My yard shunter, still going strong, needs a new interior if any ones got one, will buy complete truck if needed , be nice to finish her and get back on the road again.
Im thinking of sending these pics to volvo to point out there electrics aint that good… 
A pal of mine has a Volvo 8 wheeler tipper, & the electrics have caused him loads of bother,silly little things render the vehicle immobile the wiring is a nightmare,& expensive to rectify, Every thing is diagnostic & costley, so much for progress. Regards Larry,PS, Im not a Volvo fan myself. Regards Larry
Tavern Hire in Maldon, Essex have been long term Volvo users since the 70’s, but that may be coming to an end, with the Govner looking at MAN for his next purchase. Volvo’s have become a nightmare to run, loads of electrical problems, Add-Blue
problems, gearbox problems, Tacho problems, dealer/service agent problems … . . . . . . . . 
Bring back the 385 intercooler F12, the last decent reliable Volvo made. 
A couple of pics of a preserved C-series 4x2 with a ■■■■■■■ 350 Super-E. All the lit. shows ERF as supplying the 320 in 4x2 chassis and the 350 in 6x4 chassis. Was this one retro-fitted or factory-fitted then?
Interesting that the system has blanked out the word ‘■■■■■■■■■ Are ■■■■■■■ 14litre straight six diesels now politically incorrect? They certainly made better lorry engines than society makes stop-oil activists 
A closer look at ERF’s Trail-Blazer campaign throws up another anomaly. I have just acquired a 1980 Motor Show leaflet / brochure quite clearly showing B-series ERFs with the SP3 cabs that adorned the new C-series a couple of years later. I had no idea that late B-series ERFs looked like early C-series! This may answer the question of why some C-series Middle-East export units appeared to be based on B-series chassis.
ro
Does anyone know which issue of TRUCK magazine this Pat Kennett road test appeared in? The ERF CP was unveiled in late 1984 (and 1984 is mentioned on the first page) but the article might have been printed in early 1985.
Or, if anyone has scans of it (four pages I believe), perhaps they could do the honours and pop them on here! Many thanks.
Ro
EDIT to say that I now have the offending article! ^^^^^^
Looks like a twin-steer with a lift axle on the bulker. Probably a CP by C-reg, though often you couldn’t tell. It’s got C 290 so we know it’s a Cummins.
I obtained for a good price on ebay this week an interesting book about ERFs in New Zealand. I was surprised to see pictures of several double-drive C-series ERFs with Cummins 370 lumps and 9sp Fullers. This would have been mid-80s.
Was the 370 a factory fettled NTE 350, does anyone know?
ERF’s domestic market offered its 6x4s with NTE 320 and Middle-East export model with 350.
But 370 would be great in a 6x4 C-series.
I’ve done a bit more research on the illusive NTE 370. I think they were probably significantly more expensive and less easy to keep within the economy band than their lower-powered stablemates, from what I gather.
One wonders why the NTE 370 was not offered by ERF for its C-series in the UK and indeed, whether or not it was offered instead of the NTE 350 in the Middle-East export version. I can find little reference to it in ERF literature. Ford ran the E370 in its Transcon, rated at 345 bhp.
Dyer’s book on the Transcon says this of the introduction of the ‘big cam’ NTE engine. The two more powerful engines, the E350 and the E370 were again aftercooled….with a heat exchanger unit that doubled as the intake manifold, but featured a lower compression ratio to the E290 of 14.3:1. This maintained reliability and was achieved by the use of a deeper piston bowl. The injection timing was slightly different too and the injectors featured nine holes rather than eight. Engine speeds were down on the old NTCs, with the E290 and E350 running to maximum of just 1900 rpm and the big E370 running to 2100rpm. The two lower-powered units provided optimum performance and economy between 1200 and 17000rpm, making them extremely flexible, which meant fewer gear changes.
I do remember in Kent, Ken Trowell’s 6x4 Transcon had the 370; they were badged HA4435.
In Australia and possibly elsewhere, the 855 Cummins, governed to 1900 rpm. were known as Formula xyz, the Formula 290 was a popular engine, well respected for its balance between power/torque and economy, in its era.
That’s interesting. The 855 was just another name for the famous 14-litre straight six Cummins (855 cu inches = 14-litres). The NTC 290 was very popular and successful here. The 300 version of it was, I think, an American option that didn’t filter through to Shotts in UK who built Cummins diesels under licence.
It became NTE 290 when the big-cam version appeared in the late '70s.
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is this Kingsley
I was pondering this afternoon. We talk these days about how super-comfortable today’s lorries are and how easy they are to drive. And I’m sure most of us wouldn’t want to spend week after week living in ‘70s or ‘80s cabs. But if I had to take a lorry out for the joy of it over the Alps or Pyrenees, I’d still want an ERF C-series with a Cummins NTE 290 and a Fuller RTX in it. During the 2000s when I was driving modern trucks, the single thing I missed most, by far, was all that grinding down through the gears in the mountains using a constant-mesh box with a stick-shift for every gear change.
