I recently trained an ex colleague who’s driven all sorts of lorries over the years but had never tried tippers, partly due to the rumours/reputation some drivers and firms have.
The mentioned ex (now fellow) work colleague loves it and wishes he’d done it before.
The vehicles do tend to be dirty inside and out and you have to like dust and dirt, but the job’s easy with no manual work except a bit of shovelling/hosing out after a sticky load. The money (certainly around here) is as good if not better than other driving jobs.
Whats not to like, they nearly load and unload themselves and you get home each night.I like tipper work.
A lot of tipper firms won’t take on experienced artic drivers,as they jump into a tipper and think its easy. You can cause a lot of damage with and to a tipper if you don’t know the job.
Never again !!! did some tipper work years ago , couldn’t wait to get back to walking floors …
Yes i would do it but preferred hooklift/rolonoff/compactor skip work.
Anything would do that pays good money and gets me home aftwerwards in a sensible 12 hour max working day…well except parcel work where you have to be bonkers to do it and i take me hat off to those who can.
Only for professionals ! 
In the winter of 2010/11 I came back to England for 3 months to avoid the horrendous winter and the fact that my job would have paid crap in winter conditions in Canada and as a result the firm gave me the option of returning home and keeping my job open.
Having never done tippers before I became almost obsessed with trying it out for a while, and if I hated it then there was nothing to lose as it was only going to be for 3 months either way at most.
I went around the local firms in North Lincolnshire but there was nothing available so I went a little further and approached Alford Traffic in Alford, Lincolnshire and despite being turned down in face, the day after he called me back and offered me work, which I took him up on.
First of all, I’ll say what I enjoyed about the job. Obviously its quick and easy to get unloaded in general, you tip it up and it comes out, and loading the thing usually only takes seconds or a few minutes, depending what you’re putting in. I liked the fact it was a bit more hands on, in that you had to think about what you were doing, where to position yourself, where to put the load. I didn’t even mind climbing up on to the load if it were a lighter load that came above the sides that needed leveling down in order to pull the sheet over and I really enjoyed the wide variety of places I’d pick and and tip off loads. Grain from farms, dolomit from quarries, prilled urea from the docks etc, I found all that very interesting.
Now for the down sides. It was all go go go, which usually I like, I want to crack on and am the sort of person to use every last minute available to me, but it was my first experience of a digital tacho, and it was the first kind that eat your time up and many a time I lost hours of driving, just moving forward in a queue or in traffic jams and that really annoyed me, especially coming from using paper logs books in North America. There was always the pressure to just “get one last load on” before your time was up, but knowing full well that if you tried to do so, you’d run out of time in the queue.
Another thing I hated was on that particular firm there was a lot of A-B-A running between either Hull, Immingham or Goole docks to Drax power station with various kinds of biomass, usually wood chips, peanut husks and crap like that, all very dusty and messy stuff that over the course of a day gets you very blathered up. Now in my opinion Drax power station was the biggest ball ache of a place I’ve ever been, H&S gone absolutely mad and just about everybody who worked there was the very definition of a jumped up jobsworth and I hated having to go there 3 or 4 times a day, and worse still was the fact that said company I worked for did not pay for parking so it was layby’s and industrial estates every night. This to me became the biggest issue, because unlike euroliner dock work, where you generally stay clean, at the end of the day, I was covered in wood chips, all sorts of dust, my hair was matted with the stuff and I felt disgusting and the fact all I had to look forward to was a layby and going to bed dirty was enough to put me completely off the job so I only did it for a few weeks.
So to sum up, I’d have really liked the job if I could actually have had a shower after a messy day, which was every day on biomass, but less so on other work and if I did more tramping working and less dock to power station work, but then tippers often do a lot of dedicated back and forth work so thats just how it is. When they sent me off all over the place, I loved it, when they put me back on the Drax job I couldn’t wait to park the truck up and leave the job.
Round my part of the world pays far better money than tramping,trunking or multidrop,home indoors by 17.00-18.00 no maxing out hours or living like a dosser!
Only if the other option was driving a bus.
Is tipper driving still like ‘Hell Drivers’?
youtu.be/U9GRB1rUyYU
I’ve driven tippers before and would happily do it again.
I’ve never tried it. Currently deliver to stores, soon to be starting a job that goes into Europe but I’d certainly never rule tippers out in the future. Would suit me far better than say, trunking, plus it would be something else to learn and experience.
Same as driving for animal feed companies dirt dust and filthy but home by 17.30 showered tea on table and sat in garden with a beer by 18.30 !! Glad alot of guys turn nose up at it and tipper work gives us a chance to have the work and earn good pennies !!!
Its what I’ve mainly done since first starting driving. Done muck away work and delivering recycled materials and taking stuff to landfill from transfer stations.
Money’s not bad and fairly regular hours I do 6.30 to 4.30ish Monday to Friday and alternate Saturdays 6.30 to 12 ish. So you can plan a life outside work
Like any job you have good days and bad days and the winter time can be pretty grim on a landfill site but I’d rather it than sitting in some rdc waiting room and lipping in a lay-by.
Started out on tippers ( foden with a crash box) not a bad way in for new drivers.
Have to say that i do like a cleaner enviroment and (for the most part) being on firm ground.
I started on artic tippers. Tramping 4/5 nights a week. Loved it!
I came off tippers after 11 years for what was meant to be a trial period in May last year to drive quarry plant. At first I was glad to be away from the increasing bs and arguing amongst the drivers (mainly due to the stupid bonus scheme) but soon I found just as much arguing and in fighting within the quarry. The company went back on the agreement to let me return to the road and depending on your point of view I was given the boot after writing a strongly worded letter voicing my disapproval.
After some temporary work for a local contractor I went onto food service until August when I went back to tippers. I surprised a lot of people with my choice of employer as they have not got the greatest reputation around here, yet they’ve been the complete opposite to all the rumours.
The only downside is that I drive a MAN now and not a Foden (but the money’s great)…
I’ve played at it a few times over the years but just don’t like it, I’m a tanker man and wouldn’t change it for any other.
I love tipper work. Get to go all over the place rather than motorway boredom. No RDC nonsense to put up with. Next to no waiting about. One drop and back again.
There’s no excuse to have a dirty motor, you could eat your dinner off the dash of most of the lorries in our yard.
I’d like to see some of these Tesco etc drivers jump on our firm for a day, lost, tipped over or stuck in minutes.
You have to have a bit of sense about you.
I’d like to get on artic tippers tbh as miss night outs a bit.
mds141:
Is tipper driving still like ‘Hell Drivers’?
youtu.be/U9GRB1rUyYU
Yes Hell Drivers is a documentary.