The Fowler B.5 Armoured Road Locomotive
- and how to build it!

On the Fowler B.5

Fowler steam traction engines emerged most successfully from War Office trials in 1899 for engines to be employed in the South African war. As a consequence, machines built by John Fowler & Co. Ltd of Leeds represented by far the biggest proportion of the forty or so traction engines that were in South Africa by mid-1900. The traction engines were used for pulling trains of supplies - alongside oxen or mule transport - or towing guns to different positions. For protection against attacks on supply columns by Boer raiding parties some armoured traction engines were ordered, and the first of these vehicles, together with four bullet-proof trucks, arrived in South Africa in July 1900, followed by a second train two weeks later.

The armoured engines were Fowler model B.5s of 10 n.h.p. (nominal horse-power) or 115-125 maximum i.h.p. (indicated horse-power). The bullet-proof plates completely enclosed the body of the machine in a slab-sided structure, only the chimney projecting. At the front a hinged semicircular plate protected the lower part of the boiler, and at the rear the armour was extended out either side, partly over the driving wheels. Three loopholes for the use of the crew's weapons were provided in each of these projections. Access to the vehicle was by means of a door through the armour at the rear. The armoured trucks which went with the Fowler

B.5s were four wheelers, the front axle, which incorporated the tow-bar, being mounted on a turntable. The armour on each side was in three sections, which could be hinged inwards independently. Each section carried a loophole. There was no overhead armour pro­tection. A field gun could, by means of special channels, be hauled into a truck and carried, instead of being towed.

A total of four Fowler B.5s was armoured - Nos. 8894, 8895, 8898 and 8899. The first two armoured road trains were sent to Bloemfontein on arrival, where the armour was removed from both engines and trucks and used to make armoured railway trains. Towards the end of 1901 the General Officer commanding the Kimberley District asked for further trucks to be fitted with armour so that the troops needed for road-convoy escort duties could be reduced, and the War Office was requested to supply two armoured trucks. Remembering that the first two sent had been stripped of their armour to make armoured railway trains, it is not surprising that the War Office did not meet this request.

The gun-carrying truck, mentioned above, inspired Lieut.-Colonel von Layriz, a prominent German military writer, to suggest that quick firing guns should be mounted on the wagons to act as a sort of mobile fort to protect bridges and other important points against flying columns of Boers. This idea was not adopted, but if it had it is interesting to speculate that it would have anticipated by many years some of the elements of the tank.

For more info, click here!

Making a Fowler B5 of the Boer War period
by Gerald Scarbourough
(From Airfix Magazine March, 1971)

During the Boer War of 1898-1900, several Showmans' Traction Engines were purchased and altered to suit military needs, The War Office also ordered many new engines, amongst which were the Fowler armour plated engines complete with armoured wagons for carrying ammunition and the 4.7 inch howitzers. A train would consist of four wagons and two howitzers either towed or carried aboard the wagons. They would be winched up steel channels using the engine winding rope, the drum of which was on the left side of the rear axle. This winch could, of course, be used either for unditching the engine if it should be bogged down or for dragging the wagons over small streams, etc. The engine weighed 22 tons of which 41 tons con­sisted of armour plate, the boiler worked at 180 lb psi ; it was rated at 10 nominal horse power, though the actual indicated horse power was about 120. The hind wheels were 7 ft dia and 2 ft wide and it carried 400 gallons of water with 15 cwt of coal in the bunker.

Life for the crew would be pretty unbearable with the heat in this enclosed cab from the firebox and boiler under the hot African sun. The driver had only two narrow vision slots facing forwards and of these he could only see through the left one by means of a mirror. The wagons were each about 15.5 ft long and weighed 5 tons each and could carry 12.000 Ib of ammunition. Reference to what must be the grandfather of all fighting vehicles can be found in A Century of Traction Engines and various other books on steam power, and a draw­ing of the basic Fowler engine (though this is fitted with the standard 1.5 ft wide hind wheels) can be found in Traction Engines Worth Modelling. Construction of the model is not in fact difficult, the armour covers up all the intricate detail of engine, gears and controls, etc, and construction of the wheels is not as hard as might appear. Start with the armoured body and draw the sides, top and back on 10 thou plastic card. This may seem rather thin but does allow you to represent the rivet detail effectively and these should be impressed, before cutting out the part, with a blunt compass or fine point ball pen using a piece of cardboard behind the plastic card. Turn over and score in the joins between each panel and then cut out each part. The sketch should show how the rest of the parts go together but don't put the bottom in at this stage.

