I dare say your question is ‘more important’ CF, but I’d quite like to get my question properly launched first.
I might add that I have defined the ‘European’ as the higher specc’d Europeanised version of the standard MW-cabbed ERF. However, I have only inferred that from the various writings (brochures and articles).
I have also assumed that all ‘Europeans’ were LHD; but what of Beresford’s 5MW-cabbed ERFs with Rolls 220s and 10-speed Fullers, 14 of which were RHD and one of which was LHD? I have seen several RHD ERFs on various internet sites described as ‘Europeans’ so is this an erroneous result of the folk-myth that all MWs were ‘Europeans’ or were some ‘Europeans’ actually RHD?
The whole topic is really open to scrutiny! Robert
robert1952:
I dare say your question is ‘more important’ CF, but I’d quite like to get my question properly launched first.
I might add that I have defined the ‘European’ as the higher specc’d Europeanised version of the standard MW-cabbed ERF. However, I have only inferred that from the various writings (brochures and articles).
I have also assumed that all ‘Europeans’ were LHD; but what of Beresford’s 5MW-cabbed ERFs with Rolls 220s and 10-speed Fullers, 14 of which were RHD and one of which was LHD? I have seen several RHD ERFs on various internet sites described as ‘Europeans’ so is this an erroneous result of the folk-myth that all MWs were ‘Europeans’ or were some ‘Europeans’ actually RHD?
The whole topic is really open to scrutiny! Robert
Probably the best way to define it is how the factory described and titled it at point of dispatch.As opposed to what might have happened after market by the standards of the domestic market environment at the time.In which anything outside of the typical guvnors A series type heap with a Gardner in it might understandably have been seen as something ‘special’ and then erroneously titled ‘European’ to denote it.
Although it would say a lot about the state of that domestic market if just a 220 Rolls and a Fuller in a 5 MW cab made something,that was seen after market,by the average poor lumbered driver population,as being ‘special’ enough to the point of being given the same differentiation as a 420.Let alone if the factory actually saw it as that.
Took these pics at Rush Green yesterday, took 1st 1 from distance, but then as walking away noticed the Number plate stuck in the front, so climbed up on some old tyres to get the No. plate in, it might not be the plate off this wagon & may just have been wedged in there at some point, but if it is then it could give a reference point for someone! Regards Chris
adr:
Took these pics at Rush Green yesterday, took 1st 1 from distance, but then as walking away noticed the Number plate stuck in the front, so climbed up on some old tyres to get the No. plate in, it might not be the plate off this wagon & may just have been wedged in there at some point, but if it is then it could give a reference point for someone! Regards Chris
Well-spotted Adr! Yes the number plate is the right one. It belonged to Partrick of Northants and did Europe, mostly Portugal. Here is a pic of it in all its glory, taken by Ashley Coghill who travelled in it as a youth. There are plenty more pics of it on the ERF LHD 5MW thread. Cheers! Robert
Carryfast:
Probably the best way to define it is how the factory described and titled it at point of dispatch.As opposed to what might have happened after market by the standards of the domestic market environment at the time.In which anything outside of the typical guvnors A series type heap with a Gardner in it might understandably have been seen as something ‘special’ and then erroneously titled ‘European’ to denote it.
I’m afraid you’re out of luck on that score, because ERF in its own 1972 Earls Court Stand 88 brochure described its 3MW-cabbed Gardner-engined 38-tonner - the MGG 380 - as a ‘European’ (they’ve even put the word in quotation marks to show that they mean European by name, not just by nature). Robert
Carryfast:
Probably the best way to define it is how the factory described and titled it at point of dispatch.As opposed to what might have happened after market by the standards of the domestic market environment at the time.In which anything outside of the typical guvnors A series type heap with a Gardner in it might understandably have been seen as something ‘special’ and then erroneously titled ‘European’ to denote it.
