british steel used to have a very large fleet based at all of their plants.here’s an atki. from ebbw vale.
here’s one of raymond’s many borderer’s.loaded with coil.
joint motorways’ first ever 1635 merc.this truck always went so much better than all the other 35’s joints and others on the steel had,she even sounded different to them.seen in the merc. red,until i started painting them in the last livery in 1990,joints trucks were all colours almost with no two trucks the same!
here’s billy hathaway (in boilersuit) and dai francis.two long serving joint’s drivers.they were respectivley day and night man on this marathon,the first of many marathons that joint’s had.they ran 29 of these leylands,though they never had 29 running at the same time!it wasn’t unheard of for them to be off the road for a week or more waiting for a door handle.to be fair when they went they went well,with 290 ■■■■■■■ and fuller box.in the early 80’s when joint’s started buying mercs. nobody wanted a marathon again!!!
me in 1982 standing infront of one of tony morgans 142’s.
a picture of some of tony morgan’s fleet.
this kenworth was by any standards a powerfull machine when tony morgan bought it in 1980.it had a 475 detroit in and it went like merry hell!
two of j&m’s parked at the yard.
another middle east photo i have been given,on the back it says turkey 1976.
i immediatley recognise this as one of bubbleman’s holiday photo’s,but what marcus may not know until now is that this is an ex-john raymond motor,i have a photo or two of it in raymond’s livery somewhere amongst my 40 odd raymond’s albums.
Hi Andy,I did know she was ex JR mate,here she is with her sister. 
Cheers Bubbs 
Great pictures andrew . Have Owens still got the joints old yard in Port Talbot ? Also is there any firm except Owens doing steel work now ?
hi tony,
what was joints yard is totally empty.abp who own it wouldn’t sell it to owens so they left.it’s completley cleared and almost ghostly!clayton,who you may remember tells me that owens do all of what little uk distribution that the abbey has now.all of the overseas and there’s not much of that is done by a polish or another cheap ovewrseas firm,sad really.
Yes it is sad.Some of the drivers up here went to Owens.Some went to Fabre prest. I bet the Abbey now seems very empty,I think Cliff has retired.Glyn his son has his own lorry a MAN doing containers.Addie has passed away.I don’t know what Shotton is like now may be thats quiet too.I used to load the trailers in Manchester at Shephards with scrap I don’t know if they are still going.Thet had a place in Rochdale too.
around 20 years ago mc.donald’s transport based on village farm industrial estate,had a smart fleet of around 15 tippers artics and rigids,they all worked on the coal.
they mainly had volvo’s,but several merc 's were ran also.
Hi Andrew,
They had some tidy looking lorries,judging by your pics,a nice shade of metalic red.
Cheers Dave.
back in the summer of 1989 i painted the cab on this ex joints 1633 merc.for a mcdonald’s subbie martyn handley.
sadly,within several months of my painting the cab martyn’s driver turned the truck over tipping coal in llanwern.joints bought it back off martyn and kept it at the back of the yard for spares.
back in the mid-70’s i took this photo of grahame keedwell’s yard on village farm ind. est. in pyle.