BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

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classicgambler
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by classicgambler »

here is my home made spitfire one
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treefrog
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by treefrog »

pennymachines wrote:And here is the Fleet Air Arm which was previously painted yellow
At least the wood was good under all that paint...... Missing it already. :#: Still I am one of a minority that believes in keeping original finishes on machines as the years go on they will become rarer and rarer and genuinely believe will longer term become the more desirable... I suspect I will be proven wrong.... Nice job done though.
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Anyone seen this topflash? BMCo auto-pay, "Dawn Patrol"

Post by uslobsterman »

Topic merged - Site Admin.

First time post, but eager to participate.

I've had this for a long time. Only recently learned to call it an "Allwin".

Happy to have found similar/identical machine on YouTube and MelWright.

In other places, where there is a cast topflash present, it's called "Fleet Air Arm" (in fact, a replica is available in the spare parts page on this site).

However, this one has, what certainly seems to be original, a cast topflash that reads, "Dawn Patrol"
Apart from missing keys (are replacements for the original locks available?) and a damaged coin door, it's all in quite good shape. I believe it was battery powered originally and has since been converted to UK/ then US (110V) power. I'll shoot some interior shots for a later posting.

thanks for any comments, and I look forward to sharing more.

USLobsterman
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Re: Anyone seen this topflash? BMCo auto-pay, "Dawn Patrol"

Post by pennymachines »

Hello Uslobsterman, and :WELCOME:
That is indeed a new one to me and brings the number of coin-pay variants to four. As you say, it appears otherwise identical to the Fleet Air Arm. How fortunate it's retained its top casting. I'll be interested to see inside. You say it may have been battery powered originally - that was my belief too, though I had little to support this idea than a notion that travelling arcades around WWII would have found the need for a mains power supply inconvenient.
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Re: Anyone seen this topflash? BMCo auto-pay, "Dawn Patrol"

Post by coppinpr »

Hi USL, and a warm welcome to the best slot site (and busiest) on the web. I'm not an allwin man so the experts will be along soon I'm sure to drool over your machine which I think is quite rare with that art work, at least three other versions are known but the top flash it is certainly very rare. Any history on this particular machine? !!THUMBSX2!!
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arrgee
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Re: Anyone seen this topflash? BMCo auto-pay, "Dawn Patrol"

Post by arrgee »

Hi USL and welcome to the most knowledgeable site for these sorts of machines in the universe, you will find a good deal of very interesting information disseminated over this site. A very nice looking British Manufacturing Co wall machine you have there.

No doubt our intrepid overseas reporter John T Peterson from the US will be along to add any further information that he has.
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Re: Anyone seen this topflash? BMCo auto-pay, "Dawn Patrol"

Post by john t peterson »

I'm here and as intrepid as I can be but I have no specialized information to add on these fabulous BM Co. machines. Gameswat is more the expert here. And Mr. Pennymachines will link this discussion to the previous ones on this game and its several iterations.

So, just let me offer my welcome to a fellow Yank. Anyone who self-identifies as a Lobsterman has to be an excellent bloke.

J Peterson
Fellow mariner in America !!STEER!!
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Re: Anyone seen this topflash? BMCo auto-pay, "Dawn Patrol"

Post by uslobsterman »

Thanks all for the warm welcome. It's clear I'm going to enjoy it here.

Will post photos and comments re. my meager collection of other machines as time allows.

best from the frozen coast of Maine.

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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by pennymachines »

This BMCo cigarette payout WINAFAG sold in Germany yesterday for a very reasonable £197. No UK bidders because they didn't offer shipping.
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by treefrog »

I did have a mad moment in working out fuel and ferry costs, but it was only a brief mad moment :HaHa:
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by pennymachines »

treefrog wrote: Sat Dec 08, 2018 8:56 pm I did have a mad moment in working out fuel and ferry costs, but it was only a brief mad moment :HaHa:
Not put off by your trip to the Isle of Wight I hope? !!UHOH!!
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by treefrog »

Yes I would not do that again, especially that auction house, the most unhelpful I have ever used and I have used lots throughout the country.....

It is always frustrating seeing machines in far flung places where you know it is just not viable to buy and ship, eg that OW in the Channel Islands recently..... I have not bought a machine in a long time now :#:
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by coppinpr »

Wish I'd seen that, I could have got a German collector friend to buy and ship to me for £40 as he has a shiply courier he uses to collect from EH and he will bring machines back for 40 if he's already doing the outward trip. I'd have liked that machine.
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by paulbohlmann »

Hi,

I'm the one who bought the "winafag" - still need to pick it up, what is planned next week.

Can you tell me little more about - do you know when it was build?

As far as I know - Fag means Cigarette , but also has a not so nice meaning...
so I was a wondering about the name.
Will let you know more, when i have it in my garage.....

Regards Marco
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by pennymachines »

Firstly - Happy New Year Marco and well done on purchasing this unusual allwin for an unusual price.

We don't have anything concrete, but everything about these war themed BMCos suggests they were made during or immediately after WW2. I think probably during, because materials weren't available for new machines for several years after the war and by that time folk were pretty tired of war themes. Also, cigarettes were a prized 'luxury' during and immediately after the war.

