Just reading through some of these threads and the pics from the 70s, so here’s my question to some of you more…err senior lads.
You’ve got Seddons, Atkinsons, ERFs, Fodens and all the rest of UK manufactured trucks all built with sleeper cabs, (even sleeper cabbed UK based AECs in the 60s running the continent from the UK) …but all built only for the European mainland market.
So question is, why did they not have the option for sleepers, or even standardised for their own home market for UK hauliers?
It isn’t that Brit drivers didn’t have nights out in ‘UK only’ work, and even a lot of European runs (and Middle East ) were done with day cabs.
Was it just tight arsed UK firms who thought nothing of their drivers? (nothing changed there then )
I started in 1979 and we all know it was just the done thing for the boards across the seats on nights out, which went on more or less right through the 80s with some firms, the luckier lads had a proper European truck sleeper, and second best were the weird and wonderful ‘sleeper’ conversions stuck on the back of Seddons and the like.
I know it was the thing to get digs at that time, but surely the sleeper cab option would have suited both the driver, and the co better?
I’ve suffered a couple of dodgy digs in my early days, so I favoured cabbing it.
I think I had my first sleeper in 81, but that was just a casual job, my first permanent sleeper was a truck I bought myself, and even that was a conversion on the back of a Mk2 Atki.
As far as I remember UK truck cabbed sleepers were not commonplace until after the arrival of the 110 Scanias and 88 Volvos etc over here, just in order to compete with them.
So why were we behind everybody else in Europe at that time?
Any comments?
Well I will start the ten pages off then!! I was told (rightly or wrongly?) that legislation decreed that the driver had to spend his rest period away from either the steering wheel or the whole vehicle? None of the drivers from the fifties and sixties that I knew slept in their cabs, even into the 1970’s they lodged out and when I did my HGV training in 1976 the digs I stayed in at Pickering had many drivers staying there overnight instead of sleeping in their cabs to save the night out money. So no real call for factory built sleeper cabs back then, although some of our Foden eight legger tippers at Tilcon in the early eighties were fitted with drop down Jennings bunks for the lads doing distance work and a couple of Foden Haulmaster tankers on Y reg had factory built double cabs although the drivers didn’t actually night out!
because it was britain which was and is 50 years behind the rest of europe.
british hauliers were as miserable and tight fisted as farmers and there was no direct competition from volvo scania daf and man,hence they had a captive market which also allowed their poorly built trucks to survive for so long.
this theory also applies to the car,and bike industry which thankfully is now down the toilet.
i stopped in digs 3 times max and apart from i would always have been driving till i dropped then i preferred collapsing on a board across the hump to being one of the boys in digs.
as soon as i got a cab with a bunk,(guy j4) then the next move was to a transcontinental and thereafter any job i went for or got offered was based on
the earnings plus the truck having a sleeper as by that point i was spoiled.
I would think that British hauliers didn’t want sleeper cabs as the lorry only earns money when the wheels are going round, sleeping was for Saturday night when you got home after being away all week, the money was also good for the driver when the wheels were turning, never been in digs once, put me off with tales of bed bugs, fleas, and six smelly snoring drivers in a room I’d rather sleep in my own muck, sleeping in the cab was what you made it, easy to make a board with foam and a cloth cover that tied in the back of the cab or behind the seats, I did about 11 years tramping with no sleeper it was just part of the job, loved it, I had come of wool and general haulage before i got a sleeper and night heater, Scania 82H six legger, great motor and job but things were changing then, just look at the
[ trucks ] now and the 90% ignorant drivers who can’t even lift a hand to say thanks, British lorries may not have had sleeper’s but they had proper drivers then who respected and helped each other.
A bit more towards the Christmas 10 pages. Les.
In the period you are asking about,in the UK, it was illegal to spend your rest periods in the cab. So why would firms who never went abroad pay a premium to have a lorry with sleeping accommodation ? So it follows that lorry manufactures didn’t make lorries that hauliers did’t want to buy.
As mentioned earlier, even when the law changed and you could sleep in the cab ( provided it had a " bunk " ) the union tried to out law the practice.
Regards. John.
I never bothered digs either most were bad I’m told. For all it was odd not to have sleeper cabs isn’t it even odder the amount of motors with them nowadays that are never used !!■■ Cheers Coomsey
The blue touch paper lit, I decided to sit back and observe! As predicted we have thrifty or sometimes greedy hauliers, ‘luddite’ unions, established digs, stoic board-across-seat die-hards and tradition as our choice of elephants in the room on this one. There will be all sorts of factors that make up the mosaic on history on this. A contributory factor will be absence of legislation against sleeping in a wagon without a sleeper cab. This was, I believe, remedied first by Germany in (someone put me right here) the late '60s or maybe very early '70s. The knock-on effect of that will undoubtedly have had an eventual impact on UK wagons transiting Germany and mainland Europe in general. Only nine and a half pages to go to Xmas! Robert
i remember their being a flash in the pan clampdown on cabbing it around the busy parts adjacent to london ,scratchwood services ect when we all got turfed out the cabs at night with some power mad wooden top spouting the no sleeping in your cab rule with your bunk had to be more than so many inches away from the steering wheel ect,and assumed standing around in the carpark all night was more conductive to a good nights rest possibly somewhere around 1980.■■
his operation of disruption went somewhat haywire when we all just climbed back into someone elses cab .
there was a bit of verbal consisting of " you cant do that,thats not allowed,prove it,and ■■■■ off" thereafter they did and we all got a kip.
it only lasted a very short time possibly because it got them nowhere once word got around.
