Turner Engineering’s stand, there is a Turner Yeoman that resides not too far away from you Saviem, Cheer’s Pete
MaggieD:
Hi Dave,Thanks for all the photo’s, brilliant, you are pushing your luck out on Valentine’s day taking pic’s and with hot crumpet ! is Liz away ■■
Regards
Richard
Richard,
Well, killed two birds with one stone, 3 doors up from the garage is the president of the pistol club,
I’ve been having an intermittent problem with the gun, the M/T cases not always ejecting smoothly, He’s a bit of a buff with pistols, so I got him to have a good look at it…thankfully it was only the last batch of ammo causing the problem…but I was there a couple of hours, and as he’s also a biker…we had plenty to talk about…
However, Liz had been watching that soppy Pride and Prejudice while I was out, but still, I played it safe and took her out for a meal…phew… 
Cabs on the production line, but who’s, and where ?
![01.(15) [grv].jpg](https://europe1.discourse-cdn.com/flex013/uploads/trucknetuk/original/3X/9/f/9f22867af3eccfecaf59974792339516960ee569.jpeg)
Evening all,
Fergie…you are at it again…sensory overload…
Just a couple of memories… Feb 16em,…fifth one down, is that St Malo? the lorry is a Unic Esterel, (MZ125 8 litre 6 cylinder 160 hp), @19 tonnes 4x2, or 35 tonnes tractor. That lorry looks new, so would be around mid `60s. But that dock looks so familiar with the buildings behind!
I loved those Unic lorries, really French, that long bonnet on the Autobineau cab, fabricated in Neuilly -sur-Seine, with its many louvered bonnet sides and top, and the names, Galibier, Izoard, housing the early V8 of 10.77 litres, and an earth shattering 225 hp @2600 frantic rpm! Rolling along on the enormous, (to my young Anglo Saxon eyes), 1200x20 tyres.
I remember regularly stopping at the Cafe des Sports, at Sainte Mauve-de Touraine,( massive old pile, incorporated a superb old Hotel), with clean, but very dated rooms where I always stayed, the little Foden safe on the road outside. They had paper tablecloths that were inprinted with line drawings of the “New” Unic range, Galibier, Izoard, Esterel, Auvergne, with various bodies…How I wanted one of these…but was too timid to ask…(it was a very formal establishment)!
I eventually got one, from a little Cafe at Angouleme, where I relished staying overnight…and I was given a couple of these tablecloths…kept them for years, treasured memories!
Now Transports Capecci, a hard nosed outfit from Genoble, one of the first to get the powerful 340 V8, under that Geneve tilting version of the Fiat cab. They loved their Unic`s, and later they went to Iveco, when Unic was no more…funny how the Unic had its synchromesh 8 speed box, yet after Fiat had trawled through the design offices of Unic, and Saurer, their , (mighty), V8 adopted M Fullers gearbox.
But for sheer presence on the road it had to be the early 60s V8s, as in Fergies first picture of the Chauffeur and his son, posing in front of their V8 T270, oupled to a Fruehauf Savoyard…35 tonnes of pleasure, would you just wish to be driving that!..and in that gorgeous sunlight as well!
The page before Fergie posted a picture of one of L Girauds 2800 DAFs..........now DAF got into Giraud on the back of the herculean efforts of an Engishman, John Baker, (last heard of with Leyland DAF @Thame...........he and I did great battle over that fleet.........but the Dutch pockets were far deeper than those of the French Taxpayer!!!!!!! ........Boy were those the cheapest 2800s ever in Europe...............but I got us back in eventually......two Englishmen fighting for the business of one of Frances finest…
But for image I prefer the Antoine Loheac “Ton Ton”, with one of his wonderful design of frameless tanks behind it. A design worth preserving, years ahead of the mainstream manufacturers…
Lovely shot of the LD610 Willeme tank, is that not at the Suisse border…looks familier to me…as does the big Berliet Pinardier…
But old age, a hard day, and a need for sleep…after a small Bollinger…take me away…
Cheerio for now.
Sort of PS…
(Pete, I always had a soft spot for those Turner Yeoman of England, but I thought that most went to Australia…whose got the one near me?)
