Rush Green Motors, Langley

[Split_Pin]

Looks like an epic place. Does anyone have a lonk to the website for pics?The Devon Scrapyard was featured in the October(ish) 1990 edition of Popular Classics. It had a big scary pic of a Triumph Herald to head up the article registered MUO 602F, but I'll cant remember the name of the scrappy. I cant be arsed to look out the edition as my 'filing system' is somewhat follow-your-instinct based, so if anyone else has a more handy copy, that will give the name.

[Rusty Pelican]

Cant believe I never knew of blackborough , living only an hour away as i do ,

[Dead_E23]

Supply depot is an interesting theory - according to the planning application for their new shed, it seems that the business started some time in the 1940s so maybe they took over a wartime site of some kind. However, looking at old OS maps it seems that there was some kind of hospital on the site in the 1920s. Probably a cottage hospital rather than a huge asylum type thing because it's marked as a dot. Don't know what that has to do with anything apart from it wasn't marked 'works'.There's also the mundane possibility that some kind of haulage operation grew out of a farm on the site and then turned into a breaker's - but that's not as much fun.

[AXrescuer]

Rush Green Motors is my local car breakers, I was there yesterday as a matter of fact. Nigel who runs the place is a sound lad and never tries to rip you off. Also, I found a set of Avenger 'L shaped' rear lights there today and tucked them away. Anyone interested?

[Ratdat]

Looks like a really interesting place!

I also passed a massive yard with loads of cars in, this one was Langfords Vehicle Dismantlers near Gillingham/Shaftesbury. Anyone ever been in?

I discovered a Leyland EA.

Heres a google satellite view, bare in mind all the cars are on top of another 2 or 3.

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=breakers+yard+loc:+Gillingham,+Dorset,+UK&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=12.270158,34.541016&gl=uk&ie=UTF8&hq=breakers+yard&hnear=Gillingham,+UK&ll=51.038183,-2.183506&spn=0.001592,0.004216&t=h&z=18

 

But upon seeing what Barrett just posted, perhaps this one^ isnt that big....

I used to visit Langfords in the late 80's and early 90's. It used to be an amazing place with hundreds of old cars but they had a big clear out in the late 90's as fas as I know. I have some pictures take there many years ago but I'd have to scan them in as they're proper prints.

 

Tytes yard at Lyons Gate in Dorset used to be a real winner for old stuff too. I believe there's still a good bit of old tat there now. Here's some pics from about 5 years ago...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Rusty Pelican]

Langfords burnt to a crisp a couple of years ago , right before the Glastonbury festival , apparently they were crushing a camper and it still had a large full calor gas bottle fitted , the whole place was wiped out , burnt for 3 days IIRC ,twas on the local news , they werent insured either , Its still running but theres no old stuff left.Tites is still going strong , Geoff took over from his Dad many years ago , the enviro bods tried to close it down but thankfully failed , not quite so much old stuff in the general yard but there is loads of it scattered about that his dad owns , its all for sale as far as i know , My Commer Imp was bought from there in 1991.

[brammy777]

Ta for the info Ratdat and Rusty Pelican.As far as Langfords is concerned, it wouldnt matter if they did have loads of tat in there, as they dont let you in! I did see some older stuff round the bottom of the yard when we passed it, but it looked pretty stripped...I wish there was a scrappy full of old tat round here, Aldermaston does take in some fairly interesting stuff though.

[Des]

A gearbox specialist told me about Rush Green in about 1992-ish, he'd scored a few rare boxes for £10 or £20 by saying they were from something mundane, I went up looking for a cyl head for an old Austin, there was just a girl there who told me to have a look around, I kind of forgot what I was looking for and spent hours just looking around the place, started to get dark and remembered what I was there for, realised I'm not going to be able to remove a head now, even if i find one, on my way out I found what I wanted sitting on the deck in the middle of some strange sheltered bay. £10.That head was then sandblasted, built up and replaced a cracked one, and I have yet to fire it up. I've always taken my time when working on my own stuff, but this is getting on for 20 years, gotta pull my finger out.

[Guest]

.I wish there was a scrappy full of old tat round here, Aldermaston does take in some fairly interesting stuff though.

There's a couple of local ish yards to me that have some really old decaying shit at the back - couple of early Renault 4s, longitudinally engined 5s, Routemaster bus, that sort of thing.Back in 2002 the yard at Queensferry was the absolute tits - they had a Renault 20 there!

