Indholdsfortegnelse for August 2021 i Heritage Commercials

Well, I was hoping to start this month’s comment with England having won EURO 2020 by beating Italy at Wembley, but it was not to be. Personally, I think we should have learnt by now that we need to go all out for a win rather than hold out for penalties, better to lose say 3-1 in normal time than to go through another dismal penalty shoot-out. That’s just my opinion. At least it showed that Covid restrictions have certainly been lifted, with thousands at the match and thousands more spectating around the country with very little social distancing evident. There looked to be hundreds at the Wimbledon finals too, but I can’t say how efficient social distancing was there. Let’s hope this doesn’t cause another huge spike and a…

Born in Shipham, Somerset, Donald was the eldest of three children, brother Robert and sister Jane. Donald married Jackie in 1971 at St Martins Church, Worle and they had three daughters Debbie Kate, Kelly Louise and Angela Pearl. Donald’s first job was working for Eddie Ford, tarmacking and quarry work. He then worked for Willetts, delivering animal feed around Somerset. This was his favourite job but wanting to earn more money, he went to work for Sliveys driving a tanker delivering heating oil, petrol and diesel around the South West. Don retired at 61 having driven for Sliveys for 27 years covering more than one million miles and delivering more than 100 million litres of fuel, with never a day off throughout his working life. Don had a passion for…

It’s almost 40 years since his grandfather passed away but Richard Brent still has vivid memories of the way he walked: “He always pointed his right foot inwards slightly. It was something he did naturally.” When your working life is spent guiding the head of a horse through all sorts of diverse testing terrain, then you learn very quickly to keep your own feet out of the way: “Having a heavy Shire horse step onto your toes is not really recommended,” says Richard with total understatement. Don’t worry, you are not reading the magazine Horse & Groom by mistake and we will get round to mechanised load shifters in a minute, but the point we want to make at the outset is how the Brent family have seemed to have…

One of Joseph’s key classic vehicle contacts is Dave Bonner from Southampton. They often chat about plant machinery with a link to Joseph’s dad’s pipeline days. When Joseph mentioned Heritage Commercials to Dave, he kindly contacted his friend, Eric Coats, the current owner of a well-documented 1965 Ford D800. The 1965 Ford D800 12-ton flatbed was supplied new to Hyde Abbey Motor Works Ltd, Winchester fitted with a flatbed body. On 11 July 1966, ownership passed to D.F. Ranger & Son at Mitcheldever, Hants. It was used for hauling paper with Portals of bank note fame nearby. The D800 provided invaluable service until it was involved in an accident at Bullington Cross (at the Junction of the A303 and A34) and written off by the insurance company. In 1970, the…

I can always remember the late Siddle C Cook talking about his frustration with carrying ballast. The conversation we had was probably about 40 years ago but the point he made is still more than salient today: “What a waste of effort.” He did have a great idea to get round it which as I’ll explain was actually a development of what some box tractor users already did, but – so far as I know – it’s never caught on. As yes, the industry has realised you just have to lump it – as you can’t get anywhere without it. Of course the boffins will tell you that it’s simply the law of physics that hauling tractors which pull loads of weight do in fact need themselves to be weighed…

A smiling face makes a big difference in this challenging world and that is exactly what you get when you meet Ken Jackson, one member of the family-run garage team, on the A1, up at Priestbridge, just north of Morpeth in Northumberland. In lorry terms, the Jackson’s recovery team has been located here since Scammell Pioneer ballast-tractor days. For those of you too young to remember those iconic Scammell heavy-haulers, with their lumbering, un-killable Gardner engines, these were dependable leviathans auctioned-off by the Ministry of Supply from years of war service and the Jackson family built up their heavy-recovery business on the back of these great trucks. The Jacksons have had an involvement with the British Army for many years partially due to their convenient proximity to the Otterburn training…

