does anyone have any info or pics of this firm please? also known as john wyatt jnr.
JJ72
I thought this firm was still trading as John Wyatt jnr using Volvo’s. According to information I have, they began running as Fridged Freight to Italy in 1958 with AEC Mammoth Major and Mandator Mk 111’s (tinfront) (!!) and later Mk V’s pulling drawbars and also tilt cabbed models. I have no personal recollection of this outfit but an almost identical Scania wagon and drag was a regular visitor to the cold store at Manchester Meat Market in 1973 when I was a drivers mate. I was never near enough to see the name but it was painted what I call canary yellow and green so was almost certainly a different operator.
A lot of interesting fridge wagons used to run in there at that time due to the large amount of meat being exported but of course carrying a camera was the last thing on my mind. Just a few I remember : Berliet artic from Corsica who was running back with a Frog reg Merc 2024 rear-steer artic , A Bussing wagon and drag who turned up at the wrong gate in severe fog (easily done- we were waiting to get out in a Bedford KM twin steer), an F88 6X2 artic on Irish plates and an Irish Scania 110 which was there some weeks parked next to its well and truly twisted prop shaft . The rarest wagon though was a Klockner-Humboldt -Deutz 6X2 steer artic which was delivering, I havent seen one before or since.
It was owned by my best mates grandad. They finished ages ago. They were one of the first U.K firms to do Europen, i remember seeing a photo of a truck and trailer of theirs being lifted onto the ferry! Will try to get some info etc from my mate. There was a firm called T.J Wyatt from Snetterton Norfolk who did regular runs to Portugal in the nineties, they ran mainly F12"s. Well the boss of them was Tim Wyatt, who was a son of the bloke who started Fridged Freight. T.J Wyatt eventually sold out to Matthews of Great Yarmouth. Will try to get more info from my mate, but he lives in London, so dont get to see him a lot nowadays.
that’s the one boden, and i did wonder if there was a connection kindle - a mate of mine who lived at red lodge (not the actual cafe, the village 
) and emigrated to the states worked for tim wyatt many years ago - if your mate did have any photos and / or info i’d be grateful but appreciate it may not be possible - it’s mainly to immortalise them at an 87th of the original size 
I remember them very well. When I first started continental work in 1966 (SCA Express), we would occasionally go out via Dover, rather than our normal Soton. FF were often on the boat. Very amusing drivers, proper old Norfolk boys with their, to me at that time, strange ways of saying things.
E.G. “Coo! I shan’t half be glad when I gits hoom boy”
They were reputed to run very heavy and it was suggested that they would have a load of steel on the floor with hanging beef or lambs in the roof.
If I recall correctly, they had green AEC Mandators.
Just my 2p.
Steve
gilbert4649:
Not sure if this has posted ok…Does anyone rember this far back?
I surely do remember FVF 500C it was a cut down mk3 mamoth major rebuilt at AEC notts, 11.3 engine, davy brown box, a duramin cab, mk5 dash.
Kenny Bell and I picked it up from AEC NOTTS one friday night at midnight and took it back to Diss.
Kenny had her for about 6wks then i took her for the next 18 months or so, that motor was so noisy I had three full sized wool blankets as bonnet covers we went from one end of europe to the other at times, and being a young man I enjoyed ‘nearly’ every minute of my time at a very heavy
steering wheel
heavies:
gilbert4649:
Not sure if this has posted ok…Does anyone rember this far back?
I surely do remember FVF 500C it was a cut down mk3 mamoth major rebuilt at AEC notts, 11.3 engine, davy brown box, a duramin cab, mk5 dash.
Kenny Bell and I picked it up from AEC NOTTS one friday night at midnight and took it back to Diss.
Kenny had her for about 6wks then i took her for the next 18 months or so, that motor was so noisy I had three full sized wool blankets as bonnet covers we went from one end of europe to the other at times, and being a young man I enjoyed ‘nearly’ every minute of my time at a very heavy
steering wheel
It looks as if the front of the trailer would foul the tyres of the second axle, when driving up a ramp (for example, when boarding a ferry). Was this the case?
