Truck Shite

[DodgeRover]

I get loads of free beanies from our building materials suppliers, if I was spending £750k on trucks I would be expecting a fairly decent car or van let alone a jacket....

[cms206]

Thinking back I think I only drove one "big" FL - an F-reg FL7 250bhp 4x2 artic with an Allison auto 'box and a double reduction back axle.

 

We ran a few FL6s from a single automatic FL6.08 up to FL6.19s and a single much newer FL220, all 4x2 rigids.

 

Oddest ones I drove were a pair of US-spec 1992 FE7 autos which I never quite understood 'cos the broadly similar but UK-spec FS7 was available by the time the FEs were delivered.

 

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[CreepingJesus]

Think the FE was a heavy duty chassis, the S of FS was 'Swiss' for their odd width laws. Although being that it was built on the FL10/12 chassis, I'd imagine it amounts to the same thing. Six and half a dozen and all that. The full FS range encompassed some real oddballs, including the supercharged 7 that used to live near my old house, and AWD chassis with the 360 horse 10L and Telmas, for the mountains.

 

TS300 is nearer the mark: the local workshops I've been to (MAN Dunfermline and Drummond's Daf in Kirkcaldy) are a total sausage fest.

 

I spoke too soon about the council Dafs being tough wee buggers: the change in weather is wreaking havoc on them. Electrical and cooling problems caused by all the wet mank up inside the workings freezing over and bursting stuff. Apparently their retirement has been brought forward, so it is said.

[cms206]

 

 

Think the FE was a heavy duty chassis, the S of FS was 'Swiss' for their odd width laws. Although being that it was built on the FL10/12 chassis, I'd imagine it amounts to the same thing. Six and half a dozen and all that. The full FS range encompassed some real oddballs, including the supercharged 7 that used to live near my old house, and AWD chassis with the 360 horse 10L and Telmas, for the mountains.

The FEs were full US spec - ours had TD73 engines but Caterpillar units were an option, Allison autos, US-spec narrow hubs and push button handbrakes. The FS was more or less a heavy duty euro spec FL6 with the 7-litre mill from the FL7. The Swiss narrowbody ones were Volvo CH230s which has shaved down wheelarches to fit within the Swiss 2.3m width restrictions.

 

FS and FE for comparison...

 

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[Vantman]

This is the only 'small' Volvo I drove!

 

[0ldCh0d]

Here is one the works FE's........This one is no longer on the fleet, it was one of a batch that were sold on when the replacement Mercedes Econics arrived.

 

 

However, there are still 5 or 6 of them left on the fleet now & in daily use.  They are alright motors, apart from being bouncy when empty...

[0ldCh0d]

This is NOT my Picture, However, I have not seen a UK Waste PLC lorry for a long time (I know that Biffa took them over, However, trying to get pictures of the UK Waste PLC Lorries is pretty hard). in 1994, My Dad worked for this company & I used to go with him every Saturday morning. 

 

I remember when these very Volvo FL10 FEL's were introduced up here by UK Waste, It used to be Leyland Constructor 8x4 REL's (rear end loaders) & the idea was to phase out the REL's with these Volvo FEL's.

 

They were, at the time fitted with Volvo's own Powertronic fully automatic gearbox (NOT Geartronic) & when they were brand new in 1994, they were pretty nice machines, plus it was the first time I had ever been in an automatic lorry,  The Bathgate Depot got x3 of them to start with, All L reg, consecutively numbered, ended KSX. Supplied from Volvo Dealer in Broxburn.

 

They then also got a Batch of M Registration ones the following year(1995) I am sure they ended PSX.

 

Anyway.....

 

 

 

 

[cms206]

You're welcome

 

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[CreepingJesus]

I applied for the bin operative job with Fife the other month. Passed the interview with flying colours etc., but weighed up free uniform and DCPC against probably not driving much and £16k pa for a 36 hour week (leaving me no time to make more money) and decided against. Scared the crap out of the boss when the council asked for a reference though.

[bigstraight6]

I applied for the bin operative job with Fife the other month. Passed the interview with flying colours etc., but weighed up free uniform and DCPC against probably not driving much and £16k pa for a 36 hour week (leaving me no time to make more money) and decided against. Scared the crap out of the boss when the council asked for a reference though.

You made the right choice there, I appreciate the hours but the salary isn’t worth getting out of bed for.....

[0ldCh0d]

You're welcome

 

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WOW......They are cracking models. & Your picture. Are the models promotional ones or home made?

