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Here’s my understanding of some background of the Rootes Archive.
In 2004 Puegeot transferred their collection of Rootes engineering drawings to the Association of Rootes Car Clubs (ARRC). It organized a Charitable Trust to take custody of them, the Rootes Archive Centre Trust (RACT). RACT is a registered charity in the UK.
The collection of well over a third of a million drawings of parts and cars has been housed in several locations since. There were four main streams of income that supported the operating costs involved in renting space to store and access the collection – a donation for the ARRC, a donation from a car insurance company that covered many Rootes cars and private donations and fundraising events.
Over the years rents continued to increase and recently the donation from the insurance company was unilaterally decreased. However private donations have climbed. The RACT Trustees understood the dangers of decreasing income and escalating costs. Before the economic situation became dire they opted to buy a unit to house the collection, freeing the Trust from the endless cycle of rent increases.
Late in 2016 they decided to proceed and by late 2017 they had moved into their new customized home.
The collection includes nearly 200-thousand drawings on Aperture Cards (Microfiche) alone, plus over 10-thousand large oversized rolled paper drawings and nearly 50 cabinets, each full of vellum type drawings about 2’ by 3’ in size. Additionally, there are several smaller standard file cabinets containing thousands of legal sized drawings.
The drawings are generally stored by using their drawing numbers. (the sorting of the large paper rolls is ongoing. The drawing number is also its Rootes Part number. However, there are many more (perhaps 5 times as many) drawings as there are part numbers in all the Rootes Parts manuals. Rootes engineers used these extra drawings to give needed instructions and specifications for building the cars and necessary tooling.
To guarantee preservation, volunteers are scanning the drawings. Over 15K drawings on Aperture Cards (microfiche) have been scanned in the past year and a half.
Once the drawing file is digitized it is copied and the copy is stored in a remote location. All the eggs are not being kept in just one basket. My personal focus (selfishly) has been to preserve as many Tiger and Alpine drawings as possible.
As the drawings get scanned, the digital files can be easily examined anywhere in the world. (each is intentionally rather large, about 15mb) Tom Hall has already worked with what’s been made available to him, about a thousand drawings. Much of the process is now understood and progress is literally being made daily. We have recruited a few volunteers who plan to start the scan of the next ten thousand drawings, after which most of our initial Tiger/Alpine goal will have been accomplished.
Among the most important Tiger specific drawings discovered so far are those that have confirmed the observational conclusions that are at the foundation of STOA's TAC Program.
The PDF below contains a more detailed and excellent 6-page article on the Archive's history written by RACT Trustee Andy Bye.
BT
In 2004 Puegeot transferred their collection of Rootes engineering drawings to the Association of Rootes Car Clubs (ARRC). It organized a Charitable Trust to take custody of them, the Rootes Archive Centre Trust (RACT). RACT is a registered charity in the UK.
The collection of well over a third of a million drawings of parts and cars has been housed in several locations since. There were four main streams of income that supported the operating costs involved in renting space to store and access the collection – a donation for the ARRC, a donation from a car insurance company that covered many Rootes cars and private donations and fundraising events.
Over the years rents continued to increase and recently the donation from the insurance company was unilaterally decreased. However private donations have climbed. The RACT Trustees understood the dangers of decreasing income and escalating costs. Before the economic situation became dire they opted to buy a unit to house the collection, freeing the Trust from the endless cycle of rent increases.
Late in 2016 they decided to proceed and by late 2017 they had moved into their new customized home.
The collection includes nearly 200-thousand drawings on Aperture Cards (Microfiche) alone, plus over 10-thousand large oversized rolled paper drawings and nearly 50 cabinets, each full of vellum type drawings about 2’ by 3’ in size. Additionally, there are several smaller standard file cabinets containing thousands of legal sized drawings.
The drawings are generally stored by using their drawing numbers. (the sorting of the large paper rolls is ongoing. The drawing number is also its Rootes Part number. However, there are many more (perhaps 5 times as many) drawings as there are part numbers in all the Rootes Parts manuals. Rootes engineers used these extra drawings to give needed instructions and specifications for building the cars and necessary tooling.
To guarantee preservation, volunteers are scanning the drawings. Over 15K drawings on Aperture Cards (microfiche) have been scanned in the past year and a half.
Once the drawing file is digitized it is copied and the copy is stored in a remote location. All the eggs are not being kept in just one basket. My personal focus (selfishly) has been to preserve as many Tiger and Alpine drawings as possible.
As the drawings get scanned, the digital files can be easily examined anywhere in the world. (each is intentionally rather large, about 15mb) Tom Hall has already worked with what’s been made available to him, about a thousand drawings. Much of the process is now understood and progress is literally being made daily. We have recruited a few volunteers who plan to start the scan of the next ten thousand drawings, after which most of our initial Tiger/Alpine goal will have been accomplished.
Among the most important Tiger specific drawings discovered so far are those that have confirmed the observational conclusions that are at the foundation of STOA's TAC Program.
The PDF below contains a more detailed and excellent 6-page article on the Archive's history written by RACT Trustee Andy Bye.
BT
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