An article from 1962.
Click on pages twice to read.
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That Foden tilt cab is exactly the same internally as the one I did my HGV training/passed my class 2 test in. A nice shade of blue fibreglass. However it had a Gardner 150 and 12 speed gearbox, the handbrake wasn’t air assissted (I never have seen one of those?) and the rear suspension was the conventional four spring and balance beam set up. Oh and it didn’t have power steering either but, apart from all those items, it was exactly the same! 
To be fair though ‘mine’ was a later 1968 model, not 1962 as in the article, so I’m guessing that the air handbrake and the two spring back end didn’t prove popular with operators and was dropped?. 
Pete.
DEANB:
An article from 1962.Click on pages twice to read.]
The smoking gun that they knew that the EU regs were made to suit EU manufacturers and put us at a disadvantage even before we’d joined.
Also seems to confirm the difference in the case of NZ and what might have been here. 
gingerfold:
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If I had been boss of Bernard and one of my staff had designed something as repulsive as that he would have been told to clear his desk there and then.
Let’s just say the French have a strange idea of beauty.Citroen DS for example. 
Any of those NZ examples are definitive of the genre.The KW especially just seems right as an 8 wheeler more than an artic.MX motor 18 speed fuller perfect.
8 Wheeler milk tankers seem a bit of overkill.
Wheel Nut:
8 Wheeler milk tankers seem a bit of overkill.
Common here now though, Bargh’s have a lot of them and usually fitted with a lifting 4th axle. Possibly not very busy at present though with all the unwanted milk being dumped at farms?
Pete.
windrush:
Wheel Nut:
8 Wheeler milk tankers seem a bit of overkill.Common here now though, Bargh’s have a lot of them and usually fitted with a lifting 4th axle. Possibly not very busy at present though with all the unwanted milk being dumped at farms?
Pete.
I’m doing my best to use more milk Pete, working from home two or three days weekly I’m definitely buying more milk… must be having too many brews.
Carryfast:
DEANB:
An article from 1962.Click on pages twice to read.]
The smoking gun that they knew that the EU regs were made to suit EU manufacturers and put us at a disadvantage even before we’d joined.
Also seems to confirm the difference in the case of NZ and what might have been here.
The EU regs were not made to suit any nation in particular. Throughout history, nothing has stopped UK makers from building vehicles to suit any of the prevailing legislation in any European country. Try naming a set of regs which could not easily be passed by a British vehicle of the age. I can’t.
The most odd regulations I can think of were the Italian 8-axle ones of the 1960s and early '70s, and what did they demand? Eight wheelers, of course. None of the local makers did one, so the customers had to rely on conversions. GB makers were actually better-equipped than the locals.
The rail-friendly German multi-axle rules of the 1950s played right into the hands of GB makers. All of them could deliver a Chinese 6, because it was a doddle to take one axle off an ordinary eight wheeler.
What about the French 13 tonne axle requirement which, if I remember correctly, applied throughout the 1960s and '70s. British export chassis had that sewn up too.
The only restrictive legislation I can think of was the British 38 tonne rules of 1983, in which the axle spacing of a tri-axle trailer was required to be greater than that of the huge, established Continental fleet. Your argument works, but in one gear only- reverse.
[zb]
anorak:Carryfast:
DEANB:
An article from 1962.Click on pages twice to read.]
The smoking gun that they knew that the EU regs were made to suit EU manufacturers and put us at a disadvantage even before we’d joined.
Also seems to confirm the difference in the case of NZ and what might have been here.The EU regs were not made to suit any nation in particular. Throughout history, nothing has stopped UK makers from building vehicles to suit any of the prevailing legislation in any European country. Try naming a set of regs which could not easily be passed by a British vehicle of the age. I can’t.
The most odd regulations I can think of were the Italian 8-axle ones of the 1960s and early '70s, and what did they demand? Eight wheelers, of course. None of the local makers did one, so the customers had to rely on conversions. GB makers were actually better-equipped than the locals.
The rail-friendly German multi-axle rules of the 1950s played right into the hands of GB makers. All of them could deliver a Chinese 6, because it was a doddle to take one axle off an ordinary eight wheeler.
What about the French 13 tonne axle requirement which, if I remember correctly, applied throughout the 1960s and '70s. British export chassis had that sewn up too.
The only restrictive legislation I can think of was the British 38 tonne rules of 1983, in which the axle spacing of a tri-axle trailer was required to be greater than that of the huge, established Continental fleet. Your argument works, but in one gear only- reverse.
The article obviously foresaw something which actually happened IE the move away from the rigid 8 sector.In which domestic manufacturers were effectively bullet proof against the Euro competition.
Your argument only even gets out of crawler if the Euro export market was worth close to the domestic market to us which it wasn’t.Italians were never going to buy Brit 8 wheelers and Germans weren’t buying Brit Chinese 6’s and the French weren’t buying British either.