[cms206]

WOW......They are cracking models. & Your picture. Are the models promotional ones or home made?

Sadly not... both fron flickr. IIRC the UKW models were Code 3 promos for the company.

 

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[0ldCh0d]

Staying on UK Waste, They had a fleet of these, Roll ON/Roll OFF Leyland Constructors.....Identical to this...Again, not my picture.

 

 

 

 

 

[CreepingJesus]

Hooks are hilarious. I keep trying to get officially trained for free by the council, but it keeps getting kicked into the long grass.

 

You made the right choice there, I appreciate the hours but the salary isn’t worth getting out of bed for.....

The job's been readvertised since, so presumably someone else came to the same conclusion. The ejector driving job is more like £22-23k but until they sort their shit out over shift patterns (halfway between a chaotic 7 day/fortnight pattern and four on, four off) I'm not even considering jumping into that.

I'll be kicking myself when I'm skint in January though...

[wuvvum]

I have to say I thought the bins paid better than that.

[willswitchengage]

Staying on UK Waste, They had a fleet of these, Roll ON/Roll OFF Leyland Constructors.....Identical to this...Again, not my picture.

 

 

 

 

 

 

That looks very similar actually to the military version, which I never knew actually carried the Leyland DAF badge

 

[CreepingJesus]

I have to say I thought the bins paid better than that.

The pay for the same job over in Clackmannanshire was only a wee bit more, and the travelling would've eaten the difference, so I wasn't too fussed to get knocked back. Similar pay and outcomes applying for jobs driving Fife's Mobile Museum, and Edinburgh's art bus. Councils don't pay well any more, and they don't have the same long term benefits any more either. Same story with Tesco's and their drivers I found out a few years back.

Yet I was talking to a mate of mine the other day, he was telling me how his current driving gig is worth £30k basic, and his overnight allowance is well over £60 per night. Industry standard is £25. Most of us don't do the job for money or glamour!

[0ldCh0d]

 

Not my pictures

 

[willswitchengage]

In the 'looker' category, the new MAZ Prostor complete with Euro 6 MB engines...

 

I've seen Turkish Ford trucks in the UK and a Finnish Sisu. Wonder if any of these Belarussians have ever made it over the border?

 

 

 

Also, the only other Eastern-bloc manufacturer, Kamaz, appears to have finally made its own indigenous offering: (previously they were using the old Axor cab)

 

[CreepingJesus]

I spy Telligent Shift paddle in the second pic. Although the first one looks like a better made 'disguised prototype' Actros.

The cab dimensions of the third one look quite Axor-y too, I wonder if it's the old Axor cab frame in new clothes? Presumably Merc wouldn't mind getting cheap pressings for the spares stock, they'll have to consider that cab for a while to come.

 

I look forward to somebody setting up a KAMAZ garage in Glenrothes in years to come. It'll blend right in to the Bloc aesthetic.

[scruff]

That looks very similar actually to the military version, which I never knew actually carried the Leyland DAF badge

 

 

 

 

IIRC that Leyland Daf came into being part-way through the DROPS contract. 

 

Nice lorries. 8x6 with Perkins Eagle 800 engines (300 horse??), Allison autos and Telma retarders (bloody awesome). Had good fun barrelling these and the Foden version down the runways at Colsterworth. I'm always surprised how many are still in service too.

[scruff]

Back on FL Volvos who has had the pleasure of the 7.5 ton FL4? 

[CreepingJesus]

I was trying to forget...

 

The FL4/FLC was an absolute and utter shitbox. No redeeming qualities whatsoever. None.

The FL6 goes down in my book as the worst truck I regularly drove, but at least the 220 would hang on ok after a fashion. The 4L four pot in the toy wheeler was unbelievable. Gutless. I wouldn't even use it for a generator.

[CreepingJesus]

Not maybe directly relevant, except that any truck that lived with them for more than ten minutes became a rolling shit tip (and a few of us have driven for them), but goodnight P+H...

 

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/nov/28/wholesaler-p-and-h-goes-into-administration-loss-of-2500-jobs-palmer-and-harvey-tesco

[cms206]

We had no FL4s but I did have occasional use of an Allison auto 'boxed FL6.08 which went like fuck. We ran several others which I glanced on earlier; a mid 80s FL6.14, two '89 FL6.17s, two '91 FE7 autos, a pair of later FL6.19 autos and a solitary FL220 which lasted a matter of weeks as it's Vestergaard Elephant equipment was too complicated for our MT to deal with compared to the FMC TM1800s we were used to.