[Hudsonpie]

I went to Blackborough Manor after I read about it in Practical/Popular Classics, it was utterly brilliant. Loads of festering tat nestled around a womdefully delapitated old house. The house was largely given over to parts......loads of them....made my eyes bleed...with joy. The then owner was called Chris....(I think) and was really enthusiastic about the place,and he did'nt mind you having a wander about. I scored some bits for my sisters Austin 1300, I was there for hours. It was old tin heaven.I remember matey telling me about it having to close, and how it was going to be cleared. The two guys running it were genuinely upset about it IIRC. I just wanted to move in...there was also a shed which housed some rally prepped Escort which had me drooling. The place had a fantastic feeling about it, bet it was fucking creepy at night though.....I though that was it, but I heard on the grapevine a while back that it was still operating and some of the old cars were still there. So a trip out was in order. Its now a shit hole run by a twat.........this was about three years ago......some of the old cars are there, I saw several too-far-gone MK2 Jags, an A35, and a cople of Farinas. There was an A55 camper that I spotted on my fisrt visit, and a couple of Ford Pops.The rest is modern tat as it is now an ordinary scrap yard, matey was'nt very friendly and we were only there for two minutes....and I nearly got eaten by an Alsation and my step dad stood in dog shit....... If you're gonna visit IMO it aint worth getting out of the car, it worth a drive down the lane but thats it........Blackborough should have been left as it was. There are still a few lttle gems to be seen around Devon /Cornwall. But they are getting thin on the ground.There was a massive yard called Potters situated beside the A38 between Plymouth and Exeter. Proper old skool gaff with a shed for an office, they had stuff going back to the thirties. Charles Trent took it over, and fucking ruined it.....when they cleared it they were digging up artillery wheels and all sorts......I remember the place was infested with red ants.....so if you had to lie down to remove some bits (rrgular occcurence with the shit I used to drive)...you got eaten alive, bastards used to get in your pants.....It's now a self store gaff.

[hammy]

Langfords burnt to a crisp a couple of years ago , right before the Glastonbury festival , apparently they were crushing a camper and it still had a large full calor gas bottle fitted , the whole place was wiped out , burnt for 3 days IIRC ,twas on the local news , they werent insured either , Its still running but theres no old stuff left.Tites is still going strong , Geoff took over from his Dad many years ago , the enviro bods tried to close it down but thankfully failed , not quite so much old stuff in the general yard but there is loads of it scattered about that his dad owns , its all for sale as far as i know , My Commer Imp was bought from there in 1991.

That was the Glastonbury Wednesday during 2008, I was down driving shuttle buses from Castle Cary station to the site, I remember coming out of Shepton Mallet and just seeing a huge plume of black smoke in the air - we thought it was the festival site itself at first. When we came back for the station on our first trip the traffic was queing back to Shepton and beyond and round trips were taking 2 hours +, instead of 40 mins. It was like that for the whole day and people were getting stuck at the station because the buses not getting through, in the end the queue was on the platforms to the point that trains couldn't unload anymore.That was when Plod got involved and started escorting buses through the traffic. I led one convoy of 18 buses with Octavia VRS and motorcycle escorts through the traffic. Absolutely manic with a Metrobus full of people belting through gaps in the traffic. I remember the plod car opening up a gap and as I came through the motorist in a Jeep Cherokee tried to close the gap, hand straight on the horn and before I knew it, plod were in reverse and the copper was yelling out the window to the guy in the Jeep to get out the way and let us through! Absolutely mad - that was a long day and the fire burned for most of it!I'll dig out the link and post some pics!

[Mr Lobster]

There's a couple of local ish yards to me that have some really old decaying shit at the back - couple of early Renault 4s, longitudinally engined 5s, Routemaster bus, that sort of thing

O RLY?

 

Where be these yards?

[hammy]

Early morning queues!

 

Police Escort!

 

 

[trigger]

Talking of scrapyards, I past an interesting one today on the A1 with a fighter jet in the middle of it, I'm sure a few of you will know of it, I've done a bit of Googling and found it.

 

 

It's in Balderton, Nottinghamshire, Any scrappy that has a jet fighter in the middle of the yard must be worth a look!.

 

[pogweasel]

I have driven past Balderton 10 times this week and have not spotted that! 2 more days at retford next week so I will keep eyes peeled.

[trigger]

You can't miss it Pog, It's big enough!

[Mr_Bo11ox]

The plane has been there as long as i can remember!

[CortinaDave]

What is it? A lightning?

 

 

I think they've been out of service for 20 odd years now so it looks like it has been there a while!

[scruff]

My grandad went down to Blackborough in about 1992 - after it had been in Popular/Practical Classics - and bought an engine out of a A60 van which he was allowed to drive before the fella helped him take it out. That engine is still running in his A50.

[Vin]

As Reg Bollox said the lightning has been there years. When it first went there it was sat alone, and I used to see it on my regular trips down to Northampton in the mid nineties. It was in the same condition as the one in Cortinadave's piccie, but not for very long.... Never remember there being any cars there though.

