This pic conjours up the '80s trucking scene in Spain perfectly… Robert 
Good pic Robert. It reminded me of a long running thread / discussion / argument on here ages ago about the meaning of the yellow marker lights / signs that were on the roofs of all the Spanish trucks back then. Some said they had religious significance, others stated that the signs (crosses, triangles etc) denoted special permissions regarding the transport of produce etc. Cant really remember what the eventual reasons were. 
Square meant it was hire and reward, the triangle meant it was pulling a trailer.
You can just see the triangle (for the trailer) on the right hand side of the cab roof. I notice that he’s got TWO sun visors; and of course, the obligatory ribbed-for-extra-pleasure tilt trailer! Robert
Quick question for you all…
On spanish lorries what does the “sp” plate mean ?
Answers on a post card to tubbysboy, most boring question@trucknet.com 
Tubbysboy:
Quick question for you all…On spanish lorries what does the “sp” plate mean ?
Answers on a post card to tubbysboy, most boring question@trucknet.com
Not 100% on this but I once asked a spanish driver in Valencia it stands for sociadad propiadad or near as dam n it. Meaning they they can do general haulage. a lot of the local tonkas and cement lorries , small pickups etc would have MP on . Not sure what the translation is but i assume means carry own goods. I remember when I was on the spanish run up to 97 . There were a few english reg lorries with the spanish lights yellow sq & triangles. I think they did this to get them through France on a saturday night. Brings back haapy memories.
PB
It’s the same as the red and white diagonal stripes on Italian motors.
newmercman:
Square meant it was hire and reward, the triangle meant it was pulling a trailer.
Mark, wasn’t there also a cross? Only it was more like the ■■■■ “Iron Cross” in shape, dark on the yellow background / light?
Don’t remember a cross, may have been a Basque thing, I always looked straight ahead and never made eye contact in red cap country 
newmercman:
It’s the same as the red and white diagonal stripes on Italian motors.
Must have been very confusing when they saw all those Atki Borderes coming out of the north of England in the 70’s
Jeff…
Any Italian would be right to be a little confused at seeing an Atki coming down the strada.
It would be a bit like the much quoted German M/E driver looking at a mk1 Atki on the way to the gulf and saying it was no wonder we won the war with men tough enough to drive ■■■■ like that
Taxibear:
Tubbysboy:
Quick question for you all…On spanish lorries what does the “sp” plate mean ?
Answers on a post card to tubbysboy, most boring question@trucknet.com
Not 100% on this but I once asked a spanish driver in Valencia it stands for sociadad propiadad or near as dam n it. Meaning they they can do general haulage. a lot of the local tonkas and cement lorries , small pickups etc would have MP on . Not sure what the translation is but i assume means carry own goods. I remember when I was on the spanish run up to 97 . There were a few english reg lorries with the spanish lights yellow sq & triangles. I think they did this to get them through France on a saturday night. Brings back haapy memories.
Correct ! Sp means “servicio publico” hire and reward. Mp is own account stuff.
I always thought it meant SPain ! Haha.
Yes I do remember a few english motors with the triangles on, I seem to recall a bloke called roy Wilson (Liverpudlian but lived in Essex) getting heavily fined in Spain with them on top of his old lorry. He used to sub for cargovision from basildon…
Another old favourite was white back doors on the trailer (tilt or taut) with a italian style d on it…
And of course all the spaniards loaded with Groupage on fridges running home Sunday. I got stopped at Bayonne on Sunday lunchtime with a fridge on and got away with it!
I’m sure those green square stickers changed every year, a, b, c and d. Unless they were for carrying different things, they were only valid in Italy on Sundays and public holidays anyway so wouldn’t be much use in France, well not as much use as a FF50 note anyway.
newmercman:
I’m sure those green square stickers changed every year, a, b, c and d. Unless they were for carrying different things, they were only valid in Italy on Sundays and public holidays anyway so wouldn’t be much use in France, well not as much use as a FF50 note anyway.
I thought the a b c d thing was depending on the type of permission / load you had? D was/ is food stuffs… I think ? Not sure about the rest… ships spares was another one of them, but don’t know what one. Still see them on italian trucks. Donati have them on some of their tanks, which is even more confusing as they only do chemicals…
Yeah that’s my interpretation of the letters too, we had holiday permits for Italy on Solstor, but they were a waste of time if you were heading the same way as the tide of traffic, 100+ mile queues were not uncommon. Still the crumpet spotting was pretty good compensation.
newmercman:
Yeah that’s my interpretation of the letters too, we had holiday permits for Italy on Solstor, but they were a waste of time if you were heading the same way as the tide of traffic, 100+ mile queues were not uncommon. Still the crumpet spotting was pretty good compensation.