Whatever the regs were the article foresaw a problem in projected legislation and it obviously didn’t provide nor maintain the incentive, that the NZ regs obviously do to date to the advantage of the local product.I wouldn’t call NZ’s regime working in reverse for the configuration.But ‘something’ obviously effectively wiped it out in general use here and the Euro manufacturers obviously gained from that.
In this case clearly having been predicted in the trade press long before it happened and obviously nothing to do with me because I was only 3 at the time.
As an answer to Carryfast’s and Gingerfold’s comments, I’d say that, in these days, each country had its own idea about how a beautiful car or truck should look like. And fortunately! One could at once decide at the first glance wether a truck was British, French, German or Italian. Nowadays, they all look the same!
Most French truck fans consider cabs as the LAD (though some LAD-cabbed Leylands were sold under the Hotchkiss brand in France) or Mickeymouse (Foden) cabs as disgustingly ugly. To me they’re just deliciously exotic!
Froggy55:
0Certainly a brilliant idea to have started this thread, Patrick! I discovered 8-wheelers when I boarded off the ferry in Dover in July 1965, aged 10. They were unknown here in France, where rigid trucks were limited to 26 tonnes until 1992. Bernard made an attempt jn the early sixties with this truck (26 DA 8P 180 fitted with integral air suspension), hoping it would be admitted at 32 tonnes. Alas for them, it was admitted at 26 tonnes, and scrapped a couple of years later, due to its important kerb weight.
Cheers Paul
I reckon the whole 8 wheeler industry was a UK solution only, the closed thing I’ve ever seen that would resemblance the 8 wheeler design was the Dutch tipper market, which started on a 6x4 basis at first.
Right from the early beginning, they’ve favoured artic’s and drawbars on the continent it seems?
DEANB:
An article from 1962.Click on pages twice to read.
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2
1
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Cheers Dean and very interesting indeed!
Bewick:
0
Love it or hate it, it’s a classic nonetheless, ta Bewick
gingerfold:
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If I had been boss of Bernard and one of my staff had designed something as repulsive as that he would have been told to clear his desk there and then.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder…?
Froggy55:
…Most French truck fans consider cabs as the LAD (though some LAD-cabbed Leylands were sold under the Hotchkiss brand in France) or Mickeymouse (Foden) cabs as disgustingly ugly. To me they’re just deliciously exotic!
Fascinating. Regarding shapes of things, my own taste has always veered towards the square, although I have mellowed in old age. I suspect date/place of birth stamps a permanent mark on one’s tastes, which fades over time. As a youth, I preferred the look of the Ergo Leyland to the LAD, although I never regarded the latter as ugly- just wrong LOL.
Until this internet forum entered my life, I was unaware of exotic (that word again) delights such as the TV and Cottard Boule. Although I started visiting France in 1980, I do not remember seeing anything other than contemprorary vehicles. If I had seen a Boule, I would have classed it alongside the Mickey Mouse Foden, as unnecessarily curved!
MLL 570 L picture taken off the Henley thread. This was the longest eight wheel chassis built by Atkinson at the time. Bought for its double drive capability on site when delivering Charcon concrete sectional buildings, the chassis was built to take a 30ft body to enable a profitable 18 pallet load of fruit and veg at other times. The picture was originally published in either Motor Transport or Commercial Motor.
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I wouldn’t like to take that Atkinson on some of the sites I encountered, it was a struggle getting around some of the access roads with a standard length eight legger without knocking a few kerbs out!
Pete.
Froggy55:
Most French truck fans consider cabs as the LAD (though some LAD-cabbed Leylands were sold under the Hotchkiss brand in France) or Mickeymouse (Foden) cabs as disgustingly ugly. To me they’re just deliciously exotic!
Ironically I agree with them on that and the ERF A series.
To me Bedford TM and KW cab overs look right and the classic Pete conventional although not as practical with the silly narrow cab.
In the case of cars it’s the Farina BMC’s Cambridge/Westminster and Triumph Michelotti 2000/2.5 saloons and Jag XJ6 series 1/2/3 and most of the 1960’s US saloon designs and prefer the 67’ Corvette to the E type.
As for French their designers seem to have had some eye problems.
pv83:
Right from the early beginning, they’ve favoured artic’s and drawbars on the continent it seems?
I don’t think that the drawbar configuration is mutually exclusive with the 8 wheeler v artic choice.We were certainly heading in the NZ direction up to the type of sudden change described in the article.The rigid 8 and a decent trailer is where it’s at regarding ultimate payload and minimum axle weights.While an 8 wheeler without a trailer was a good combination of maneuverability and payload.Realistically allowing 38t gross on 5 axles was the final nail.A high gross and low axle weight regime would probably have been more 8 wheeler friendly.Along the lines of 60t allowed on 8 axles and around 80ft length and a stricter drive axle weight regime for example.