Author Topic: Vehicle markings  (Read 79902 times)

Offline zulu delta 534

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Vehicle markings
« on: May 30, 2012, 09:35:11 PM »

A long time ago on another forum this photograph of a particular vehicle was posted and created a bit of interest as to its ownership at the time of the photograph (1965).
Somewhere in REMLR.com there is a page that offers information re door markings and how to recognise who or what
certain markings represent. The Diamond, Triangle, square, circle and two rectangles (vertical and horizontal  ) represent,  in order, HQ, 1 or A, 2 or B, 3 or C, 4 or D,  5 or E, depending on the era. These can either represent Batteries, Companies or Squadrons, depending on the Corps. (That is represented by the colours of the Tac sign).
The following concerns the "pentropic" set-up under which most units headed off to Vietnam, and generally an infantry Battalion in those days used letters to define its Companies, A Coy, B Coy etc., and numerals to define Platoons and sections.
A Normal Infantry Battalion consisted of 5 Companies, under a Head Quarters group.
HQ consisted of Admin, Sigs and Q mainly.

There were generally 3 or4 Rifle Companies, usually labelled alphabetically, A, B, C, and D.
These Companies themselves consisted of a HQ element, Sigs element and 4 Rifle Platoons.

Then there was Support Company.
Support consisted of a Pioneer Platoon, Mortar Platoon, Sigs Platoon, and Anti Tank Platoon.
This set up may have differed from Battalion to Battalion as some had different primary roles and would have been set up slightly differently.
The OC of each of these sub sections would have been entitled to a vehicle and his vehicle would have been allocated the number 1,
The 2ic would have had #2, and Admin and Q would have probably had #3 and #4.
 So in the case of seeing the above short base Land Rover rumbling towards oneself, the first thing to look at was the colour of the Tac sign; Red with white numbers- Infantry. 55 represents 1 RAR. The small sign on the grille tells us 'S' for Support Company, 'P' tells us Pioneers and the number '1' tells us it is the OCs vehicle.
The one behind it is the OC of Mortar Platoon in Support Company.
Had there been a gunbuggy in the picture it would have been listed as S (Support) A (Anti Tank) 4, 5, 6 etc., depending on which vehicle it was. Anti tank would have had extra vehicles allotted as most of its weapons were vehicle mounted.
What this means is that there were at the time of the conflict, nine Battalions raised and each one would have used a similar numbering technique, so if we see a gunbuggy numbered SA6 we don't really know which one it is as each Battalion had a vehicle marked SA6. The Tac sign becomes the important issue for recognition here.

When we are talking about a Transport Platoon, a similar system operates, the Tac sign tells the parent Company, the shape on the door tells the Platoon and the numbers in that shape tell the section and the vehicle number. Therefore a truck with a Triangle on the door and the numbers 53 on the door belongs to 1 Coy RAASC (Tac sign) 1 Platoon (Triangle) 5 Section and it is truck no. 3. (It can't be number 53 as a Tpt Platoon only had 33 vehicles!)


There may be some old Infantry Tpt NCOs out there who may elaborate on the above generalisation, or even some Artillery bods who can throw some light on the interesting system the Drop shorts used.
I Hope this makes some sense and is of assistance to some.
Regards
Glen
« Last Edit: May 30, 2012, 09:38:35 PM by zulu delta 534 »

Offline aussiegregmac

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #1 on: June 01, 2012, 09:31:56 PM »
Glen, I totally concur with the explanation re the Rovers on the ramp of the LCH but I was waiting for an Infantry type to elaborate.  Greg Mac.
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Offline digger

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #2 on: June 05, 2012, 09:06:20 PM »
thats MY car!!   ;D

Thanks Glen,
we had come up with some ripper 'explainations' (guesses) re the SP1, SM1
and appears we were no where close!

