Steve Budd reacquaints himself with Airfix’s Autocar U-7144-T and F1 tanker, reproduced here in a very different guise
Great Britain’s all-out effort to defeat the Axis powers had crippled the nation economically, industrially and emotionally.
It was a tired nation that nonetheless set about the long process of recovery; as 1945 morphed into May 1946, a positive note was the official opening of Heathrow Airport to commercial traffic.
With the ‘mend and make do’ spirit still very much extant, Heathrow (along with several other airports) secured a selection of American Autocar refuellers at knock- down prices, leftover when the USAAF packed its bags and headed back Stateside. No domestically produced fuel tankers were in production at the time, so the Autocar was a welcome ‘off the peg’ solution for filling the capacious tanks of civilian aircraft, which came in ever greater numbers. Initial examples retained their canvas roof over the cab, but this later gave way to alternatives manufactured in more durable metal. The biggest change, however, when Esso Aviation took delivery of its vehicles at Heathrow, was in the overall colour; weather-beaten Olive Drab disappeared under a beautiful bright gloss red …
