Early Bay Prison Bus tailgate?

[morphim]

Hello.
I wonder if anyone has ever come across anything like this before or has any info on it.

I have an early bay tailgate. I got this from an 'H' or 'J' reg van maybe 25 years ago. It was in a scrap yard near Alton, Hampshire.
The van had a large dent in the roof which had also damaged much of the near side too.

If you look at the images of the tailgate, you'll obviously see the crossbar in the window area, making two, small windows. This looks to have been produced from a door 'blank' since there are no obvious signs of welding inside or out.

The rest of the van had similar windows on both sides, including sliding door, but not the drivers or passenger door (or windscreen) which were standard.
I wish I'd taken a photo of it at the time as it was most unusual. I've not seen anything like it before or since.

It also has a church key type lock connected to a horizontal bar that locked into the body of the var on either side.

Any ideas?

Obviously the tailgate has seen better days now but really just needs a needs bottom grafting on but does seem worth saving.
I intended to fit it to my 1969 dormobile but have since sold the camper so not sure whether to keep it / fix it / sell it??

Any thoughts gratefully received? Thanks in advance.

 

[bubba dubba]

Hi, that's an unusual one for sure, my best guess is it was made from an ambulance rear hatch as im pretty sure they were made without glass.
it looks to be a homemade conversion on a panel van if all the side windows were the same, (again this is purely a guess).
it could also be a special order of some sorts from the factory, have you had a look on the samba website? that might a good place to do some searching on special order vehicles........whatever it is its cool ......kev

 

[Clem]

Hi, that's an unusual one for sure, my best guess is it was made from an ambulance rear hatch as im pretty sure they were made without glass.
it looks to be a homemade conversion

Id agree with this Cool tailgate tho!

 

[morphim]

Thanks for the replies.
That's interesting about ambulance tailgates as this is definitely made from a tailgate with no windows to begin with.
I agree; a custom panel van but I think for some specific purpose. As mentioned, I wish I'd taken photos now but this was at the time of my awful, bright yellow Agfa 'point & shoot'. Not good at the best of times and usually only for holiday time.

I will certainly take a look on thesamba.

Cheers : )

 

[morphim]

I know this was almost 4 years ago but, just for completeness (is that a word?) here is the kind of bus this came from.
It was a Police Bus. I think this vintage photo is from the Netherlands.
The bus I got this from was trashed in scrap yard but was on UK plates.
Wish I'd had the cash / means / forsight to buy the whole thing now but I was a young lad then : )

I've finally go around to listing it now here too, if you're interested:
http://forum.earlybay.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=79186

Anyway ...

 

[Clem]

Nice one! Thanks for the update. Love it

 

[matty74]

What a great pic [emoji106]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[ozziedog]

Nice picture, I might be the one in the bus. If you look closely you’ll see me in the rearmost window waving.

Ozziedog,,,,,,,,and shouting,bloody Volkswagens :mrgreen:

 

[bubba dubba]

Thanks for the update.......i have never seen one of them before. i guess the smaller windows were put in so the prisoners couldnt smash them and jump out do a runner :lol: :lol: