tyres and electric lights. From 1931 Thornycroft started using names rather then letters, this gave birth to wonderful and evocotive names such as Bulldog,Speedy,Jupitor,Taurus,Tartar,Stag,Trusty,Trident and Sturdy. During World war Two Thornycroft built over 13000 lorries for military service as well as 2000 vehicles for essential civilian users. After the war civilian production started again in earnest, the main models being the Nippy 3 tonner, Sturdy 5/6 tonner and the Trusty available in 4,6 and 8 wheeler versions. In 1948 the company changed it's name to Transport Equipment (Thornycroft) Ltd and the same year the 100ton gtw mighty Antar came into production powered by an 18 litre/1098cu in Rover Meteorite Mk.101 V8 petrol engine with 2 magnetos and 2 spark plugs per cylinder, each magneto fired spark plugs on both sides of the V8 so if one magneto failed the other could cope albeit at reduced power. There were two switches on the dash to test the individual mags, by running at 1500Rpm switch one off there will be a drop of 500Rpm, switch back on then repeat for the other magneto
Thornycroft vehicles were built with most of the parts produced in house at the Basingstoke factory, but by 1961 in the declining British Truck industry Thornycroft were taken over by the ACV Group who were the parent comany owning AEC, the models that competed with AEC were phased out and production was turned to the specialist market producing The Nubian, Big Ben and Antar models. ACV was taken over by Leyland who themselves owned Scammell.The Basingstoke Factory was closed in 1969 and production of the specialist vehicles vehicles transferred to the Watford plant of Scammell. Following the aquisition of Leyland by the Dutch company DAF in 1987 the Watford plant was closed in 1988 as part of the rationalisation programme, another nail in the coffin of our great British Lorry Heritage. Follow the links on my home page to the Thornycroft Register web site.
Thanks to Marshall Greer for help with the spec on the Antar engines, take a look at his web site follow the links on my home page.
Here are some of the Vehicles produced at The Basingstoke Works
A New Thornycroft for ICI Ltd at Widnes
A Magnificent new Thornycroft Tartar 6 Wheeler JR 4383 for RT & J Hewitt Ltd of Morpeth
A Four Wheeler Thornycroft Sturdy ready for delivery to A.W.Hall of South Lambert
New Four Wheeler for Rolmac Ltd Whinstone Quarries, Newcastle.
Sad last resting place for these two once mighty Antars
A fine looking dropside four wheeler registration number VK 275
Guinness is good for you, nice looking Trusty wagon and drag
New Gully sucker leaving the Basingstoke Factory
Thornycroft Trusty 8 ton flatbed lorry
Wonder if Robert Thorne is still on the go, or if this lovely old girl made it into preservation. I hope so.
Another fine example of Thornycroft craftmanship getting The Commercial Motor Official Test
LNER were fond of their Thornycrofts, here three are line up for pre delivery inspection
Mildred 1945 Thornycroft Sturdy Diesel, 6 Cylinder diesel engine number 266, chassis No 45820
Taken at Ainscough's Heavy lift division yard in the old Leyland works,Golden Hill Lane,Leyland.
This magnificent beast is in full working order.
Which is more then can be said for this one, again taken at Leyland, Lancs.
Pictured in The Leyland Vintage Commercial Museum, Leyland Lancs. Thornycroft Gun tractor
used by the Army in the Boer War built at Basingstoke in 1909
1903 Thornycroft Colonial Steam Lorry, number 21C originally sold to Alf Marsh, later shipped to
South Africa, found out there in disrepair and shipped to Holland. My friend Mike Wilkinson bought
it and it is now in Lancashire awaiting restoration. The boiler on it is not original and will have to
be replaced with a new one. I accompanied Mike's lowloader driver Steve out to Holland to collect it.
Cobelfreight ferry from Immingham to Rotterdam First sight of Steamer, not much to see ?
Loading ready for shipment Wheel nut The Thornycroft Steam Wagon Co Basingstoke
Ready to roll Filling up with go go juice
From a truck window Embarking at Rotterdam for trip to Immingham
And Finally what it should look like, Robert Crawford's magnificent Thornycroft Steam Lorry
One of the most pleasing aspects of showing your vintage lorries at rallies is the interesting people you meet.
I recently went to the open day at the Leyland Vintage and Commercial Museum and met a gentleman called
Peter Willaims, he told me his father had been a partner in a haulage company just after the war and they had
purchased a brand new short wheel base Thornycroft Sturdy Tipper. Peter told me he had a picture of it when
it was delivered new to the firm Evans and Williams , I asked him if he could scan it and email it to me. I could
see by the look on his face he was not into cyberspace technology but he promised to post it to me. Sure enough
the precious momento arrived the following week by snail mail. Written on the back were the details of the purchase,
it was supplied, painted and delivered by Greens Motors of Haverford West (still trading to this day but sadly not
in Thornycroft Lorries) to Evans and Williams Transport Ltd, Letterston Pembrokeshire. The picture is reproduced
here by kind permission of Peter Williams of Fishguard, Pembrokeshire. Note the telephone number 18
Old advert for ex WD Thornycroft type ZS/TC4
Reinaldo Miller Martins of Sao Paulo Brazil sent me these pictures of a Thornycroft Amazon he has bought with a view to restoring,
He has recently joined The Thornycroft Register and we at The Register wish him all our best in his endeavours. Place your cursor
over the first picture to go to the website.
