Tag: vehicles

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John Deere vintage tractor

A green vintage tractor with bright yellow wheels displayed in a museum surrounded by other agriculture pieces.

This is a 1951 john Deere model R in the Bill Richardson Transport World. This tractor arrived in New Zealand on the ship Baden in September 1951. Used in Mataura Island and Christchurch before being finally purchased for the museum in October 2007. It was then repainted and tided up in 2008. John Deere’s are my favourite tractors. This is thanks to my grandparents Jean and John who gave me a kids ride on toy tractor when I was a child. They lived just outside of Nantwich in the UK and I would always know I was nearly at their house (where my toy tractor lived) when we passed the John Deere store on Millstone Lane in Nantwich. Ever since I always know a John Deere when I see the iconic green tractors with bright yellow wheels.

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Yellow vintage Harley Davidson 1926

A yellow vintage motorcycle in a museum with concrete floor and white wall behind.

This incredible looking Harley is part of the amazing Classic Motorcycle Mecca in Invercargill, New Zealand. According to the small sign in front of this motorbike this is a 1926 Harley Davison (USA) 1000cc Striped Stock Racer. This bike stood out for many reasons. It wasn’t part of the rows of the other 300+ classic motorcycle’s in this museum. Secondly the bright yellow paintwork with the red Harley Davison logo, the white tires and the low dropped handlebars. Yellow is not a typical colour for motorbikes, let alone Harley’s. The other thing to note is that this bike does not have brakes so clearly purpose-built for the track. According to my research this type of track racer could reach a top speed of around 100 mph. I can’t imagine what it would look like, feel like or sound like in 1926 to see this brakeless bike flying around a track at that type of speeds!

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1980 Concrete Truck Mack R606RST

A large bright blue, yellow and orange cement truck parked inside a museum.

I really like bright coloured cars and trucks. Its a shame these days that so many vehicles on the road are various shades of grey, silver, black or white. Clearly this wasn’t always the case as this 45 year old concrete mixer shows. Bill Richardson’s Transport World had a few concrete trucks but this one’s bright blue, yellow and orange colours really stood out. This truck was originally bought for Southern Transport to be used as a bulk lime sower, but it was too heavy and it sat in storage for about two years. It was then set up as a Concrete Truck in 1983 and used at Gore for two years then returned to Invercargill where it was used until it was retired in 2004.

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Steaming Traction Engine

Steaming Traction Engine

One of the great tourist attractions of County Durham and the North East of England is Beamish, the living museum of the north. I’d heard about it and had been meaning to go for years. When I went it was much big and better than I expected. It was Easter weekend so whilst it was very busy, they had dozen of old vehicles from old tractions as seen here to old cars, buses and fire engines. There were also many volunteers and staff dressed in olden days clothing. The museum was opened in 1970 with a focus on the restoration of Victorian and Edwardian industrial revolution Britain. The site is about 300 arces and has a old trams running around the outside (as you can see the green pole in this photograph for the tram lines). This traction engine was coming up the hill to the main entrance just off to the right. The hill indirectly helped this photograph have lots of smoke coming from the coal powered steam engine.