rigsby:
Horses for courses Dennis . There were 7 quarries round Buxton at one time and 5 of them ran Foden fleets . Rough , rugged lorries that never went far , Liverpool was long distance . They had to cope with the Peak District terrain mostly , and the work they coped with would have killed an ERF . The only ERF fleet was flats for lime bag deliveries . Once Tarmac took over most of the quarries , they got whatever Tarmac got a good deal that week .
I wasn’t including tippers Dave only the type of units I operated and I note you used the term “Rough” to describe the Foden tippers ! Cheers Dennis.
Bewick: Neither did Foden ever figure in the large hauliers fleets . [/quote]
Don’t think AJ Bull would have agreed with that.
As for being lumbered with one of your Crapkis v a Rolls powered S80/3 your drivers obviously never had the choice.
Robsons of Carlisle, Tate and Lyle, Joseph Hoyle, British Salt, Horace Kendrick, Suttons of Cornwall, Johnsons of Ambergate, Robinsons of Stockton on Tees, Bayleys of Macclesfield, Breedon Lime, Bardon quarries, Longcliffe quarries, Tilcon all ran a large number of Fodens. We tried a few Sed Ak 400’s when Foden were in short supply, apart from the cab the rest of the chassis was pretty poor really. Chassis cracked, (one broke in two!) springs broke VERY regularly, the Eaton diffs shed their crownwheel teeth, balance beams needed replacing annually, brake linings wore unevenly, they had the turning circle of the QE2 and the cabs were rusting away after only about six years. Plus they were just too darn heavy, 15 cwt less payload than the Fodens and when loads were costed at 20 tonnes they just couldn’t compete.
Fodens had their issues I admit, some of the wiring was poor and their own gearboxes could have problems which were only partly solved, but overall they stood the very hard work we put them through with few problems and many operators were sad when they could no longer buy them. Very easy to maintain as well, no special tools required apart from a 1" square steel tube to set the gearbox selectors! The later Paccar built ones were excellent machines, many are still operating at 20+ years of age.
windrush:
We tried a few Sed Ak 400’s when Foden were in short supply, apart from the cab
Fodens had their issues I admit, some of the wiring was poor and their own gearboxes could have problems
Pete.
An S83 with the SA 400 cab would have been a great truck and ideally the way it should have gone together with Leyland and ERF using it.
I liked the Foden box in the S85’s before they were all retrofitted with Fuller 9 speed RTO and think the change was more about driver simplicity than any real problems at least at 24t operation.From memory the S85 was one of the nicest trucks I ever drove.
windrush:
We tried a few Sed Ak 400’s when Foden were in short supply, apart from the cab
Fodens had their issues I admit, some of the wiring was poor and their own gearboxes could have problems
Pete.
An S83 with the SA 400 cab would have been a great truck and ideally the way it should have gone together with Leyland and ERF using it.
I liked the Foden box in the S85’s before they were all retrofitted with Fuller 9 speed RTO and think the change was more about driver simplicity than any real problems at least at 24t operation.From memory the S85 was one of the nicest trucks I ever drove.
Replacing GRP with steel that barely lasted a year. Would have been a backward step I think…
windrush:
We tried a few Sed Ak 400’s when Foden were in short supply, apart from the cab
Fodens had their issues I admit, some of the wiring was poor and their own gearboxes could have problems
Pete.
An S83 with the SA 400 cab would have been a great truck and ideally the way it should have gone together with Leyland and ERF using it.
I liked the Foden box in the S85’s before they were all retrofitted with Fuller 9 speed RTO and think the change was more about driver simplicity than any real problems at least at 24t operation.From memory the S85 was one of the nicest trucks I ever drove.
Replacing GRP with steel that barely lasted a year. Would have been a backward step I think…
Steel obviously has its predictable issues.But at the end of the day a plastic shed and the justified fears over the integrity of that in a bad motorway collision for example,was never really the answer.As the foreign opposition had long decided.
Carryfast:
Steel obviously has its predictable issues.But at the end of the day a plastic shed and the justified fears over the integrity of that in a bad motorway collision for example,was never really the answer.As the foreign opposition had long decided.
To be fair we had several S39 and S80/83 cabbed trucks that were involved in serious accidents and in all cases the cabs were a write off but the drivers were not badly injured. They tended to ‘explode out’ rather than trap or crush the occupants, I’m sure that Bewick would have had similar experience with the Atkinson cabs? The most seriously injured driver, Bert Weston, had a ‘coming together’ with a portable toilet being carried on an artic that hit his S80 cab and Bert ended up with a loo seat over his head which bruised his face, neck and shoulders badly!
Carryfast:
Steel obviously has its predictable issues.But at the end of the day a plastic shed and the justified fears over the integrity of that in a bad motorway collision for example,was never really the answer.As the foreign opposition had long decided.
To be fair we had several S39 and S80/83 cabbed trucks that were involved in serious accidents and in all cases the cabs were a write off but the drivers were not badly injured. They tended to ‘explode out’ rather than trap or crush the occupants, I’m sure that Bewick would have had similar experience with the Atkinson cabs? The most seriously injured driver, Bert Weston, had a ‘coming together’ with a portable toilet being carried on an artic that hit his S80 cab and Bert ended up with a loo seat over his head which bruised his face, neck and shoulders badly!
Pete.
The difference being , with the grp cab day to day knocks and bangs were soon repaired with fibreglass , whereas a steel cab would need new panels or panelbeating . I felt safer in a “plastic” Foden cab knowing that it wouldn’t crumple in and trap me .
Carryfast:
Steel obviously has its predictable issues.But at the end of the day a plastic shed and the justified fears over the integrity of that in a bad motorway collision for example,was never really the answer.As the foreign opposition had long decided.
To be fair we had several S39 and S80/83 cabbed trucks that were involved in serious accidents and in all cases the cabs were a write off but the drivers were not badly injured. They tended to ‘explode out’ rather than trap or crush the occupants, I’m sure that Bewick would have had similar experience with the Atkinson cabs? The most seriously injured driver, Bert Weston, had a ‘coming together’ with a portable toilet being carried on an artic that hit his S80 cab and Bert ended up with a loo seat over his head which bruised his face, neck and shoulders badly!
Pete.
The difference being , with the grp cab day to day knocks and bangs were soon repaired with fibreglass , whereas a steel cab would need new panels or panelbeating . I felt safer in a “plastic” Foden cab knowing that it wouldn’t crumple in and trap me .
Correct Dave, actually almost all of our badly damaged ‘plastic’ cabs were repaired by Richardsons at Fenton, S.O T, as they had the moulds to manufacture new panels. I drove several there for repair, one S80 without a drivers side cab door!
windrush:
The most seriously injured driver, Bert Weston, had a ‘coming together’ with a portable toilet being carried on an artic that hit his S80 cab and Bert ended up with a loo seat over his head which bruised his face, neck and shoulders badly!
Only in Britain and truth being stranger than fiction.Luckily for me I never had cause to compare the crash worthiness of plastic v steel during my council driver runs.
rigsby:
what wound me up most Pete was the halfwits who tilted the cab without opening the front grill , there was no need to tilt unless it was on service .
Lift grille, tilt the radiator forward and then raise the cab. We had a few front panels damaged until drivers got the message! For major engine work I used to tilt the S39 cabs despite them not actually being a tilt cab! Much better than getting cramp kneeling inside the things.
Cheers Dennis.
Very easy to maintain as well, no special tools required apart from a 1" square steel tube to set the gearbox selectors! 
The later Paccar built ones were excellent machines, many are still operating at 20+ years of age.