classicaldrive
When the Mail Must Get Through Will Rubber Fenders and Lack of Heaters Help?
Filed in archive British Cars , Oddball Autos by Philip Powell on November 30, 2006
Minor Mail Van

Britain's Royal Mail drivers must have been a hardy lot in 1953/54. During that period their Morris Minor vans were delivered without heaters because the mail bosses believed the workers would otherwise be too comfortable. This made demisting difficult so the vans had to be fitted with windshields that were hinged from the top and could be opened to create a flow of cool air across the glass. No heater... cold air rushing in; that would keep anyone alert (as we learned back in the days of opening vent windows)! However those top-hinged windshields interfered with the wipers, which then had to be moved from the bottom of the window frame to the top. Any money saved by deleting the heaters likely wouldn't have been enough to pay for this special factory order but the Royal Mail came up with another big idea: black rubber fenders. Apparently the postmen and postwomen were guilty of occasional dings when squeezing through city mews or narrow country lanes and thus the rubber fenders would, the bosses thought, reduce the cost of repairs. Maybe, but this little trick meant the headlights had to relocated into old-fashioned nacelles, as you'll note in our photo by Nigel Mathews at the recent Birmingham classics show. Apparently less than a dozen such Minor vans still exist as the rest were probably beaten to death by angry postal workers. You can learn more about these British light vans at the MinorLCVReg Website.

Permalink: When the Mail Must Get Through Will Rubber Fenders and Lack of Heaters Help?
Tags: Morris  Minor  Royal  Mail  vans  Birmingham  classic  vintage  antique  collector  old  car  cars  auto  automobi 
Trackback: http://publish.creative-weblogging.com/publish/mt-tb.pl/49603
img Addthis img Ask img Blinklist img del.icio.us img Digg img Fark img Facebook img Google img Lycos img Ma.gnolia Add this page to Mister Wong Mr Wong img Netscape img Netvousz img Newsvine img Reddit img StumbleUpon img Slashdot img Tailrank img Technorati img Wink img Yahoo

Vote for When the Mail Must Get Through Will Rubber Fenders and Lack of Heaters Help?:

  • Currently 6.00/10
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • 6
  • 7
  • 8
  • 9
  • 10
Rating: 6.00 out of 3 vote(s) cast.
 
Subscribe
Share It
RSSrss
See all blog subscribe options
Google google
What is RSS?
Yahoo! yahoo
Addthis Subscribe using any feed reader!
Bloglines Bloglines
Newsletter

TwitterFollow us on Twitter!