A photo of the Rainford Steamwagon from the St Helens Heritage Network magazine by Chris Coffeey, with some information following up from an article in the newspaper.

Hello Chris, Congratulations on a thoroughly interesting article on the history of Rainford in this week's "St.Helens Star".

I was particularly intrigued by the accompanying photo of the steam lorry carrying the Rainford Potteries branding.

I have done some research into this vehicle and have come up with the following. It was built by the well-known steam lorry manufacturer Sentinel at their Shrewsbury Works in 1929, it is atype DG4 and Works No.7666 and delivered new to Rainford Potteries and was registered by the then Lancashire County Council.

It had a payload capacity of 6 tons and a maximum speed of fifteen mph. After seeing service with Rainford Potteries this steam lorry was sold to T. Lawrenson of Bootle where it ended its service life. Fortunately, quite a few steam vehicles from the Sentinel factory survive in preservation today and can be seen at various steam rallies.