During a tour years ago we were given the “D” green stickers for our trailers for running on a sunday, Domenicha in Italian, the “A” was Autorisation. May not be correct but that was what we were told
Makes sense, but it’s Italy so it could all change just for the sake of changing it.
I was told when I was doing Spain that the square ment it was over 10 tons, triangle was pulling a trailer, makes no sense to have a lit up sign saying hire & reward.
Yeah I got the hire and reward thing wrong, I knew there was something that indicated it, but forgot about the SP/MP thing.
Still not a bad effort considering I was ■■■■■■ up when I posted that
Just came across this site by chance and glad I did. Certainly brings backs the memories . Just taught I’d share a story that I have never told anybody until now as to how i started off driving. My first ever driving job was in 1977 a company called Eirhaul in Dublin. Tony pluck was the manager . How things have changed since them days. I never drove a lorry until I started with Eirhaul. and never drove on the continent not even in a car, I did my test in a small rigid, I think it was a 2 ton flat back no bigger than a van, on a Tuesday and found heading for Runjis in Paris that Friday night. it was a scania 110. I was only nineteen at the time and had to change the date of my birth cert to say I was 23.It was easy them days as they were written out in ink so just erased my date of birth to 1952. I Took a chance and told a few porkies and got a job there and then. I taught the game was up, as Tony the manager decided to take me out to the yard to test me. As luck would there was no spare lorries in the yard so he asked me would I mind getting the boat over to Holyhead and take a truck off a driver that was going home.
I was delighted if he tested my driving I was gone. I remember him saying “I am sure you are a good driver, you look honest enough” So I headed to Holyhead with a load of permits and a bundle of different currencies. After getting the papers off the other driver i was left alone to hook up a fridge . That was only the start of many problems. I just could not do it. as I never even sat in an artic before , I managed to find reverse and backed into the trailer but missed the pin . The fifth wheel over shot the pin and the tractor was stuck . It was now about 3 in the morning and I must of burned all the rubber off the tyres trying to get the unit out, I was about to give up when another driver came to my aid he lifted the legs and hooked it up for me. sweating like a pig I left Holyhead and pointed the truck for London with about four maps opened in front of me.
I often taught after that if it was anything other than a Scania I just wouldn’t been able to drive it. I started up the old A5 still in the lower range and the engine roaring like [zb], I did not cop on to the higher range for a good half hour. How I got down the road I will never know, First mistake I stayed on the A5 and drove over the top of the mountain I drove all night (if you could call it driving ) about 7am and with pure exhaustion I fell into the bunk , it was February and the snow was thick on the ground.i arrived at the first services outside Birmingham on Sunday at about 2 pm. I should have been in Calais by then ,Anyway to make a long story short I met another Irish driver in the services , think his name was Pat he was driving a six wheeler for a company called O Shea’s Oversea
This man saved my life and after about ten cups of tea during which I told him the truth that I never drove an artic before, but needed a job, he drew a list of roads to take me to Dover. Only for him that would have being the finish of my short driving career. . He told me I would not have got a job with any other company only Eirhaul ,he called it the driving school, he took me around the car park and showed me the gears. He gave me one more bit of advice he said “you will never make Paris in time now …attack is the best form of defence , get on the phone now to Eirhaul and tell them the truck broke down, you managed to fix it and you are not happy with them for sending a tractor out when it was not fit for work”. That’s exactly what I did. What happened on the rest of the trip and over the next few months you could not make it up. Basically I must of cost Eirhaul hundreds of thousands of pounds , I almost got shot in Amsterdam , was jailed in Milan after I was beaten up in a club, knocked a balcony down off a house in Italy, send a poor man driving a little dinky car a fiat 500 into orbit at a set of lights in Milan, almost demolished the Shell garage in Runjis, Caused the Paddy (ferry from Roslare to Le harve) to be late by six hours as I tried to get a high curtain slider onto the ship but got stuck under a steel beam, have to let all the air out of the tyres and get pulled out by a tug, the frame of the trailer had to be replaced . but, I have to say by the time I was sacked I had learned how to drive an artic as long as it was not a crash box.,Dublin Meats this time being the victims for my crash box training.I had many experiences on the road, some funny, some dangerous . I was jailed about six times in France Spain and Italy. Got barred from driving in France for driving through a French farmers road block. I was an owner driver by then, They had just burned an English truck and wanted my truck as I was carrying lambs. As I drove over the burning tyres I went through one of the cars that was parked in the centre of the road a French man jumped onto the passenger side and started to smash the window . I kept going with about four cars full of his mates chasing me. I was doing about sixty or seventy mph, going from from side to side trying to shake him off he was trying to break the window of the truck, at the same time I throwing anything I had in the cab at him as he hung on for dear life.I never stopped until the police surrounded the truck. The other time I was locked up over night in France was some farmers took exception to me taking a local girl to a hotel room , but that’s another long story.