'Fag' was established as a colloquial term for cigarette in British English long ago. Apparently it meant 'loose piece, last remnant of cloth' as far back as the 14th century and it was from this 'fag-end' meaning (i.e. the bit that's left after you smoke it) that it became applied to cigarettes. It remains in common use here. 'Fag' as pejorative term for homosexual was more common, it seems, in American usage.
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JC
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by JC »

It seems a little odd to me that BMCo would come up with an allwin, which we know was produced in a number of variants, as 'Win a Fag'. This seems far more Oliver Whales to me. I don't think I've ever encountered BMCo machines that have paid out anything other than coins - one exception being what appears to be a small number of large auto-pay allwins that dispensed a gift. Is it perhaps more likely that this particular machine was produced from BMCo stock after the war by Whales?

That aside, I'm afraid I do have to take issue with you Mr PM:
......for cigarette in British English long ago......
British English? BRITISH ENGLISH???? Have you been abducted by Microsoft? Please may I remind you, in no uncertain terms, that there is no such thing as British English. There is the English language and there is American English. I bear no malice toward our colonial cousins across the pond for bastardising our spoken and written word, but there is only one ENGLISH language. God save the Queen!
/\UK/\

Anyway.....
As far as I know - Fag means Cigarette , but also has a not so nice meaning...
That's American, not a term we've ever used here. However, the term 'fag' was traditionally common in British public schools. A fag was a younger pupil assigned to a more senior boy, to run errands, act as a servant and generally 'do things' - often (so we're told) along the lines of the American use of the word. Read 'Tom Brown's School Days' - will give a good insight to the English public school system, and will probably explain why we all have such stiff upper lips over here.
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john t peterson
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by john t peterson »

There is the English language and there is American English. I bear no malice toward our colonial cousins across the pond for bastardising our spoken and written word, but there is only one ENGLISH language. God save the Queen!
I resemble that remark.

J Peterson
Proud American Bastardizer of British English
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by pennymachines »

JC wrote: Thu Jan 03, 2019 1:01 am It seems a little odd to me that BMCo would come up with an allwin, which we know was produced in a number of variants, as 'Win a Fag'. This seems far more Oliver Whales to me. I don't think I've ever encountered BMCo machines that have paid out anything other than coins - one exception being what appears to be a small number of large auto-pay allwins that dispensed a gift. Is it perhaps more likely that this particular machine was produced from BMCo stock after the war by Whales?

There is a problem regarding the maker of these. I've always understood them to be BMCo. but none of them are included in Arcades & Slot Machines extensive listing for that company. Nor are they listed under Oliver Whales, although Whales did make a Win-A-Cig of course. The auto-pay mechanism is unique and unlike BMCo's other auto pay allwins and also unlike anything else Whales made. It's possible, as you suggest, that the Win-A-Fag was converted from a coin payout by another company (like Whales) but a bigger problem is not really knowing who built it in the first place. On the first page of this topic Gameswat posted an example sporting a label: W. West, Automatic Machine Maker, Bannerdale Road, Sheffield.

JC wrote: Thu Jan 03, 2019 1:01 am Please may I remind you, in no uncertain terms, that there is no such thing as British English.
Whether you like it or not JC (and I'm guessing by your tone, you don't :!?!: ) British English was a thing a couple of centuries before Bill Gates was in long trousers, defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as, "English as used in Great Britain, as distinct from that used elsewhere".

JC wrote: Thu Jan 03, 2019 1:01 am Anyway.....
As far as I know - Fag means Cigarette , but also has a not so nice meaning...
That's American, not a term we've ever used here.

Although that usage was uncommon in the UK when we were kids, it was sufficiently familiar by 2005 that Labour MP Bob Marshall-Andrews was accused of calling one of his colleagues a faggot. He claimed he was using obscure Italian slang 'faggio' (menial servant) but certainly wasn't referring to meatballs.
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by coppinpr »

I bear no malice toward our colonial cousins across the pond for bastardising our spoken and written word
Although I fully agree with JC in that there is only one "English" plus several versions of "Pidgin" English including the version used in the still to be recovered (when the state of the nation improves to a point any one wants it) colony across the North Atlantic I believe he is mistaken when he includes the word "spoken". Having read several books on language development it seems all agree that the version spoken in the southern states of the USA, including the accent (along with several words no longer used in the UK) is in fact how we (the general public) in the UK used to speak at the time (1650 to 1800). It is in fact us that have changed the way we talk, not the colonials :shock: (please keep this terrible fact to yourselves and on no account write to the BBC about it :didact: ).
This is also true of the true Australian accent which is, so they say, a London Cockney accent, added to of course but much like the version spoken in London in the early 19th cent. I suppose it could be said we IMPROVED on the English spoken word, whereas the colonies did not :!?!:
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Re: BM Co. Fleet Air Arm, Bomber Command, D-Day etc.

Post by paulbohlmann »

interesting discussion,
be sure - i did not want to start any cultural dispute


br Marco
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