newmercman:
I’m going to genaralise here but if you look back to 1980 there were still crap lorries that were facelifted versions of lorries from the 60’s on sale & if you weren’t in a Volvo F10/12 Scania 111/141 or a Daf 2800 you were in a piece of [zb]! There are those that swear by Leyland/ERF/Foden etc but let’s be honest you could still do a days work in an old Volvo/Scania/Daf, whereas you wouldn’t wish a Leyland Buffalo on your worst enemy, you want proof, try and find a dealer selling new british trucks!
+1 if only adolf hadnt came in second we wouldnt even have had them in the 60s to have remmnants later…
jerry truckartist:
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Regarding ; Gnasty Gnome’s post, about early EPS merc’s, i remember reading an article ( in TRUCK i think ) about a tanker somwhere in Germany that crashed in a village killing a lot of people, This was an EPS merc which ran away, the driver blamed the gearbox, Merc blamed the driver… never found out the outcome, of the investigation.
Hi all!
A little Off-Topic but this story is known as the “Disaster of Herborn” till now.
The pieces of that Mercedes can be seen in the museum of work in Dortmund, called “DASA”. google.de/imgres?imgurl=http … CFQQrQMwEQ
The town of Herborn is only 70km from my village away.
Today there is a safety lane downhill where the truck wasn’t able to stop.
You can see some pictures of the accident and the location here: google.de/search?hl=de&site … joVf-k0AyI
Not the worst but certainly the noisiest ,I had the displeasure of driving a four wheeler Leyland Clydesdale for a fortnight while a driver was off ill ( probably with a headache),what a racket!
for me it had to be the foden s80 . you had to be a contortionist to climb in , shimmy round the seat to sit down , howling gale round the gear lever gaiter , stand up to reach first gear . it was useless off the tarmac , go on a building site and you got stuck , and those great big useless headlights were a nightmare . not one of foden’s finest designs . dave
rigsby:
for me it had to be the foden s80 . you had to be a contortionist to climb in , shimmy round the seat to sit down , howling gale round the gear lever gaiter , stand up to reach first gear . it was useless off the tarmac , go on a building site and you got stuck , and those great big useless headlights were a nightmare . not one of foden’s finest designs . dave
I agree with you, This one I owned was a shed, I got gave it the hot spanner treatment after running it for 6 months & sold it in bits to the people that liked them, Regards Larry.
in my case it was a ford cargo magirus deutz engined tractor unit,totaly gutless and to lightweight for 32 ton work,used to scare the life out of me going up or down hills fully loaded.
I’m going to genaralise here but if you look back to 1980 there were still crap lorries that were facelifted versions of lorries from the 60’s on sale & if you weren’t in a Volvo F10/12 Scania 111/141 or a Daf 2800 you were in a ■■■■■■■■■■■■■! There are those that swear by Leyland/ERF/Foden etc but let’s be honest you could still do a days work in an old Volvo/Scania/Daf, whereas you wouldn’t wish a Leyland Buffalo on your worst enemy, you want proof, try and find a dealer selling new british trucks!
Passed me test 1981, in a little Bedford TK tractor unit with 30ft single axle tralier.
I laughed big time when I turned up at the driving school and saw it, cause I’d been “doin a bit” on HGV L plates in an F88 and thought they were taking the ps
Instructor said: "If you can drive and park this piece of st, you can drive anything"…He wasnt wrong! And I passed !
Then I got me first “HGV”, a Seddon Atkinson 200 16 tonner. Back to front gearbox, day cab - slept across the seats. Bloody awful!
I started European and had some decent trucks - F10/F12, 2800/3600, 142 - but the “pinnicle of my career” was when I packed in Europe in 1989 and started for Coca Cola. “what a job this will be” I thought. Multi BILLION company, you see Coke everywhere…ended up with ALX 666Y… a LEYLAND BOXER 5 speed box, no radio, and windows that wouldnt stay up. I scrounged one of them radios with a big chrome speaker built onto the end of the thing. Spent a Sat morning fitting it to the rear cab wall but even at full volume, I still couldnt hear it above the engine
Now THAT was the worst truck I ever drove.