[pompei]

The former Airfix/Humbrol factory in Hull used to have a jet aircraft on its forecourt on a replica stand. I always meant to get a picture before it closed down and the plane disappeared.

[Tayne]

.

[AXrescuer]

Talking of scrapyards, I past an interesting one today on the A1 with a fighter jet in the middle of it, I'm sure a few of you will know of it, I've done a bit of Googling and found it.

It's in Balderton, Nottinghamshire, Any scrappy that has a jet fighter in the middle of the yard must be worth a look!.

 

I have two of the port side under wing access panels off that Lightning in my garage! Got them last year whilst visiting my brother.

[M'coli]

That lightning needs to be put out of its misery. IIRC, it was originally bought by a bunch called something like "A1 Car Sales" or such from RAF Binbrook. The wings and tailplane were cut off for transporting and re-attached with screws and angle iron at the site, and a tube frame was built for it to rest on, crushing its belly. I'll try to see if I've still got the photos I took of it in 2001/2 somewhere, I phoned my Dad with my head up the area the top Avon 302's jet pipe...

 

Edit:

From the "Thunder and Lightnings" website:

On the subject of crying shames, the Lightning above is a sorry sight. XN728, one of the few remaining F.2As, and just look at it - massively vandalised. Placed in the A1 Commercial Sales Yard to attract customers back in 1983, since the yard's collapse in the early 1990s, XN728 was left to rot. Presumably the receiver thought it was an asset which is why it wasn't simply bulldozed away. XN728 was used for BDR for a while and carries a few patches to prove it, and for transport to the yard the wings and tail were simply cut off - and cut in the wrong places. Reassembly was carried out using large sheets of metal to hold everything together once more, and they have rusted badly and warped under the stress. The landing gear was considered too weak to support the airframe (which is complete with engines) and accordingly the belly was supported with a framework of girders. Unfortunately at some point someone nicked the radome, and the change in the center of gravity tipped XN728 on her tail; the belly tank wasn't up to this and the girders have cut right through and are now firmly embedded in the belly. The cockpit has been gutted, the canopy stolen, the glass in the windscreen smashed out of existence, the spine is nearly non-existent and the fuselage is badly holed in many places with just about anything nickable long since gone. To finish her off, as you can see the entire aircraft is liberally spattered with graffiti (mostly applied during the late 1990s and early 2000s when the yard was basically an empty plot of land with just the Lightning sat in the middle, and no security or even fencing at all). It's a sad end for a proud fighter. After years of dereliction the yard was purchased by a new owner in 2005 and it was reported that the owner was thinking of beginning a restoration effort on the airframe - to date, nothing appears to have been done and given the contact I've received from said owner, I firmly believe the aircraft is doomed to collapse into a pile of rusty metal. It is, it has to be said, pretty much beyond help at this point anyway.

At one point it had graffiti stateing that someone was a slag, but wasn't legible enough to read who it was it from the A1.

[Ratdat]

Here's some pics I snapped when the poor old girl was just sat alone before the scrapyard appeared around it....

 

 

 

 

[Tayne]

.

[CortinaDave]

Heres a pic I found of that lighning when it was in service. Not flown since 1977 apparently, and been in that yard since 1983. It looks utterly fooked, much worse even than the Vulcan that was scrapped recently at Blackpool Airport. Probably best put out of its misery.

 

[HillmanImp]

much worse even than the Vulcan that was scrapped recently at Blackpool Airport. Probably best put out of its misery.

There is a Vulcan at Carlisle airport apparently with what looks (from google maps) like a lightening too. Not sure what access is like to get to it, but my uncle is a fireman there so if access is not normally allowed i might be able to wangle it. Saying that i doubt the security at Carlisle airport is too much trouble even if you are not allowed near it.http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&source=hp&q=carlisle+airport+google&ie=UTF8&sll=54.941875,-2.802908&sspn=0.000918,0.00284&split=1&filter=0&rq=1&ev=p&radius=0.06&hq=carlisle+airport+google&hnear=&ll=54.941767,-2.803643&spn=0.000918,0.00284&t=h&z=19Cant believe they scrapped that one at Blackpool.*edit* just googled it and it is part of the Solway Forth Aviation Museum and you can even get in it. Apparently its in really good condition.My Grandad's log book from the 2nd World War was on display in that museum until recently, when the family got it back but i never saw it when it was there.

[trigger]

I also past another jet plane on the way home yesterday also on the A1 but further south on the Northbound side, I think it was part of a museum.I'll have to have another looking on Google maps.

[pogweasel]

There's one outside RAF Wittering, probably what you are thinking of Trig.