The boiler I made from wooden dowel as very little of this shows, but if you have a ball pen case of suitable size it could be used instead. The front wheels and axles come from the Airfix Mk I Tank, they are spot on for size although to be strictly accurate they are short of spokes. Cut off the axle beam and cut out a clearance at the centre for the pivot. This I made from rod with the "nail" head formed by applying a hot poker to the end, but if you have a spare propeller shaft left over from an aircraft kit this could probably be adapted.

The turntable is from a T-34 road wheel cemented to the top of the axle beam and another, with a section the width of the axle cut out, is cemented half in front and half behind the beam as shown in the sketch. Add the "saddle" for the front axle support to the boiler and all the steps, drawbar brackets, winch rope guide rollers, rear door, top venti­lator hatch covers, smoke stack and boiler front, hinges, etc, to finish off the armoured body. This can then all be painted ready for final assembly.

For the hind wheels, first cut out two strips 8 mm wide by 86 mm long from 10 thou plastic card. Bind these with wool round an old, empty, Humbrol paint tin, as this is just about the right size. Put this in a tea-cup and pour boiling water over the lot, leaving for about 30 seconds for the heat to penetrate, then tip out the hot and fill up with cold water. This should set the plastic card and give two round and true rims. Next cut two strips 4 mm wide by 84 mm long from 20 thou plastic card and give them the same "cooking" treatment. These will be cemented inside the outer rims after trim­ming at the ends to give a good fit: make sure the joins come at opposite sides of the ring. A sliver of Sellotape at the join on the outside will hold the lot in place until dry. Trace the drawing of the rim, hub centre and the spoke positions and tape this down to your building board, then place the rim over this using thin strips of tape to hold in place. Pin and tape a scrap of balsa wood, 1/16 inch thick, in the centre and add the spokes from Microstrip cut to length and with one end bent over as shown in Fig 1, leaving room in the centre for the axle. When dry, turn over and add the second set of spokes similarly but this time you can add the half axle from rod (I used a wooden cocktail stick) a loose fit in a hole drilled in your board, as shown in Fig 2. Fiddling the second set of spokes in is a tweezer job but is not really difficult if you lay them in place and then spot the join with Mekpak on a fine brush.

It is, of course, best to touch all plastic as little as possible with the fingers and these must be clean. I find that a little Swarfega removes the dirt and perspira­tion better than anything else, so if you have trouble with joints that won't hold, this could be the reason. To finish off add the differential lock collar and hub cover and leave to dry. When thoroughly dried out, carefully remove from the building board and thread a 15 thou plastic washer on to the inside and cement to the spokes in the centre, making sure the axle is lined up true.

Add the diagonal strakes (there should be 44!) from Microstrip around the outside of the rim - it's best to cut these oversize and trim the ends off when dry but do note the way they go, don't make two left wheels. After painting, the wheels on their half axles, can be inserted in holes drilled in the body sides (again, note the way the strakes go) and pushed into a collar inside the body. You can now add a bottom to the bodywork if you wish to strengthen it up.

The trailers are a nice, simple structure as will be seen from the sketch, but we have to turn wheelwrights again. Use short lengths of dowel of the correct diameter, instead of the Humbrol tin, the rim width as the drawing, the circum­ference of the front wheels about 30 mm and the rear 40 mm. A normal train would be about four wagons but I only made two, but however many you decide to make, do a few spare just in case you go wrong. I made these a bit simpler with Microstrip spokes as shown in Fig 3. 

If you do not want to go to the trouble of making them, Slaters do 4 mm scale, 12 spoke wheels at about 9p per dozen and I would think that two of these stuck together would be suitable. You would want the 22 ft diameter for the front and the 3.5 ft diameter for the rear and these should be available at suppliers like Jones Bros of Chiswick. There is not a lot of lock on the front axle beams but if you can make this working it looks better. I used a "wheel" and a bit of the wire axle from under a Minitank stuck on top of the axle, pivoting in a hole in the strip under the "chassis". The mode of getting wagons round a tight bend was for the engine to drag them bodily sideways with the winch. On metalled roads steel plate skids were used under the wheels to avoid ripping up the surface.

Finally, the colour would be a lightish battleship grey overall, bright metal showing on the wheel rims and strakes, dusty and sooty with the odd patch of rust.

One of the photographs depicts the engine using the winch to drag the wagons round a rock, and the Airfix Tarzan Set native onlookers give some idea of the size. For wargamers interested in the Boer War period this could make an interesting addition to your campaigns, and as a straight model I think it deserves a place among any collection of tanks and AFVs as probably the first self­propelled armoured vehicle actually used for war purposes. Anyone lucky enough to have the old Lesney Showman's Engine can arrive at this same model very much more easily. Removing the canopy gives you a basis on which the armoured body can be built and the problem of making the complicated wheels does not arise.