The Lincolnshire Steam & Vintage Rally always throws up one or two items not seen before, and this year, it was a combination of a couple of military vehicles and a few commercials seen in the pages of magazines and now in-the-flesh. This rally never disappoints with its variety, content and sheer numbers, and its popularity is enhanced by the very reasonable entry charges, be it on the day or for weekend campers.

The aforementioned military vehicles included a 1936 open-cabbed Tilling Steevens searchlight lorry, quite a contrast to the later commercial on show. The other interesting item was the Fordson RAF tanker, complete with dummy refuellor out front. This was part of the Manston Fire Museum Display, which I understand through the CCMV forum on Fotopic is now housed just up the road at Scampton where it is more appreciated.

The two commercials I appreciated seeing were both Fodens, one the immaculate Breedon & Cloud Hill Lime Works Ltd liveried S20, the other the Tilcon Slater’s Transport liveried S36.There were many other excellent commercials on show from the Midlands, including some from Peter Hedger whose collection is up for auction at Quadring near Spalding in Lincolnshire on Saturday 10 October, full information from Thimbleby & Shorland.

An excellent display of fire appliances both large and small led on to another first for Lincoln, a section for vintage and classic caravans, which were presented superbly. Maybe the three entrants within the Bygones section should move up here to join their brethren, freeing up another avenue of spaces for true bygone collections, as long as they are of suitable quality and not just a ticket in.

The car and motorcycle lines are very wide ranging with all shapes, sizes and countries of origin, and as always, we had the largest line-up of steam engines I’ve ever seen outside of Dorset. Miniature steam as well is very well catered for if a little on the perimeter of the site, but at least static displays and trade stands do not have to ingest their smoke. It was good to see a handful of steam cars as well.

Tractor displays are perhaps not the strongest area of Lincoln’s offering, but still perfectly acceptable for all of that. Thought does go into their line-up so one can see subtle differences between models side-by-side, but it is such a pity more veteran tractors cannot be accommodated. The horticultural section was as wide ranging as ever, and an offer was made of a Barford Atom or two to plug the gap as no examples of this Lincolnshire manufactured machine were present. Stationary engines continue the theme with many diverse makes and models, many with working equipment being demonstrated, others with relevant bygones arranged to add to the display.

The models continue to be housed in the old exhibition halls, and the quality here is always superb, especially the fairground and the Eva transport models, truly remarkable. Meccano is always here in large numbers but this year I was introduced to Bayko building models, truly representative of their time, which I understand was from the 30s until the 60s. It gained its name from it being made from plastic, namely Bakelite. Having been brought up on Lego, this seemed a much more crisper and realistic design.

Moving on to the fairground, there were a couple of new additions such as Ken Fox’s Wall of Death which we usually see at Haddenham, and a Noah’s Ark ride. Shaw’s Moonrocket made its last appearance prior to being sold, so whether that will return in future years, time will tell. As always, a number of showmen’s engines stood around and fairground organs filled the air with tunes to add mucho atmosphere to the proceedings.

Due to the uncertainty of the work situation earlier in the year, we’d booked in a compact display of matchboxes as a filler, but were quote taken aback by the interest in them. Like the milk bottles a few years back, everyday items seem to create more attention despite them being quite common, and unsolicited offers of collections were forthcoming all weekend. They’re definitely worth another outing next year before we rotate our display again.

Lincoln along with Woolpit was one of the show’s I was going to attend this year come hell or high water, and as next year is the 25th Anniversary, there’s bound to be something new to see. We’ll see you there.