Ok Folks,
Time to come clean on this one now.
I had no idea about the Poclain connection till I stumbled on an article in "The Engineer Magazine" Nov 1955.
The article states quite clearly that the excavator was made by "Winget." See the relavent passage below.
It also goes on to describe the trencher pictured below.
Determined to find out more I researched Glasses Guide and everywhere else I could think of, all to no avail.
I then foumd an autobiograpy written by Mr Ray Hicks.
He was a development engineer who was appointed to Winget of Gloucester in the early 60s to rationalise and improve the product range of The Group and he starts the relavent chapter as follows,
The individual companies located on the site were:-
- E. Boydel, T/A Muir Hill Dumper.
- Slater & Walker Dumper.
- Gardiners of Gloucester.
- Moxey Ltd.
- Gloucester Railway Carriage and Wagons.
- Poclain Hydraulic Excavators.
- Redler Cranes.
They were all autonomous commercial units which had been aquired by Winget and in some cases were registered companies in their own right.
My job was to assess the technical viabillity of each of these companies and to reccomend development programmes.
I had to insure that they developed products that kept them in the top ranks of their particular line of business,"
He went on to say, "There was an equaly diverse range of companies at Rochester," for which he would also be responsible.
All this has led me to further research. I will post more shortly in my thread "The Way We Were" which I think will be more apropriate.