i was driving up to 1995 then went coaching driving for a quieter life, or so I taught. As I look back now I often think about the times I had and the mates I made it was not just a job it was a way of life , and what a way of life it was. In them days we felt like we were kings of the road and in a way we were. driving night and day one week bribing Police and customs , faking permits, struggling to change tyres or diaphragm’s on the side of the road , (in the rain of course) The next week on the ■■■■ with six or seven paddy’s and maybe an English man all stuffed into the cab heading down the Rue St Denis in Paris or week ended in the arse hole of Spain. Them days when you met an english speaking driver on the road you became mates, you might never meet again but for them few hours you were mates, and unlike today you never ever passed a truck on the side of the road if the driver looked like he needed help. No ■■■■ thing as multi drops or timed deliveries , no tracking devices or mobiles , no getting into the back to load or unload you opened the doors or lifted the tilt cover. you were the driver you called the shots, but one thing you did was get there and back and I often drove for twenty six hours non stop ■■■■■■■ in a bottle in the cab if I needed to catch a ferry. i remember ruining with a driver Charlie was his name worked for Shannahans he had no heat in the truck and used … Sorry lads , getting a bit carried away. that’s another story… think I will have to write a book.
tony pluck CMF , gentleman… , BERT HEALY, SHAY RYAN , EDDIE TIERNEY , KEN TUNSTEAD, GEORGE TUNSTEAD RIP, TOM FITZSIMONS RIP, CHARLIE CULLEN,
I remember one of my first continental trips in a Volvo f88 CZN 610 , I went to Hilden in Germany in 1978, my dad had bought the truck from traynor motors in finglas dublin, and thought trucking would be better business than selling cars, he went out on a trip and hated it! Now he was left with this truck, so he decided in his wisdom to let me try, so off I went ,at 19 years old, on my way I decided to collect my brother warren from school unknowns to my da and ma to keep me company , he was 10 at the time, off we went to the B&I boat and on our journey!we made it to Antwerp ok where we then had a problem with the truck, in the docks in Antwerp we met Jim Mc,clarran, (the elder lemon)later of Molloy & Sherry fame, now deceased, who was driving for KELLY freight,he saved us from starving as we had no money and he fed us two kids. After a trip or two I loved the job, and went to Italy Spain Greece you name it in the old Volvo, eventually I sold it and bought daf 2800 then. Man 280, I rem Dave doody had one too, we were pulling for shannahans from Prato at the time, I then got a job with Tim Doyle in enniscorthy, that was mad, I got a room in giovecca da lugo in Italy and was running loaded fridges to cluses over the blanc for three months in a Berliet 240tr, learned the ropes the hard way ! ,I loved the crack back then, the monkey house, Carisio, jewelry woman’s etc.
I remember Tom fitzsimons rip forgetting to put his truck onto the paddy in rosslare after we had a good few pints in the hotel one Sunday morning, we walked down to the harbor to meet the crew in the bar there, and after few more beers we calmly walked on to the boat, poor Tom , we shared a room, and after the disco and more pints he said I better go down to get me bag out of the truck, it was then he realized what he did!, he was with transcontinental at the time,.
Lots of great memories, best time was the eighties , no doubt,
FEw of the OLD TRUCKS I HAD still remember the reg numbers!, YIC 814 scania 112. 600 ZIm daf 2800, man diesel 4606AI.Berliet XZR 529 , Zzp 196 Volvo f12. Xzh 196 Volvo f10.
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