Post by Don Ricardo on Aug 5, 2007 22:17:28 GMT 10
G'day V V folk,
In 1993 we moved house from one with a big garage, double carport and attached workshop to a house with a single garage built during WW II and just wide enough for a pre-war Morris or Vauxhall, or something similar. In other words it wasn't very long and it wasn't very wide. In fact about two years later we bought a Tarago which I fondly thought we'd keep garaged. Only tried it once...I could get the Tarago into the garage but I couldn't open the car doors wide enough to actually disembark.
That gives you some idea of the size of our 'vehicularium'.
Why am I telling you all this, I hear you ask. Well the sad truth is that I had to have a drastic cleanout of the contents of our previous garage...and carports...and workshop. Out went our Don caravan's original wheels and hubcaps. Out went the van's original annexe. Out went the van's original Coleman petrol stove. Yes, yes I know - practically treason and I am very sad about it now...but then I didn't know that a decade or so later I would meet up with a bunch of people suffering from the same disease as me - vintagevanitis. I thought I was the only one in the known universe...
Anyway, one thing that didn't go out in the radical cull of '93 was the fire extinguisher which my parents bought for the van when it was new:
You can see why I didn't chuck it out. It is a device of wondrous beauty which I always admired as a kid, and still do. Although it has a mounting bracket - shown in the photo - it has lived in a cupboard in the van in its original cardboard box for the last 58 years (with mounting screws still wrapped in brown paper!).
It was made by 'The Pyrene Company Ltd' of Great West Road, Brentford, Middlesex, England and imported into Australia by Harrisons Ramsay Pty Ltd. The next photo is a closer view of the label, including operating instructions:
As far as I know, the extinguisher has never been used in anger or defence and it's still filled with its original cargo of 'pyrene' which you can hear sloshing about inside whenever you pick it up. Whether it would work now, I don't know, but it retains its honoured place in its cardboard box in the cupboard in the Don.
And to answer Firefighter's question - yes, I know an extinguisher with its mounting bracket in a box in a cupboard is no use at all if there is a fire. We have one of those little modern red extinguishers mounted just near the door of the van. But it is not a thing of lustrous beauty like the old one
Don Ricardo
In 1993 we moved house from one with a big garage, double carport and attached workshop to a house with a single garage built during WW II and just wide enough for a pre-war Morris or Vauxhall, or something similar. In other words it wasn't very long and it wasn't very wide. In fact about two years later we bought a Tarago which I fondly thought we'd keep garaged. Only tried it once...I could get the Tarago into the garage but I couldn't open the car doors wide enough to actually disembark.
That gives you some idea of the size of our 'vehicularium'.Why am I telling you all this, I hear you ask. Well the sad truth is that I had to have a drastic cleanout of the contents of our previous garage...and carports...and workshop. Out went our Don caravan's original wheels and hubcaps. Out went the van's original annexe. Out went the van's original Coleman petrol stove. Yes, yes I know - practically treason and I am very sad about it now...but then I didn't know that a decade or so later I would meet up with a bunch of people suffering from the same disease as me - vintagevanitis. I thought I was the only one in the known universe...
Anyway, one thing that didn't go out in the radical cull of '93 was the fire extinguisher which my parents bought for the van when it was new:
You can see why I didn't chuck it out. It is a device of wondrous beauty which I always admired as a kid, and still do. Although it has a mounting bracket - shown in the photo - it has lived in a cupboard in the van in its original cardboard box for the last 58 years (with mounting screws still wrapped in brown paper!).
It was made by 'The Pyrene Company Ltd' of Great West Road, Brentford, Middlesex, England and imported into Australia by Harrisons Ramsay Pty Ltd. The next photo is a closer view of the label, including operating instructions:
As far as I know, the extinguisher has never been used in anger or defence and it's still filled with its original cargo of 'pyrene' which you can hear sloshing about inside whenever you pick it up. Whether it would work now, I don't know, but it retains its honoured place in its cardboard box in the cupboard in the Don.
And to answer Firefighter's question - yes, I know an extinguisher with its mounting bracket in a box in a cupboard is no use at all if there is a fire. We have one of those little modern red extinguishers mounted just near the door of the van. But it is not a thing of lustrous beauty like the old one
Don Ricardo
condition.