Blimey, some right old dogs on this thread, like most drivers i started off driving 7.5 tonner’s, Dodge commando’s bedford TK’s & TL’s Ford D series and cargo’s decided to take my class one in 1987, did a two weekend crash course in a Bedford TL with a little single axle flat, what a dog… passed test so the firm i was working for started hiring bigger motors, just 16 tonners merc 1617s , Daf 1900 etc. after a few months i applied for a job and got it, The transport manager told me he’d start me of on the 4 wheeler rigids considering I’d no class one experience. My first day at the new job gave me the shock of my life, i was told that a driver had called in poorly , so I’d have to take his run, for the next few days. I was given the keys to a nearly new Seddon Atkinson Strato, 6 wheeler, twin steer unit ,G62 NCA, A tri axle tautliner loaded with 23 ton’s of pop , for Kwik save at Newport, awaited coupling up… to say i s**t my-self would be an understatement.
So my first drive in a truck with more than 6 gears was the wonderful, Eaton twin splitter, i did’nt think it was too wonderful at the time, belive me !!!
Don’t think people are thrown in at the deep end like this anymore, which is probably a good thing.
moved on to various leyland’s, clydesdales, freighters, roadtrains,
L10 powered Bedford TM
various hired F10’s , scania’s, Merc’s.
Then 15 years ago moved onto the easiest job ever, Emptying the bins around Leeds. No managers on your back, home most days about 2pm.
must admit though, getting 32 ton , 8 wheelers around tiny side streets and overcrowded alleyways isnt as easy as people think.
Regarding ; Gnasty Gnome’s post, about early EPS merc’s, i remember reading an article ( in TRUCK i think ) about a tanker somwhere in Germany that crashed in a village killing a lot of people, This was an EPS merc which ran away, the driver blamed the gearbox, Merc blamed the driver… never found out the outcome, of the investigation.
If it’s any consolation, the first tractor unit I drove was a dulux white Seddon Stratos with the good old Eaton Splitter (I was only 18!!!). I didn’t drive it long enough to get the hang of the gearbox properly, which I’m kind of thankful for!!
I moved on to a brand spanking new Daf CF with all the kit after that, it was like going through a time warp!!
Now I drive mostly left hook Bedford MJ/MK’s I have no idea how old they are, all I do know is that they are great for the arm muscles!!
Seddon Atkinson with a Eaton twin splitter…I was doing agency work out of Freightliners depot in Willesden in the very early 80s taking beer containers to Brick lane…No radio, windows that didn’t work, no heater an absolute heap.
But like others I took my test in a Bedford tk with a little single axle trailor in Leconfield, pretty sure there is loads of others who took there test there. I’ve got a picture some where…
SMc
A Godfrey Davis Foden S80 which I had for a day when i broke down with my usual Leyland Mastiff in London. This was in the early 70’s , I hadn’t long passed my test and had had no experience of different types of gearboxes, I was just used to the 5 speed with 2 speed axle fitted to the Mastiff The Foden had a range change box with a splitter, the gear position diagram on the gear knob had worn away, like all hire motors the handbook had been taken out for safekeeping by the supplying dealer, so I had no idea what most of the knobs and switches did.as they were unlabelled. God! I played some funny tunes on that gearbox until I got it sussed it out (took me the best part of the day though). The guy who brought it out to me at the side of the road where I broke down, and my unit was being recovered from, must have known what it was like as he wished me luck before he left.
Deepinvet:
…like others I took my test in a Bedford tk with a little single axle trailor in Leconfield, pretty sure there is loads of others who took there test there…
They’ve splashed out up there now… Man LE with slapover box for class C, then they stick a puny little box trailer on the back of it to do CE!!
Anyone who drives around there will have seen them… Triple manned by some funky coveralls!!
Worst? Easy,
Seddon Atkinson 401/411 Same Model is this photo
Decent cab for the time, bunk, night heater, decent ■■■■■■■ engine, Nice Eaton gearbox… But the ride was terrible.
Everything in the cab had to be tied down , including the driver, Hill starts were a nightmare as it tended to “kangaroo”. Hit a white line in the road and your head hit the roof, your knees the underside of the dashboard and anything that wasnt gaffa taped down hit the back of your neck.
Horrible things, It didnt help that the ones we had were short wheel based 4x2 and we spent most of the time pulling coils set well back on the trailer in the coil well.
And if anyone knows Saltburn… I was the idiot who took a wrong turn out of Skinnigrove steel works and ended up at the bottom of Saltburn bank, Getting up there around the hairpins in a kangarooing 401 with a loaded 50 foot flat was an experience that will probably stay with me until I die
And I passed !
bedford TK’s & TL’s 
