Morris Minor G.P.O. vans

[Ian Grace]

I have been meaning to research the Minor G.P.O. vans in details for some time. I have managed to accumulate a vast amount of data, but I have noe had a chance to produce a Morris Minor G.P.O. Van 'Genome'. And, as with the OHC and SV Genomes, its all fiterable, so its possible to do some stats on them.

here's the first results

There were an incredible 7,468 Morris Minor G.P.O. vans produced between 1932 and 1940.

Ignoring the specification updates during this production span for the time being, there were four varieties of van.

There were 3,542 Post Office vans produced. These were the red vans that delivered mail.

Then there were what we might call the telephone vans.

There were 1,804 external vans. These were the linesman's vans that were used to maintain the overhead telephone lines - i.e. all of the telephone system outside.

There were 1,361 internal vans - these were used to visit homes and business to install and maintain the actual telephones and internal wiring. These vans looks a lot like the standard Minor 5 cwt van.

Finally, there were 761 utility vans used for telephone work. it is not yet clear how these differed from the internal vans.

Then we come to the coachbuilders.

So far I have hard data on eight different coachbuilders. These are Duple, Birch Bros., Bonallack, Cross & Ellis, Eagle, Normand Garage, Strachans Successors and Godin.

That's about it from an initial look at the data. Much more to follow in a major article for the magazine. I'll now add data on known survivors (about 54 examples) to the Genome, which I'll upload to the Members' Area when its a bit more mature. The Genome lists ALL of the van's registration and service numbers, but not chassis numbers yet - that will be the next major exercise.

If anyone has any input on the subject, please either post here or get in touch.

[Ian Grace]

Adding the chassis numbers (and also registration months) will take some time. Unfortunately, Registration numbers and service numbers were allocated in batches so it was easy to add them in batches of up to 100 or more. However, looking at another data source, the registration numbers were allocated to random chassis numbers within these batches, rather like engine number were randomized on the production line. So I am having to enter the chassis number one by one - for all 7,468 vans!

I'll upload the Genome now and put it in the same Members' Area location as the other Genomes. Then I'll upload updates as I populate it with more data.