Re CF’s comment about “AEC fanboys”.
I make no apologies for being an admirer of AEC lorries and the products of the company… closely followed by Leyland, and of course I’m referring to the products of both companies in their heyday before everything went down hill at an alarming rate of knots.
Why do I admire AEC and Leyland? Because they were the lorries I rode about in a young lad, so I was converted at an early age. By the time I was legally old enough to drive lorries, then my uncle was running mainly AECs, with a couple of Leylands and Dodges. To me, when driving an AEC it was a far better lorry than the Leylands, (which had seen better days) and Dodge. So AEC set the benchmark for me to judge other makes. In the early 1970s I drove most of the common British makes, but in my opinion I didn’t drive anything better than an AEC.
Moving on into the 1980s and I was involved with the AEC Society and I got to know two AEC life-long employees, Harry Pick and Bob Fryars. They were contemporaries,both starting as student engineering apprentices at Southall in the 1930s. Bob Fryars is still alive at 100 years of age; Harry Pick died a couple of years ago in his 90s. Harry served as a field service engineer, manager of Maudslay at Park Works Coventry, AEC Depot manager at West Bromwich, and manager of the combined Leyland and AEC depot at Oldbury. Bob Fryars became Chief Engineer of AEC, and Chief Engineer of Leyland Truck and Bus. These are the men, engineers through and through, who imparted their knowledge of AEC and Leyland to me. Both men also had family connections with AEC before their own employment began. Harry was the nephew of Frank Pick, a senior London Transport manager, and Bob’s father was Sir Robert Fryars who was Company Secretary of AEC. So their knowledge of AEC went all the way back to its formation.
And there were several other senior AEC and Leyland men who gladly passed on their experiences. Some were field service engineers, others were in the home sales and export departments. To a man they were always objective about their products and were always more than willing to admit to design faults, and how the engineers corrected faults and improved the product. All were dedicated AEC men, trained in the ethos that customer service always came first. Harry Pick had numerous stories to relate about his time in the field; one Christmas Eve night he was changing an engine in a Regal coach at an operators in the Yorkshire Dales because it was rostered for service on Boxing Day.
Bob Fryars was written numerous papers about design and development of AEC components and engines were his speciality. Some of his writing is far to technical for my understanding, but one cannot but admire the attention to detail in the design of big end cap studs and nuts that line the split pin hole with the castellated nut at exactly the correct amount of torque imparted by a torque wrench. When he went to Leyland in the early 1970s the 500 Series project was already well under way and in serious trouble. In all the conversations and correspondence I had from both Bob and Harry no mention was ever made that the AEC engine stroke was a limiting factor to an engine’s performance and reliability. They readily admit that cooling and head gasket failings could be bothersome on some AEC engines.
One thing that all AEC and Leyland men had in common is that they never criticised the products of each others companies; they kept their counsel on those matters. They had plenty to say about the internal politics and personalities of the people at the very top of the Leyland organization, and you will be able to deduce at who those barbs are aimed.
As was written in Pat Kennet’s articles (and I met Pat on a few occasions), we must never forget how successful the constituents of Leyland Truck and Bus were in their glory years. I for one will not sit back and ignore the ill-founded comments of those who seek to denigrate the lifetime’s work of Harry Pick, Bob Fryars and thousands of their colleagues. I will always respond on their behalf.