Just seen the last picture, Stouff…sort of sums that fleet up really!!!..Not meant with any malice, but boy did they push their drivers hard… my friends at VIT, (Valenton International Transports), used to pride themselves as never ever loosing a load or vehicle on the Moyen Orient runs…unlike Stouff…
Long story for another day…
Adieu
Realised that I had left this thing switched on, so poeured another, (small), Bollinger, and sat down…
Those cabs are for the Boulevard Victor Hugo , Saint Ouen built Somua. Wonderful engineers, held back by the Pons Plan after WW2 to building middleweights, but their engineers crept up the power scale. Lovely 6 cylinder8.6 litre engine, that they pushed out to 9.3 litres, 115x 150mm, gave 150 hp, but then stuck a n Eberspacher Turbocharger on it to make 180 hp…(we are back in the `50s)!
The most spectacular Somuas had cabs by Cottard from Bourg en Bresse, really outlandish, yet functional, and Cottards integral vans on Somua chassis are poetry for the eye! 10 speed splitter boxes, great brakes, lovely stable chassis that kicked up over the drive axle, reliable, and well priced against Berliet, Willeme, and Bernard. Production was similar volumes to Bernard, 3/400 per year…until the merger with Latil, and Renault to form Saviem…then the Somua design became the first “big” Saviems.
But Fergies picture shows the vagaries of the big 26 tonne 6x2 design when in snow…that Somua JL needs the ancient GMC to pull it up the hill…no diff locks on French 6x2s…
A small Bollinger I think…
Cheerio for now.
Hi Saviem,
A lad called Ron Hough restored a Turner Yeoman,he has sadly passed away,but his son still got her if you went past the end of Kirk’s (Park Farm) drive so it was on your right it is the first place on left! Cheer’s Pete
Fergie47:
Some of those " Oh bugger" moments…
Very interesting pictures, indeed! I’ll just comment the so far uncommented ones.
-
“Moulins percherons” looks as if it had a brake failure, or wanted to deliver its flour quickly.
-
322 P 84 is a Mack (possibly NR?) with an interesting and comfortable cab. Nevertheless, the people in the crushed car underneath, if ever still alive, must be longing to be set free.
-
611 T 47 is a Willème L 10 T 8, with the 225 bhp straight-8, c. 1952. The most powerful truck available in France at the time.
-
“GB” badged picture, featuring a pre-WW II Renault, comes from the movie “Gasoil” (1954). At the end of the movie, this truck is sent into a ravine by the gangsters.
Froggy55:
Fergie47:
Some of those " Oh bugger" moments…Very interesting pictures, indeed! I’ll just comment the so far uncommented ones.
“Moulins percherons” looks as if it had a brake failure, or wanted to deliver its flour quickly.
322 P 84 is a Mack (possibly NR?) with an interesting and comfortable cab. Nevertheless, the people in the crushed car underneath, if ever still alive, must be longing to be set free.
611 T 47 is a Willème L 10 T 8, with the 225 bhp straight-8, c. 1952. The most powerful truck available in France at the time.
“GB” badged picture, featuring a pre-WW II Renault, comes from the movie “Gasoil” (1954). At the end of the movie, this truck is sent into a ravine by the gangsters.
Thanks for that…never thought that the GB photo was from a film, thought it was some poor old O.D. struggling on a Saturday afternoon doing much needed repairs to his old wagon ready for loading up Sunday and off again…bugger, …disillusioned now…
The cab factory was close to Lyon , the name S.N.A.V means “Société Nouvelle des Ateliers de Vénissieux” ,the same place where Berliet built their lorries.
Later SNAV was integrated in Saviem and also built some railways and construction machinery products.
A link ,in French, which explains the factory:
pam.venissieux.org/+en-memoire-d … e-l-usine+
michel:
A link ,in French, which explains the factory:
pam.venissieux.org/+en-memoire-d … e-l-usine+
Thanks Michel, very interesting, particularly the sabotage story by the resistance, very brave men and women…
Old French road scenes
Rural French towns and villages rarely change, you could see a photo taken 50 or 60 years ago, visit the place today, and you wouldn’t see much difference.
Most pic’s should have a lorry in there some where…
