How many Staghounds survive?

 I have posted this before but it has been substantially updated since I last posted it, this shows most of the Stags that survive today.

Surviving Staghounds (free.fr)

Stag 1 - A new owner but the story continues.

So having purchased my second Staghound,  a slight more complete example, I was unsure what to do with the first one. Initially I though of putting it back on its wheels and then looking to sell it as a static exhibit. I also considered restoring it as a command Stag, a sort of M20 armoured car version of the Stag, with no turret and an open top. Whilst there are no formal records of these ever being manufactured, photographic evidence exists of field conversions in war time use.

However after a chance phone call with a good friend of mine, one week later he decided to take on the project, and with the benefit of hindsight he was exactly the man for the job. Not daunted by anything, and happy to just see something run again, this was therefore an ideal project for him.

A month or so later all the parts were loaded up and delivered, much to the surprise of his fork lift that now has some seriously heavy metal to move about. After a few years procrastinating work got underway and has continued at a steady solid pace ever since. The first task was to re splice the upper hull and lower hull back together! 

The sections of the floor were cut out as they had been weld in and then transplanted to the upper half of the hull.

This was without doubt a huge amount of work and all credit to the man who got it done! 

The bonnets had been welded in place and these needed to be removed, another huge amount of grinding!

Wow - where has 7 years gone!

So it has been a while since I lasted posted, nearly 8 years in fact! Well as with anything in life things get in the way, but now the time has come to get moving with this restoration. I have been busily collecting parts over the past 7 years and now nearly have everything I need to undertake the restoration. Since my last post, I have sold the first Staghound to another UK based collector, who is also a good friend of mine. He is cracking on with the restoration and has given me permission me to post some pictures of the restoration of the stag to this blog. 

The Staghound has been moved several times since 2014 and so it is now back on its wheels, well for the time being anyway. It is my intention to restore the Stag in time for the XX Corp trip to celebrate the 80th anniversary of WW2. 

I have also always wondered what happened to the other Staghound that was sold at the Littlefield auction back in 2014, well it appears to have turned up in the Royal Jordanian Tank Museum!

Anyway I hope to be updating this blog on a much more regular basis from now until the end, so lets see....

Stag 2 - The Arrival....

So after several months at sea the Staghound from San Francisco has arrived, It was quite an exciting moment opening the doors having packed everything the other end. Still not had that much time to asses exactly what is and is not there, but one thing for sure is that it will be a much easier restoration job than Stag 1.

Unpacking it was a relative pleasure considering it was much cooler than when I packed it in San Francisco!!!! I have to say the whole experience has been pretty fun and would recommend it to anyone who has the appetite!

Staghound Number 1

Meanwhile the hunt for parts for staghound number 1 made a significant leap forward with the discovery of a lower half of a hull in AUS, this will now make the project very viable! Axles have been scourced, still on the hunt for a set of wheels. Still not sure yet what the fate of Stag 1 will be, it might become a Command Stag........

Staghound Number 2

Having attended an auction over the summer on the hunt for parts for the stag project, I ended up purchasing a second and more complete Staghound. I had to go back to the US to disassemble it  for shipping, a challenge when it was very hot and the parts are very heavy to lift on your own. Any way after much sweat, it went in the container and was on its ways home.

Interesting PDF

http://the.shadock.free.fr/Surviving_T17_T17E1_T18.pdf

Found this interesting document on the internet which I believe has been put together by Pierre-Oliver that documents all the existing Staghound's around the world. I think mine had kind of been written off and condemned to being a pillbox forever! We'll see about that! Hopefully!