I’m afraid you’re out of luck on that score, because ERF in its own 1972 Earls Court Stand 88 brochure described its 3MW-cabbed Gardner-engined 38-tonner - the MGG 380 - as a ‘European’ (they’ve even put the word in quotation marks to show that they mean European by name, not just by nature). Robert
Maybe in that case the official title of ‘European’ can possibly be defined as actually specced by the factory as a 38 tonner maybe also LHD applying to everything from a 1972 3 MW with a Gardner in it to a 1973 7MW with a ■■■■■■■ NTC.As I’ve said elsewhere,like Bedford in the case of the TM amongst others,product rationalisation or even sanity wasn’t ERF’s strong point.I’m guessing that any road test results for the former would have looked a bit different to the latter with whole sections of unprintable swearing related to its hill climbing ability at 38t gross. Although look on the bright side at least we could have just described it as the zb useless piece of zb zb zb junk on here.
adr:
Took these pics at Rush Green yesterday, took 1st 1 from distance, but then as walking away noticed the Number plate stuck in the front, so climbed up on some old tyres to get the No. plate in, it might not be the plate off this wagon & may just have been wedged in there at some point, but if it is then it could give a reference point for someone! Regards Chris
Well-spotted Adr! Yes the number plate is the right one. It belonged to Partrick of Northants and did Europe, mostly Portugal. Here is a pic of it in all its glory, taken by Ashley Coghill who travelled in it as a youth. There are plenty more pics of it on the ERF LHD 5MW thread. Cheers! Robert
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Hi Robert, seen the other pics now of this wagon thanks, not seen them all before but there so much on here that’s impossible . Don’t know how long it been at Rush Green, but looking at the other pics access was a bit easier a while back, where now it is now a lot more overgrown & hemmed in by other wagons too! You wonder what condition it was in when first went in there? Regards Chris
adr:
Don’t know how long it been at Rush Green, but looking at the other pics access was a bit easier a while back, where now it is now a lot more overgrown & hemmed in by other wagons too! You wonder what condition it was in when first went in there? Regards Chris
It’d be interesting to know what the drive-line was vis-a-vis engine and gearbox. Robert
adr:
Hi Robert, seen the other pics now of this wagon thanks, not seen them all before but there so much on here that’s impossible . Don’t know how long it been at Rush Green, but looking at the other pics access was a bit easier a while back, where now it is now a lot more overgrown & hemmed in by other wagons too! You wonder what condition it was in when first went in there? Regards Chris
It was on the road Chris.
RG used to use it on their low-loader for bringing vehicles in!.
They sold the Rolls 220 engine, gearbox and axle - what remained is what you see today.
Hiya i got a photo of the Patrick lorry 14 years ago it had both screens intact…some one from Australia was wanting
one but i never got back to them. the drivers door was closed but i opened it and it almost fell off…don t tell Bruv!!!
so its been like that since 2000 for certain.
3300John:
Hiya i got a photo of the Patrick lorry 14 years ago it had both screens intact…some one from Australia was wanting
one but i never got back to them. the drivers door was closed but i opened it and it almost fell off…don t tell Bruv!!!
so its been like that since 2000 for certain.
3300John:
Hiya i got a photo of the Patrick lorry 14 years ago it had both screens intact…some one from Australia was wanting
one but i never got back to them. the drivers door was closed but i opened it and it almost fell off…don t tell Bruv!!!
so its been like that since 2000 for certain.
Did it have a 10-speed Fuller, John? Robert
engine and box was gone robert when the door fell on me i gave up getting in for old times sake. the stick would be missing maybe a gear change
sticker might have been on the dash i,ll go near in 3 weeks i may call round to see
3300John:
Hiya i got a photo of the Patrick lorry 14 years ago it had both screens intact…some one from Australia was wanting
one but i never got back to them. the drivers door was closed but i opened it and it almost fell off…don t tell Bruv!!!
so its been like that since 2000 for certain.
