Our Touring Past

Propert Infill Panels.

I have had a few requests about the infill panels that fit on the outside, in between the outer and inner shells. They stop the wind blowing around your ears while your in bed, and they also stop the snakes from getting in.

This is a photo of where the Infill Panels go.

And these are the Infill Panels ready to be painted.

I have made up a few sets so if your Propert is missing them, send me an email for the details.

Richard.

Well, after a lot of phone calls and emails to The Properts we finally met up with Bill and his lovely wife Helen, their Son and 2 Grandchildren.( so it was 3 generations of Properts. ) Who had prepared a wealth of information for Linda and I to have a look at last weekend, I think they had so much history on their family we could have spent 2 weekends looking through it all, there was just so many photos and I could not believe some of the stuff that Thomas Propert had kept over his life time as a motor body builder.
It was just as well Bill had the foresight to collect it all, otherwise it may just have been thrown out and lost forever.

I now need to update sections of the Family history that I have, as some of the gaps and time lines have now been filled in.

I will post a small portion of the information that they gave us, just to wet your appetite at this stage.

On the 1st of October 1935 Thomas Propert Snr and Thomas Propert Jnr opened a business "Tom Propert & Son" at 20-22 Missenden Road Newtown. Building special commercial vehicles and caravans for Raycophone. An offer was made to buy the business at some stage during the war, so it was sold.. They then restarted work in a vacant service station in Vaucluse under the name of "Propert Gold Seal Products" carrying out a lot of sheet metal work.
After the war they were building station wagons for the ABC Snowy River Scheme and some caravans mainly for hire.
Thomas Propert Snr retired from the business and with the assistance of Thomas Propert Jnr he designed the Patent Folding Caravan. The business then traded as "Propert Patent Folding Caravans" and continued up untill 1974 when Thomas Propert Jnr retired.

The image below is of an original decal from when the business traded as Propert Gold Seal Products.

An early brochure for the Propert Patent Folding Caravan. The business was still trading as Propert Gold Seal Products at this stage.

G'day Richard,

Some really wonderful information you've posted about the Properts there (family and businesses). Really interesting that there were two generations involved.

I was interested to read about the Trailaway caravan too. That's information we haven't heard before (or at least I hadn't). I seem to remember that the so-called 'one-off' in the National Museum has a steel skin (don't think it's aluminium?). Do you know if that's true of the Trailaways you saw pictures of as well?

Anyway, well done - you've advanced the Propert story a long way with your research and your contacts. I - and I'm sure others - are looking forward to reading the next instalment.

Don Ricardo

Hi Don R
The caravans in the photos that I have, one is clad in bare alumimium and another looks to be identical but painted the same as the caravan on the front of the brochure.

The Trailaway in the NMA is described as having "The body of the caravan has a wooden frame clad in screwed-on pink-painted aluminium sheets". Who knows it may even be the caravan in the photo that I have.

Cheers.
Richard

Hi Richard,

So the cladding is aluminium...

I noted when I saw it that the NMA Propert wasn't lined. I'm not sure whether all Trailaways were like that, or the NMA was unlined because it was a demo model of sorts. However I figured that without any lining and/or insulation it would be quite a little oven in summer and a little ice box in winter.

Don Ricardo

Hi Don R
The Trailaway in the NMA is partly lined, I just had a look at the virtual tour of the inside of the trailaway and it shows that the ceiling is lined and parts of the walls as well. Its that close to being fully lined I dont know why they didnt.

Richard.

Propert Folding Caravans at the Australia World Fair.

Propert Folding Caravans at the 1956 Australia Word Fair.
From left is Thomas Propert Jnr ,Tom's sister Dorothy and Thomas Propert Snr.
It is interesting to see another Propert Trailaway Caravan.
I originally thought that this was an image from the same Fair, but it has a different backgroung, so it could be a photo from the 1954 Melbourne Motor Show.
A 1956 article on the Australia World Fair, with a segment on Propert Folding Caravans.

Propert 1952 Patent.

This is the 8 page Patent application submitted by Thomas Gershom Propert on the 2nd of October 1952. With the Patent published on the 4th of December 1952 and finally accepted on the 6th of April 1954.

It is interesting to note that the Patent is headed as " Improvements in caravans and like enclosures and containers."
The application basically covers any folding mechanism that make an enclosure bigger once it is folded out, with the patent covering enclosures from caravans, boats and even down to a bird cage.
Patent page 2

Patent Page 3

Patent page 4

Patent page 5

Patent page 6

Patent page 7

This is the technical drawing of the Folding caravan submitted with the application, and the caravan plan submitted doesnt resemble the Propert Folding Caravan as we know it, although it is similar with a door on the side. I wonder why this model wasnt continued with.

Propert Folding Caravan Model.

This is a scale model of the folding caravan that Thomas Propert Snr would have made to test the theory of his folding caravan principal. It is assumed that the model was made before 1952 to go along with the Patent application submitted in that year. The model scale would be about 1 inch to a foot., so it is just over 6" wide and that would make a full size van a little over 6' wide. The model is complete with wheel arches, extending draw bar, built in furniture inside and has a working folding mechanism.

The plan below is the original patent drawings for the proposed "Folding Caravan".
The first photo is of the caravan "folded for travel."

I found this little article in a 2003 Caravan World Magazine on a Propert folding caravan from Werner Ebert, who would be the last enthusiast that I know of that was in contact with Thomas Propert before he passed away.