Spare Parts Box, Chorehorse Charging Set

One of the many things that my late father purchased from the local government surplus store post WW2 was this small tool box. It wasn't bought as a collectable, but just as a useful small metal box. It was put to good use as something to store small abrasive wheels and rotary wire brushes in and eventually it passed to me. I continued to use it for the same purpose until 20 years or so ago when I had too much that I wanted to fit in it.

I have always been fascinated by the label inside with the list of contents and tried to imagine what vehicle or equipment it was intended for.

It didn't quite make sense being a spare parts box for a vehicle as one of the contents is a cylinder head gasket and it would have to be a very small vehicle/engine for the gasket to fit in the box. After looking online I believe that I've identified it as the spare parts box for the Chorehorse Charging Set.

https://hmvf.co.uk/topic/27027-chore...rging-set-mk1/

In Canada the Chore Horse charging sets were manufactured by OMC - Johnson Outboard Co. at their Peterborough, Ontario plant during WWII and put out 10 amps at 30VDC and were mainly used to charge batteries. No self respecting RCEME troop went into the field without one.

Was the Chore Horse used for anything other than charge batteries, i.e. a conventional generator?

Wireless trucks used the Chore Horse to both run the radios and charge the batteries. The trucks had a switching board that allowed the wireless operator to choose from battery power, the truck's dynamo or the Chore Horse generator. If you look closely at the picture you can see where the leads from the Chore Horse are attached to the switching board at the bottom right and the large knob on the bottom left is where the operator chose the Chore Horse to supply the power. The operator also controlled the interior lights from this board.