Meanwhile, on the subject of Rotinoff, Jerry Burley has got involved and says: "B, I noted your bit on Rotinoff's. This unit (a Super, rated at a reasonable 330 tons rather than the "frankly pathetic" 140 tons of the standard unit) is ex-Swiss Army (so hasn't been to too many wars in the last 50 years!) is up for sale on Milweb for a cool UKP80k, with a modest trailer and Centurion tank thrown in for free to help block up your housing estate car park. Which is roughly enough to buy Swindon at the moment I would guess. Nice rig and would be a helluva talking point in your vehicle collection but what size of house and garden do you need to keep one of these in, and driving it, even under STGO, in UK......? Mmmm. I bet I could cause a proper "Only in England" moment with this lot!" He also adds that there's a whole shed load of stuf on Rotinoff on Wikipedia.
I remember Mr. Tuck doing a story about a firm called something like Shamara Heavy Haulage who used to move a heavy cable reel tailer between the Pirelli works at Eastleigh and Southampton and the BT Submarine Cabling Depot at Southampton Docks, using a Q registered Rotinoff as the motive unit and the Q registered Scammell Samson as the pusher(both of which are now in preservation). At the BT depot the cable was transhipped to a 'hover plate' which was powered and pushed by a Douglas Tugmaster equipped with a very large air compressor.
I vaguely remember a an article about Shamara, but I thought that it was a Scammell Contractor on the front, ex Northern Ireland Carriers?
Parnaby Cyclones ran a Q-plated Rotinoff that has rather done the rounds since it was repatriated from Switzerland - Q43 GFR if I remember rightly.
These heavy haulage trucks you talk a bout the only sampson plus Scammell contractor was owned and used by Toni Kimber and his wife and fellow worker Mick Hughs,i used to whatch them getting ready to do a move for Pireli cabbles in Eastleih.This was in 1985-6.