It was only used on short journeys, and some days I spent more time loading/unloading at the cooperative or in the fields. Indeed, starting at a crossroads at the foot of a long hill was a tought job for him when loaded at 42 tonnes.
During the harvest, I used to put skips in the fields;
Think these are all Wine tankers by the look of them.
Photo 1…is that the man that held Saviem up when he was driving his little Foden all those years ago, and haunted him for ages after.
Sciaqua have a transport company in Jonquieres near Orange. I would guess the same family somehow.
I used to go there a fair bit, but don’t remember seeing any tankers, although some companies put demountable tanks on flatbeds.
First is Unic Izoard 6x2
Second is Unic Esterel 6x2
I would do anything not to have to drink a glass of “la Belle Grappe”! Only the Willème tanker is beautiful.
Truck on Pic 6 is unusual. I’d say it’s a Somua JL 17 T with a special body. Interesting!
Looks like the solid tyre on the back has seen better days!
Any ideas about which train the Sciacqua tanker is on?
Swiss? Domestic France?
I would guess that wine to/fro Italy and Spain was not a busy market?
Definitely a French wagon, marked SNCF. I would have thought that only the semi-trailer would have travelled by train to Italy, but it looks the rear axle of the tractor is chocked. Can’t really say more.
I would have thought that a tug would have put the trailer on the train if only that was going? But that is guessing.
Swiss might be more likely, given its French-speaking enclave. A direct delivery via rail would have avoided the 28t (or whatever it was in the '60s) weight limit. Just a wild guess!
I’d say you’re right. Swiss trucks, until a recent date, were only 2.30 metres wide. So, manufacturers had to build special chassis, cabs and axles for the Swiss market. Nevertheless, that law concerned only home traffic, and I do not know until when it remained.
Here’s a typically Swiss truck. The Volvo CH 230, in fact a F12 fitted with an F7s 2.30 m cab (the same as the Renault “G” series).
In the 90’s there was a 28T transit limit, but you could go in to deliver over that wt if you paid a tax. However even that tax was avoided if you used the nearest frontier to the delivery point. I remember going through France and Germany to use a small frontier north of Zurich to do that.
I think the 2.3m width still did apply off the main routes then.
Yes, the narrow lorries were still on the mountains.
When I did Swiss, I used to run in at full weight and have half the load transhipped at the border onto a local wagon for onward delivery. It was still 28t in the mid-2000s.
Well, I regularly went to Switzerland with sand for horse courses in 2003-2004. It was loaded South from Paris, and delivered in the French-speaking part of Switzerland (Valais). Border crossed either at St-Gingolph, or Vallorbe. Allways at 40 tonnes gross, and I had to pay a tax at the border on the way back; some 40 cents per Km.
Several times, I had to climb up the 1000 metres level difference from Sierre (exit 28) to Montana, through the vineyards. A pleasant trip, and I must say the Swiss, at least at that time, were more pleasant than the French on the road. “Not very difficult”, I can already hear the comments…
Bernard - 1952 - Vache qui rit (Laughing cow)
Laughing cow, but dreadful stuff. The cheese, not this lovely Bernard.
Can someone reply to my last post in the Promotor drivers thread. Can’t post the rest of my photos until you do. COMPLETELY STUPID IDEA.