Did it have a 10-speed Fuller, John? Robert
engine and box was gone robert when the door fell on me i gave up getting in for old times sake. the stick would be missing maybe a gear change
sticker might have been on the dash i,ll go near in 3 weeks i may call round to see
ERF-Continental:
Out of my archives I now scanned Thibaut’s ERF NGC420 from 1974. It concerns the ‘permit’ to enable to
get your vehicle approved for road-operations
According to ERF P-E-T-E-R-B-O-R-O-U-G-H this chassis (#24684) was the second NGC with 7MW cab
A nice contribution, A-J! Thank you for posting it. A good reminder, too, about the link between the 2nd NGC and Thibaut. Cheers. Robert
adr:
Hi Robert, seen the other pics now of this wagon thanks, not seen them all before but there so much on here that’s impossible . Don’t know how long it been at Rush Green, but looking at the other pics access was a bit easier a while back, where now it is now a lot more overgrown & hemmed in by other wagons too! You wonder what condition it was in when first went in there? Regards Chris
It was on the road Chris.
RG used to use it on their low-loader for bringing vehicles in!.
They sold the Rolls 220 engine, gearbox and axle - what remained is what you see today.
Hi ERF, shame that so many wagons there look as if they just been pulled in at the end of a day’s work, driver got out & walked away & no-one went near them again! Regards Chris
3300John:
Hiya i got a photo of the Patrick lorry 14 years ago it had both screens intact…some one from Australia was wanting
one but i never got back to them. the drivers door was closed but i opened it and it almost fell off…don t tell Bruv!!!
so its been like that since 2000 for certain.
Did it have a 10-speed Fuller, John? Robert
engine and box was gone robert when the door fell on me i gave up getting in for old times sake. the stick would be missing maybe a gear change
sticker might have been on the dash i,ll go near in 3 weeks i may call round to see
It be hard to get near her now, my pics look as if I was quite close, but I had to stand on tyres & zoom in, I was a good 20 ft away if not more! Regards Chris
Just to bring us back to the ERF NGC 7MW. Over the last several days, the ERF subjects have gone quite ‘organic’ and leached into all each others’ threads . This is what happens when you split ERF into lots of threads but it isn’t a problem: we needed to split stuff up to make it manageable. And in any case, one idea often leads to another and we end up with a lot of really valuable cross-referencing!
Just to keep the subject of this thread straight for those who may follow this thread and not others, three developments have caught my eye on the ERF RHD 5MW thread, the ERF LHD 5MW thread, the ERF MV cab thread and the ERF 4MW cab thread.
1). The realisation among us that what we were calling 5MW cabs were actually 3MW cabs until January 1973, when the first 5MW cabs were despatched.
2). Several pages of heated discussion about the comparative merits of the NGC and its place in transport history.
3). The discovery that, on paper at least, there appears to been an 8MW cab. This would seem to be a 7MW set over, rather than forward of, the front axle (just as a 4MW cab compares with a 5MW cab). As none of us has ever see or heard of such a cab it is my suspicion that this cab was simply offered but not taken up in practice, in the same way that the Gardner 8LXB engine and light-weight straight-framed chassis were offered but appear not to have been taken up in practice (Gardner deffo not). However, the jury is still out (on the RHD 5MW thread) about the 8MW.
I don’t suppose for one moment that a single transport monograph has been written without several salient facts emerging from the ether as soon as it is published; but this is in the very nature of history writing.
Nonetheless, that doesn’t stop me from dreading the discovery of an entire fleet of 50 Gardner-engined ERF NGG LHD 6x4s with 8MW cabs in the service of Saudi Aramco, on the very day the book is launched! Robert
All it needs is a photo of the rear two cylinders of an 8LXB sticking out the back of a Motor Panels cab, and we will have evidence that they were built…
We have ‘evidence’ that at least 2 8MW cabs were built Robert, as these were supplied to CD Belgium for retrospective fitment to old chassis.
I’m also just about to start posting info from the ERF master books I have that were saved when Sandbach closed.
I’ll start with the MV, and post on that thread, but prepare yourself for a Normal Control ‘Bonneted’ MV cab supplied to South African Railways!.
Tonight I’ll empty the huge box of works photos out, and see what I can find.
Robert
Over the last several days, the ERF subjects have gone quite ‘organic’ and leached into all each others’ threads