 

The Volvos had been quite a late development for us, our first (FL6.17 AV01635, G635 VMM) only arrived with us from Heathrow in 2006 IIRC to replace an early 80s Ford Cargo 1011, followed by FL6.14 AV01758 from Manchester, FL6.17 AV00727 from Gatwick, FE7s AV02091/2 from Aberdeen, FL6.19s AV02093/4 from Edinburgh and the FL220 which didn't last long enough to gain an AV-number had been inherited from British Airways.

 

We ran everything into the ground and the FLs took the abuse well; considering in 2006 we still had a Bedford TL on the books, the only wagons which actually gave any problems were three DAF 45s which had no end of clutch issues in the short time they lasted before disposal in favour of the Ford Cargos they were supposed to replace.

 

Our first FL6, G635 VMM, on Christmas morning 2008.

 

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[quicksilver]

Volvo FLC you say? Here's one of the little shitboxes, new to B&Q. You can't do it when you B&Q it.

T910 HCW - Jay Whyatt by Adam Floyd, on Flickr

It seems to be dead now.

[CreepingJesus]

The one I had the privilege* of driving was the bogey prize at IKEA Edinburgh. Excel Logistics used to run the home delivery, and the rest of the fleet were new, locally bought, sequentially numbered MAN L2000s (Y90-94 TGA iirc, Mitchell's in Grangemouth had Y95-99 TGA, which were actual TGAs!).

How it got there was a mystery. It was Excel liveried, unlike the MANs, and very much the short straw. In fact, if you got the keys to it in the morn, you'd got the short straw, full stop. It was used to shuttle delivery stock from the shop to a unit a couple of miles away in Loanhead. It was a shit job, the only consolation was you were back at the shop for lunch. Still, as same day delivery closed at 3, the last few hours of the shift (and sometimes overtime) would be doing locals in it. Mostly round the Forth Valley, nobody wanted to take it further.

The one and only time I got further was a full load to Aberdeen. Rammed to the gunnels. I certainly wasn't putting it near a weighbridge. (We used to get coach trips down from Dundee, Aberdeen and the Highlands, and they'd usually all specify one delivery address to save cost: it would inevitably be an elderly neighbour who was in all day and had a big garage!) Boy did that little shitbox struggle. The climb out of Dundee on the A90 is legendary for giving your truck a proper workout, and it failed miserably. The Aberdeen boys in their V8 Scannys were just ripping the piss. Pedestrians overtook me. The rabbits had aeons to get out of the way. (Incidentally, the only other thing to come close to being that bad on that hill, was one of Barr's Seddon Atkinsons: but in fairness, it was very leggy and 180hp Phasers are well out of their depth at 24t...)

Thankfully, it wasn't far into Aberdeen, so it didn't fail miserably over the top of Anderson Drive, but even so, my porter and I were deaf and shaking when we got there. I swear I had vibration white finger, and I recall punching the dashboard once or twice trying to snatch a shift into 3rd. (The bigger FL6s were guilty of that too: it was uncanny, chasing the wee stubby gear lever halfway round the cab...)

Still, on the way back, unladen bar some pallets, a pallet truck and some packaging, it wouldn't climb away from Stonehaven (another test of a climb) without dropping speed. Utterly pathetic. And it turned out to have a prodigious thirst too. It did nothing even half as well as the MANs, except never actually FTP. It was always there, lurking. You prayed never to have a breakdown in a MAN, cos its' keys would be coming your way. There was a certain creeping horror that the smug little shitebag would be there... waiting...watching...

 

As far as I know, there was quite a lot of 70s Renault in those, which makes sense. La Regie must've been pissing themselves laughing, cos the contemporary Renault offerings were far superior, with slick ZF boxes and the Daf joint venture cab on. I suppose the Gothenburg Gang had the last laugh a few years later, but it still mystifies me why they could never build a decent puddle jumper: practically everything else they've built has been at least fairly good, FL6 excepted. I bet if they did one now, with the Renault cab and a Deutz engine, like the bigger FLs successors, it would be utter shite.

[willswitchengage]

What were FTF trucks?

 

[Vantman]

What were FTF trucks?

 

 

Specialist Dutch heavy haulage stuff,i have loads of literature about them in my loft but all in Dutch!!  This should help---

http://www.curbsideclassic.com/automotive-histories/truckstop-classics-ftf-trucks-screaming-jimmies-going-dutch/

[Guest Hooli]

AEC Mercury I saw it in a museum yesterday. North  West Electricity  power generator set I'd say.