I had an email enquiry from Dave Gregory regarding the front mudguard markings..He has noted the white tip applied to some bikes and also the red tip or band applied to others, either with or without additional number markings.
I am no expert on the various markings applied so defer to those with more knowledge.
So, any information on the mudguard colours and the purpose of any numbers applied? Also likely periods of use?...Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

On my bike: red tip, white lettering: BDS = Bomb Disposal Squad

email (option): viaconsu # planet dot nl

The white tip seems to have been a blackout visibility aid rather than a 'marking'. It appears in BEF photos from France during the phoney war and indeed many softskins had their left-hand wings painted white during this period suggesting that it was to make them visible to oncoming traffic.

It was sometimes used by Home Forces but in NW Europe seems to have been most associated with CMP on Traffic Control, along with the white webbing etc.

I have a mid-war reference somewhere confirming the use of the red mudguard tip by RE bomb disposal.

Hi Hans,

Hmmmmm, BDS! That's sounds so wickedly macho.

email (option): britool51@hotmail.com

Well, macho.... Believe me, a macho will not live very long to tell tall stories about this business.
I got my first explosive ordnance training in the Corps of Engineers, in the fifties. Wetting your pants was a reality during the very realistic training.
The training material did not contain explosives, but a very nasty greasy smoke generator, and you had to clean the thing (and yourself....) afterwards, and that took several hours.
Then, some time after demob, I was asked to volunteer for the provincial bomb reconnaissance and disposal unit of the Civil Defence Organisation; for that I got a fresh-up course and supplementary training in bomb disposal, and I started training reconnaissance crews.
I was allowed to keep this devil's egg, a 250lbs GP Mk4; it was a dud because the ground crew must have been in a terrible hurry and forgot to arm the pistols. The nose pistol could not be saved, but the rear Nr 30 still had the cover; I could screw it out by hand, after having checked if it was not a Nr 37 with booby trap. After that, it was steamed-out to remove the TNT. And now it rests in a local air-crash museum ...
And that's the reason why I have that BDS on my mudguard, in honour of the real men who risked their lives during and after the war!

email (option): viaconsu # planet dot nl

hans i got this vision of you speeding along on your motorcycle with that bomb strapped to the rack on the back to get it away fron the town dumping it in a field seconds before it goes off

email (option): roger.beck@node6.com

Yes, that was a hell of a ride; fortunately, I woke up before it went off....

email (option): viaconsu # planet dot nl