Vintage compressor

[God mode restorations]

Evending everyone.
Having a sort out of bits and pieces round my father's place. And stumbled across this compressor. I don't know anything about it other than it was restored and works.

 

[brightspark]

nice looking machine. be ok for blowing tires up and light dutys

 

[daleyd]

No idea but it looks lovely!

Would this be an early broomwade model (before they were even called broomwade) as they were in high Wycombe?

 

[Swift&Bold]

....just 'stumbled across it'

 

[Robotstar5]

You'll be able to take it to vintage shows and sit in a deckchair all day now

...nice looking machine.

 

[God mode restorations]

To be honest my old got stuff all over the place. Some I didn't even no he had. Old vintage rally and a deck chair. Hmm. Sounds good.

 

[octo0072000]

looks well but it never came with a air cleaner like that looks like it's off a car

 

[God mode restorations]

Yes I did notice the air cleaner is of a later design

 

[wristpin]

What a lovely find. Looks as though the engine could be a JAP

 

[gordon stephenson]

Really nice machine, Love those unloader compressors.

 

[octo0072000]

Yes I did notice the air cleaner is of a later design

still a loverly old thing and usefull too

 

[Bill Edwards]

Looks great.

 

[The_Yellow_Ardvark]

Lovely old engine and compressor. Any History on it?

It looks similar the WD, War Department ones given out during WW2. In a, at the time, a desperate attempt to modernise farming in the UK.

They were sold to farmers by the Agricultural Department on a government loan. The deal was you pay for it, at the end of hostilities it could be sold back at the price of what was left on the loan.

Sadly at the end of WW2 that agreement was “broken” and a lot of farmers ended up with a debt they didn’t want.

A lot were lost, separated from the machine they drove, used for another use. In Wiltshire a lot got used to drive vacuum pumps on dairy farms.

To hide their history a lot had the WD number ground off. They were either a cast mark or a stamped number. Very early ones had a brass ID plate, but that soon “fell off”

In Scotland some ended up of illegal stills, the WD promised that if you made a suitable fuel distillate that no action would be taken on past illegal activities. After WW2, they got taxed, fined and still had to pay for the engine.

Yours is a good looking engine, if you can find its history it will be a great asset at steam shows etc.

 

[Cobbler]

I have a BEN spray gun, yonks old, unfortunately you can't get spares for it & it really needs a new nozzle & various bits & pieces. I tracked down the company that took them over, might have been Broomwade, I can't recall it was a long time ago & got "you've got one of them, we haven't made them for donkeys years, didn't think any were still around" by what I have been told it was excellent kit. The spray gun is an old internal mix, low air one & I used to run it off an old ice cream freezer compressor & gas bottle as a receiver.

It looks a bit of a beast of a compressor, there'd go mad for it at steam shows.

 

[slim_boy_fat]

at the end of hostelries

I think you mean hostilities, which could also break out at 'last orders'....

 

[The_Yellow_Ardvark]

 

[500e]

Click on the pump picture
http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/B._E._N._Patents
http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/B._E._N._Patents

 

[God mode restorations]

Thanks for the replies guys. I will see if I can find out anything history on it.

 

[sardine]

Looks like a Petter A1 to me.

 

[the snooper]

Looks like a Petter A1 to me.

I must be losing the plot, looked at your post and thought nah that's no Petter A1 (I have one in the garage) so posted then realized I was looking at the compressor not the engine