The firm came to prominence with transport enthusiasts in the 1970s with a distinctive and attractive green livery with red chassis and yellow cab tops mostly on AEC products running from Lower City Road, Tividale. A further notable feature was that all vehicles were given Santa names after female Italian saints. The company commenced operations in 1931 when Patrick Joseph Butler started out as a haulage contractor with a single lorry, building-up to a fleet of five vehicles by the start of the Second World War in 1939. Operations continued throughout the war and in 1944 Patrick’s son Fursey, joined the firm straight after leaving school. The business was converted into a private limited company known as P.J. Butler & Son Ltd in 1954, with a registered office at 12…

At the tail end of 1980, Scania’s new GPR range was unveiled, with the most obvious upgrade being the new cab that used a modular approach to construction. For long distance operation was the R cab with could have three engine choices under it. The iconic V8 as the R142 was the flagship but the R112 was the model that appealed to most. Eight years later, the model had a revamp and the R113/143 models replacing the established and popular R112/142. The changes were mostly to the drivelines, but there were a few tweaks to the cab as well, with side dirt deflectors the most notable difference and a new Topline high roof cab option, although, in fairness this was fairly small and nothing compared with the Volvo Globetrotter, DAF…

Due to the pandemic during 2020, it wasn’t possible to go to funfairs as everything was simply locked down and these events were simply not classed as essential. Thankfully, 2021 so far has gradually seen more restrictions slowly being lifted and this means that the travelling funfairs and circuses have been able to hit the roads again. This has delighted me no end not because I want to go and check out the rides, (I like my feet firmly on the ground) instead, I take notes where such events are taking place so that I can go armed with my camera and photograph some of the delightful older lorries which still see regular use on such work. In the last few weeks, Blackburn in Lancashire has seen several funfairs and…

Between 1928 and 1933, five different British manufacturers produced experimental or pilot-batch all-wheel-drive eight-leggers. The configuration therefore preceded the four-axle commercials with undriven front-ends that became the backbone of UK road haulage from the mid-1930s until the mid-1960s. But like so many great inventions and innovations originating in the UK, since the 1940s, the traction advantages of four driven axles have been exploited to a far greater extent elsewhere. No wonder we Brits could claim credit for inventing the concept of good sportsmanship (a.k.a. being a good loser). Research indicates the claimant to being the first-ever 8x8s were the B10E gun-tractors designed by Armstrong Siddeley, a British engineering group. Quirkily, the initial version was powered by a five-cylinder, 75bhp water-cooled aircraft radial engine. With front and rear wheel pairs mounted…

In the 1970s, Hemmings offered the Powell Duffryn Engineering Ltd Dempster Dumpster container system for industry and commerce. The Dempster Dumpster container was of eight cubic yards capacity and was delivered and collected from a customers’ premises using a Bedford TK 4x2 7.5 tonne Powell Duffryn Dempster Dumpster 5S collection vehicle. A conventional builders’ skip service was also available which offered customers a range of skip sizes from 2-16 cubic yard capacities. These were delivered and collected from customers’ premises using a chain lift type skip loader vehicle. Hemmings used the Sheppard Equipment Ltd Sheppard Meiller 8000 MK II, Telehoist Load Lugger and David Mackrill Engineering Ltd Maclift 16/19DA skip loader equipment. Some of the Maclift 16/19DA’s had a swivel head cross bar fitted to the main torsion tube. The…

ALBION TROUBLES Reading Bob Tuck’s article in the March edition of Heritage Commercials concerning the 1999 Albion Centenary Run brought back memories for me. I drove to the Hanover International Hotel at Hinckley on that August morning back in 1999 in order to witness the departure of those Albions after their overnight stay. I was sorry to read of the problems encountered by the J G Riddell Albion DB.24 and have attached a photo I took at the time of the lorry with one of the crew on his back under the Albion no doubt attending to a problem, a leaking radiator perhaps? After watching the departure of the participants on the next leg of their journey towards Glasgow, I duly returned towards home, stopping at a service station on…