I will wager 20 pages & I will also ask anyone to find documentation about measuring steering wheels and bunks as my unicorn eats stuff like that! [emoji13]
ERF-NGC-European:
The blue touch paper lit, I decided to sit back and observe! As predicted we have thrifty or sometimes greedy hauliers, ‘luddite’ unions, established digs, stoic board-across-seat die-hards and tradition as our choice of elephants in the room on this one. There will be all sorts of factors that make up the mosaic on history on this. A contributory factor will be absence of legislation against sleeping in a wagon without a sleeper cab. This was, I believe, remedied first by Germany in (someone put me right here) the late '60s or maybe very early '70s. The knock-on effect of that will undoubtedly have had an eventual impact on UK wagons transiting Germany and mainland Europe in general. Only nine and a half pages to go to Xmas! Robert
All of those Robert and also many contradictions, but before discussing those let’s just look at the historical reasons. The earliest forays into Europe for British drivers mid=1950s, but a very tiny minority of drivers. At that time BRS ruled the roost in general haulage even though it was then competing with a growing private transport sector. Tramping BRS drivers parked for the night at another BRS depot, that arranged digs for that driver. BRS had a register of approved digs, several of them run by the wives of BRS employees as a side line. Many of the sizable private hauliers also had their own “digging” arrangements in towns and cities where they had plenty of regular traffic.
Every experienced tramper driver had his own notebook of addresses for digs (and sources of back loads) for wherever he might go. Like anything else there were good digs and bad digs. The better establishments were usually recommendations from other drivers. Transport digs got the driver away from his lorry and cab. He could go for a pint, or go to the cinema, or if in London for example, catch the bus or tube and take in the tourist sights if minded to do so.
Consider the union resistance to sleeper cabs. Were they safeguarding the welfare of their driver members? Well look at frequent threads on the Professional Drivers’ Forum. Regular complaints about lack of facilities for drivers in this day and age, parking in lay-bys stinking of urine, and, we see posts recommending union membership as a means of improving drivers’ conditions. So make your minds up about union resistance to sleeper cabs 40 plus years ago. I would argue that whatever the pros and cons of trade unions they cannot be blamed for opposing sleeper cabs. Seriously, is it healthy for a tramper away for several days to spend virtually every hour in each day in a lorry cab?
In pre-sleeper cab days the 15 hour spread over duty didn’t exist. Have sleeper cabs encouraged these maximum shifts to be worked? I will argue that the sleeper cab has done more harm than good to the working conditions of drivers.
There you are,this should fan the flames of a few more pages.
Wasn’t the uk length laws something to do with it? Coupled to a max length trailer the sleeper units were overlength? Wasn’t that why Leyland had the short sleeper marathon to go between the day cab and full sleeper model for the continent? Sure i read it in an old commercial motor.
dieseldog999:
i remember their being a flash in the pan clampdown on cabbing it around the busy parts adjacent to london ,scratchwood services ect when we all got turfed out the cabs at night with some power mad wooden top spouting the no sleeping in your cab rule with your bunk had to be more than so many inches away from the steering wheel ect,and assumed standing around in the carpark all night was more conductive to a good nights rest possibly somewhere around 1980.■■
his operation of disruption went somewhat haywire when we all just climbed back into someone elses cab .
there was a bit of verbal consisting of " you cant do that,thats not allowed,prove it,and ■■■■ off" thereafter they did and we all got a kip.
it only lasted a very short time possibly because it got them nowhere once word got around.
Wheel Nut:
I will wager 20 pages & I will also ask anyone to find documentation about measuring steering wheels and bunks as my unicorn eats stuff like that! [emoji13]
gingerfold:
. Seriously, is it healthy for a tramper away for several days to spend virtually every hour in each day in a lorry cab?
In pre-sleeper cab days the 15 hour spread over duty didn’t exist. Have sleeper cabs encouraged these maximum shifts to be worked? I will argue that the sleeper cab has done more harm than good to the working conditions of drivers.
.
That’s an interesting theory, and you could be right.
I think it was a 12 and a half hour spread over when I started,.and I agree 15 hour days paired with 9 hour rests is ridiculous in this day and age,.and would be difficult to fit in if we were all staying in digs.
Some guys today never leave those cabs for their ‘‘endurance test’’ like 3×15 hour days/9 hour rests, and you’re right, parked in ■■■■ hole lay bys …as a first option rather than a last resort.
I’ve said before on the other forum, the job of tramping can be as good or as crap as the driver makes it for himself, I prefer to try and maintain a bit of social life in the job, maybe not as much (and as wild ) as we did in the old days, but I have mates who I meet up with from time to time, who have the same train of thought…so my job ain’t as bad as some.
I mentioned this to one of our vintage club members this evening, he drove for a local rigid tipper firm in the sixties on Guy Invincibles and Big J’s etc and was often away all week. He never even considered kipping in the cab unless it was an emergency and couldn’t understand folk who did, he spent enough time in it without spending the night in it as well, so always found a digs and knew all the decent ones. Park up, off to the chippy/pub with other drivers in the same situation and have a good evening out while getting paid for it!
) were done with day cabs.
)
