Yet more from our intrepid Oz photographer and reporter of all things J-type. Peter Bateman writes:

“The attached are of Ian Booth’s old van from Christchurch, NZ.  Now owned by Ben Doyle of the famous Sydney fish shop family at Watsons Bay, the van has found a new home. Any J enthusiast who wants one of Sydney’s best presented fish dinners can now enjoy their feed whilst looking at a J.  After coming across the Ditch (the Tasman Sea for those geography pedants) the van was given the correct documentation for road registration by the local mechanical firm IFIXEM.  Then a short transport stage to Bathurst for sign writing before another transport stage back to sunny Watsons Bay.
Not looking too bad for a van which was restored about 8 years ago.  Now Iain has a reason to visit the Big Island!”

We have added the photograph and three others to MORIS J’s gallery page.

We were the first award announced too. First award ceremony I’ve ever been to, in all the years we’ve been doing the show, and we win something! Register members John Beaton, over from Australia, and Ken Bennett were at the awards to witness our success.

In his speech Simon Taylor, Compere and C&SC’s Editor at Large, said:

“There’s a wonderful array of club websites out there, and after much discussion the judging panel selected as runner-up the site of the Mazda MX-5 Owners’ Club.

But as the overall winner they plumped for a more light-hearted site featuring one of our favourite commercial vehicles. You can’t help but smile when you open a website and there’s a graphic of a van motoring across your screen.

Yet there’s much more to it than that, because the site includes plenty of background material on the vehicle – with some excellent archive photos, including various special-bodied examples and even ones involved in crashes! It’s a must for anyone interested in the Morris J-type and their Austin siblings.

Best Club Website goes to Harvey Pitcher’s J-type labour of love, at www.jtypevan.com“

And the award isn’t for the best SMALL club website, it’s The BEST Club Website! We beat all comers!

Our thanks to the guys at Carousel Digital http://www.carouseldigital.com/, without whose help the website wouldn’t be anywhere near so professional.

I’m back from attending the Revival – a long drive home, reaching Birmingham around 10.30pm.

High point of the weekend for most must have been the ‘squadron scramble’ which saw TEN Spitfires take off, display in formation and then all land – a fantastic sight and an awesome sound from the nine Merlin, and one Griffon, engines.

There were FOUR J-types on site: 5003 NX, Hardy Engineering’s 221 EMF, custom van 344 CNM, and LVJ 61 in Kenwood’s livery. Over the next couple of days there will be a new page for the event, so if anyone out there has photos to add, please submit them by contacting via the ‘contact us’ facility at the bottom of each page.

J/R 4875 the ex John Beaton van #1 after making an 1800 kilometre (1125 mile) journey from Victoria to Queensland last Easter has been to the ‘exfoliant beautician’ (sandblasters) and is now ready for some metal work.  Michael Freeman, who owned Kelly Ashton’s ex Lorraine Dry Cleaners J type in his youth has started this project with the intention of doing it once, doing it well.  The only way to approach long term restoration. This van, which has an original steel floor and early shock absorber mountings is set to be a great addition to the almost 50 known J types in Australia.  We will be watching this project closely.

Peter Bateman

The Southbank Centre in London has been celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Festival of Britain with events throughout the summer. TSL 577 was on display, but SLO 414, 835 BMM and JSJ 982 were working for their living! These photos were taken by GS on August 12 2011.

4th/5th June Tatton Park, Cheshire Classic Car Show. This year the Register stand is being organised by Peter Smith. All vehicles have to be pre-booked, so contact Peter with details if you wish to attend. Those wishing to camp over can arrive from around 3pm onwards on the Friday (3rd). Last year the organisers imposed a £20 charge for the weekend for those bringing caravans. This continues this year but in addition they have decided to charge £10 for the weekend to those camping in tents. It’s beyond our control. Contact Peter on 07581 514365, or we can pass on enquiries via the website ‘Contact’ button.

In the photo, from left to right, are Anthony, Wendy, Lou, Sam and Bjorn. Wendy contacted the Register a month ago asking about  317 BXY, her dad’s van many years ago. She had found the photo on our website and following my reply, wrote: ” my Dad will be so pleased to hear all this as he often talks about it… I was born 1964 and remember it from early on, he bought it for £40 having a large brood of six kids to cart about and we went on many happy holidays in the van”. Wendy’s dad now lives in Texas, but she was able to tell him that the van survives and said in a following email “he’s thrilled we’ve managed to track the van down and to know that it didn’t go to the scrap heap”.

Wendy’s contact with us was timely, it coincided with Bjorn, owner of 317 BXY, coming to the UK for a few weeks – in the van! It was arranged that we would all meet up at Wendy’s so that she could see the van for the first time in many years. Wendy also invited along Lou and Sam. Sam worked for the GPO and serviced many J’s including BXY, and was instrumental in the van becoming part of Wendy’s family. Sam couldn’t believe how well the van was, telling Bjorn all manner of interesting bits about his time servicing the vehicles. It was a wonderful, emotional few hours, I’m so pleased to have had a part in it.

Bjorn has now met up with all but one of the previous owners of BXY (deputising Wendy for her dad) and the one remaining previous owner, a relative of Wendy’s, will apparently be in Sweden for a wedding over summer.

This really is the worldwide web working at its best. These contacts would not have been made were it not for Wendy finding the details on our website.

And ‘Chug-a-boom’? It was what the kids called the van!