Thats very interesting about where that came to be a tractor unit. This picture was taken on Victoria Rd in Diss, outside our home at the time. We only lived there for a short time before moving in about 1964 or 5ish. So it couldn’t have been very old when this picture was taken. Do you know why they converted it? Was it another accident? Wyatts seemed to have their fair share of those!
Chris Wyatt will tell you all about this one , he did tell me the story but i would not be able to get it right now!
Hello all. The photo was indeed taken from 5 Mavery building using my Brownie 127 camera which I still have. Chris Wyatt might know better, but I seem to remember that the back bogie on the trailer (nick-named "Big “Bertha”) was actually off the Mammoth Major that became the unit. It was mostly built by the then Mechanic Aubrey Taylor. Later modifications to units and trailers were carried out by John and Robert Bensley. ( Aubrey had moved to Waveny Valley Packers). Jim.
Dad’s got a scrapbook full of Fridged Freight pictures and cuttings, which I keep meaning to get on here when I get a chance. Meantime… March 19th 1973 
jmc jnr:
Hello all. The photo was indeed taken from 5 Mavery building using my Brownie 127 camera which I still have. Chris Wyatt might know better, but I seem to remember that the back bogie on the trailer (nick-named "Big “Bertha”) was actually off the Mammoth Major that became the unit. It was mostly built by the then Mechanic Aubrey Taylor. Later modifications to units and trailers were carried out by John and Robert Bensley. ( Aubrey had moved to Waveny Valley Packers). Jim.
I remember one of the drawbar trailers pulled by an LB76 had an AEC drive axle under it with the diff removed and the banjo blanked off.
Great stuff ! keep 'em coming.
My father was transport manager at Fridged Freight when the licences were lost. Albert Moore had left to start MRCT. I remember 5 of the wagons were registered in the Irish Republic to keep them on the road but kept their UK number plates. eg. HVF 111D The AEC that LB76 had for a spell.
We spent a couple of weeks in Dublin getting them weighed (the boxes had to come off) and the paperwork sorted. At the same time I was chasing subsidies for export loads that drivers had missed getting the relevant forms stamped, so we got to know the people at Custom House pretty well.
For a while we used a ferry that ran from Waterford to Cherbourg to avoid the UK but the boat used the linkspan owned by Townsend Thorreson and they had priority so the loading angle became dodgy because of the tide being the wrong height and a few motors got knocked about. Cabs hitting fridges and landing legs getting bent. There is a photo of WAH 500H after it was bought by Bobby Martin, a F88 painted blue pulling a Willie Betz trailer and you can clearly see where the roof had been altered following damage coming off that boat. Jim.
Hello all. just happened to spot a glimpse of WAH 500H on page14 of the Old North East Haulliers thread featuring a Scania 81 of Mcgoverns. You cannot see the back of the cab roof though. Jim.
Jim,I’ve just looked at that page and your powers of observation are to be congratulated, 10 out of 10 mate !!! Regards Haddy.
Thanks Haddy. More luck than judgement. I tracked Bobby down to his yard in Roudham camp to have a look at the old girl and see if he might part with it for sensible money. It was just about restoreable without a complete strip-down (1990) but he did not want to know. He also had the re-cabbed 16sp F88 that ended up with Tim Wyatt on the sugar beet now scrapped. In 1975 I was delivering in London and several of Fridged Freight trailers were in a scrap yard at the west end of Wapping High street . The fridges had been stripped off and they were being broken up. A sad sight - I had worked on all of them. Jim
Ref Fridged Freight. My father worked for this company for many years, from 1960 ish… right up until they finished in November 1974. I have many fond memories of them, also a fair catalogue of pictures ranging from AEC Mandators pulling trailers with home made sleeper pods, built on them, A (what looks like a Mammoth Major) cut down to a “chinese six” tractor unit, through to their later vehicles F88’S etc. I would dearly like to gather more pictures of these vehicles purely because they were bloody unique!!!
Look on page 3 on the thread,"Trucking in the '80’s(International)"for pics of Fridge Freight.Sorry I don’t know how to make the link.
Thanks for the info! I am going to try and scan some of these old photographs and post them on here (if i can find out how! to do it). It seems there is still a bit of interest kicking about. cheers