Thanks, its fantastic when put so clearly!
« Last Edit: June 07, 2012, 03:17:55 PM by digger »
(remlr 235 / MVCA 9)*88"-'63 .S2A--c6005  x 2-"Horrie"-112-769, & "The Vet"-112-429(-Vietnam-PRE 1ATF '65)
(unnamed)--109"--'56 .S1 (ute)(future project --88"--'66--S2A-as UN CIVPOL.) 80"-49,53 PARTS, 80"-50,52 , 1 x 109 s3, "Hans" 1 x 88 s3, AND 1 X 110 - 2012 "BEAR"

Offline Garry

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #3 on: August 21, 2012, 10:49:14 AM »

Hi

I am slowly removing the paint from the doors on my S2a Workshop and have found a white diamond

I cant seem to find anything in the middle of said diamond but is only about 4 inches corner to corner on the inside

Now I have seen black markings on other vehicles but not white, remember I am quite new to this so go easy on me

Anyone out there have any ideas on the unit it may have been assigned to going on this limited (so far) information?

Garry
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Tankradio

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #4 on: August 21, 2012, 01:06:43 PM »
Let's see more threads well written and informative by nature here on REMLR.

Well done Zulu Delta for raising the bar

Cheers

Phill

Offline THE BOOGER

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #5 on: August 31, 2012, 03:17:21 PM »
We used to have a markings thread in the old forum this seems to be closest we have now so does any body have any info on this unit tac please its on my xt600 I believe it may be a sig unit number is 5875
s111 GS, no 5, xt600 & Ferret mk2
Geoff C

Offline zulu delta 534

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #6 on: September 21, 2012, 09:20:01 AM »
Under the pentropic system (5 is the key number hence the pentropic) there were 5 sections per platoon and each section had 6 vehicles. The extra three vehicles would generally have been for the O.C., Q store and one "spare".
Regards
Glen

Offline Justwanted1

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A bit of help please
« Reply #7 on: November 09, 2012, 12:36:03 PM »
my Inter 6x6 F1 has this TAC plate on the back.. Can anyone enlighten me as to what it means / where it's from??

Offline THE BOOGER

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #8 on: November 09, 2012, 02:11:55 PM »
Training comd there should be another that will tell you what unit/corp it was ;)
s111 GS, no 5, xt600 & Ferret mk2
Geoff C

Offline Justwanted1

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #9 on: November 09, 2012, 02:50:30 PM »
Champion. Thanks..  sadly though, no other markings :-( ..   

She still drives very very nicely for something thats had gear crunching, lane swerving curb bouncers driving it.

Offline Justwanted1

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #10 on: November 09, 2012, 03:22:26 PM »
Nope...  nothing distinguishing on it anywhere except the TAC.

Its ARN is 25-297.

Offline THE BOOGER

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #11 on: November 09, 2012, 04:13:26 PM »
Dont recall what corp has a black tac but it will be a unit under trg comd so that does narrow it down if you can find the corp then its very probably from the corp school ;)
s111 GS, no 5, xt600 & Ferret mk2
Geoff C

Offline Phoenix

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #12 on: November 17, 2012, 09:41:41 AM »
I spent some more time with the sandpaper and paint stripper on one door ofmy ambulance and found nothing on the 2-3 thick coats of olive drab, but I did find some white arkings on the Deep Bronze Olive.

Looks like a 1 / 2 but I think there is more characters on either side, but it's pretty hard to tell, I need to be more careful on the other door.

Trouble is that the deep bronze green looks like it was sanded and then primed with a pale primer that is hard to distinguish form the white markings.
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rob king

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #13 on: January 09, 2013, 01:55:46 PM »
while were on the subject;
I'm about to start tidying up a few panels on my 78 SIII FFR
I can see a marking on the doors and chalked the outline as best as possible prior to sanding so I can measure the position etc.
Excuse my ignorance, I dont have a military background.
Seems a C company from the circle?
There are 3 vertical bars from the top but they dont seem to go all the way to the bottom.
Seems also to be a '14' in the circle but its a bit to the right so that might not be complete.
The guy I bought it from was stationed at HMAS Creswell (Nowra) and said he bought it from a Navy mate who bought at auction in Wagga. - but that is hardly certain.
ARN is 29-887
Just curious if it can be identified.
Thanks,
Rob.

Offline Phoenix

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Re: Vehicle markings
« Reply #14 on: January 10, 2013, 09:16:41 AM »
Mmm, that is an unusual one I must say!
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