The Newark Vintage Tractor & Heritage Show, taking place at Newark Showground on the 9th and 10th of November, will celebrate Britain’s heavy plant machinery and sugar beet production.
Among the historic companies taking centre stage is Aveling-Barford, the result of a 1933 merger between Aveling & Porter and Barford & Perkins.
In 1934, the company introduced its first diesel engines and by 1937 was supplying 75% of the UK’s road rollers. Just two years later, it introduced its first shuttle dumper.
“During the Second World War, Aveling-Barford made a significant contribution, producing a large number of Bren Gun Carriers,” says Benjamin Hobster, a heavy plant mechanic and Aveling-Barford enthusiast. “Post-war, it resumed production of steam and diesel rollers, as well as other diesel-powered construction equipment.”
An additional factory was opened in 1946, where the company manufactured lighter machines, including the G series road rollers, as well as the 4×4 Aveling Austin 99H motor grader – under licence from Austin Western – which was introduced in 1950.
Aveling-Barford subsequently developed the RM grader, which was mounted on a Fordson tractor, and in 1958 it launched its first 4×4 rear-steer loader.
“Over the years, the company manufactured a catalogue of other equipment, including site dumpers, rigid and articulated dumper trucks, and small (calf) dozers,” adds Benjamin.
In 1967, Aveling-Barford became part of British Leyland, before being sold to Wordsworth Holdings in 1988. In 2010, production ceased.
Benjamin will be bringing a two-tonne roller, powered by a two-cylinder Lister SR2 diesel engine, to the show.
“I bought it in 2017 for around £160 – completing its restoration in 2021. All the bodywork was rotten and while the gears and steering mechanism had seized – it did run.
“Some parts have been hard to come by but it’s as close to an original as I can get.”
Sugar beet production
Another focus of the event will be the evolution within the sugar beet industry, which originally required as much manpower as machine power.
In the early 1900s, Dutch farmer Johannes van Rossum travelled to the UK to contract farms to grow the crop, before building a factory in Cantley, Norfolk in 1912.
When World War One started, homegrown sugar became a national focus and by 1927 an additional 17 factories had been built, including one in Newark.
Manual labour was a key part of the operation well into the 1950s, but companies were developing mechanical solutions.
“Standen Engineering is a big name in the development of beet machinery,” says Charlie Wright, arable farmer and show committee member.
“But in the 1970s there were also contractors designing and building their own kit – Malcolm Rumley was one, he built a two-row self-propelled harvester. However, European growers were leaps and bounds ahead, with self-propelled, six-row machines in the field.”
Charles will showcase some of his family farm’s collection of sugar beet equipment at the show, including a late 1940s Standen Challenger single-row trailed lifter, which was bought in original condition in the 1980s.
He also has a Standen Rapide Tanker Mk3A harvester, complete with Opel wheels and a two-tonne bunker. “My father, Brian, bought it in the early 1990s to save it from scrap,” he says. “It was one of the last to be built, and it was barely used.”
Leigh Granger, vice chair at the Peterborough Farm Machinery Preservation Society (PFMPS), will also be participating with a rare piece of Belgian-built machinery. “We’ve got a 1968 Frandon hoe fitted to a 1966 International B275 tractor,” he says. “We believe there were only three made, so it may be the only one remaining.”
Originally salvaged by an ex-British Sugar worker, PFMPS saved the piece in 2020 when it was once again at risk of scrap. “Michael Sly at Park Farms, Thorney, agreed to store it with his collection,” notes Leigh. “Between our members and Park Farm employees, the hoe was recommissioned.”
For more information go to www.newarkvintagetractorshow.com