- Location
- Darlington
Seddon 201 with the Perkins phaser engine, new in 1986
Your old lorry photos
- Thread starter JP1
- Start date
- Location
- Darlington
And what I'm driving currently
Enry
Member
- Location
- Shropshire
- Location
- Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk
Cab-over Pete
Member
- Location
- Kenilworth, Warwickshire
I have a chat with James occasionally, they’ve been in the lime business a long time.
yorkie
Member
- Location
- pe34 norfolk,but not born there
Can remember Murray with the old Bedfords
- Location
- South Wales UK
The Old Man and Foden Trucks and Old Bedford Cattle Lorry.
Cab-over Pete
Member
- Location
- Kenilworth, Warwickshire
Those Fodens were an ugly piece of kit.
Who on earth would look at them and think they looked stylish or even remotely likeable?
Who on earth would look at them and think they looked stylish or even remotely likeable?
The iconic lorry for me when I was growing up was the Bedford TK. I spent hours and hours in them as a kid, my old man drove for JE Hemmings of Barford delivering feed, paper half hundredweight sacks handballed on and handballed off. Roped and sheeted, I could do a waggoners hitch when I was 10 just didn't have the weight and strength to do any good at the time. We had one of our own to take my horse to shows show jumping, nearly made a career out of that when I left school but my parents insisted I had a more normal career hence time spent at agri college. Plenty of memories of me as a 14year old driving that myself with the old man in the passenger seat when he wasn't well, a couple of kidney transplants and major heart problems sort of paid to him leading much of a normal life.
I drove a petrol TK taking beef, 3 or 4 at a time up to John and Bausors in Kenilworth, probably cost more at the pump than what was got for them at around 6mpg!
Another icon from going with the old man was a frogmouth Dodge with a Hiab when he drove for a mate of his moving machinery and tools such as lathes and milling machines
There are other memories from the passenger seat, threepenny bit cabbed Austins, Thames Trader and Ford D loaded with thatching straw from John Gardner at Myton Farm.
There's a few that will recognise some of the names and places which no doubt will stir up some memories for them.
I drove a petrol TK taking beef, 3 or 4 at a time up to John and Bausors in Kenilworth, probably cost more at the pump than what was got for them at around 6mpg!
Another icon from going with the old man was a frogmouth Dodge with a Hiab when he drove for a mate of his moving machinery and tools such as lathes and milling machines
There are other memories from the passenger seat, threepenny bit cabbed Austins, Thames Trader and Ford D loaded with thatching straw from John Gardner at Myton Farm.
There's a few that will recognise some of the names and places which no doubt will stir up some memories for them.
- Location
- South Wales UK
The one's before were a big rounder in looks but compared to the opposition at the time they were the business.
Cab-over Pete
Member
- Location
- Kenilworth, Warwickshire
I spent many an hour in TKs and frog mouth Dodges too. I can still hear the little whistle the TK handbrake gave out when applied. Also, the little flap/door arrangement on the side of the cab to give limited access to the engine.
Dad started with Contractamix at Stratford on a Dodge before moving to W Freeman and Sons on brewers grains then the milk tankers. Contractamix became Mill Feed Services and is now Harbro, I think.
We occasionally went to Hemmings mill at Barford. I was only telling my lad about it a few days ago. I don’t remember delivering anything there, but Dad collected bags of feed sometimes. Just along the road from Hemmings there was Oldhams of Barford who ran cattle trucks and moved furniture with the same lorries. Imagine turning up to a house now to move their furniture with a truck smelling of cattle!
I think John Gardner moved from Myton to Mere Hill near Loxley, opposite Blake’s haulage yard, another milk haulier who my uncle Jimmy drove for. The first time I went to Mere Hill was about 20 years ago. I was amazed at the amount of old lorries, trailers, tractors and machines there were strewn about the place, many of them grown into the bushes around the yard. They seemed to go on forever. It’s a lovely farm.
Blake’s yard is now a small bunch of houses. They got into fridge trailer haulage but I don’t think they are in business any more. Stobarts took over the warehouse at Alcester.
I’ll bet you knew an owner-driver named John Buckingham. He used to come to my Dads farm with a blue Bedford TK and a drag trailer, both tippers with fold flat sides. He delivered fertiliser and then took grain away after folding the sides up. Always with his shirt open to the waist and a string vest underneath, he could carry two one cwt bags on his shoulders at once carrying them into the barn. I was only a kid and would shuffle them to the side of the lorry for him.
In later life he had to have a leg amputated if I recall correctly. After that, he still drove but could only carry one cwt I heard he had to have the other leg removed and that finished his working days, that would have been over 25 years ago.
I met a woman the other day who was a member of the Spiers family. You will no doubt remember their fleet of livestock lorries based near Claverdon.
- Location
- South Wales UK
Bit more modern model.
Is it stylishness that makes em do the biz?
- Location
- South Wales UK
Bit more Modern Bedford as the Pop lorry.
- Location
- South Wales UK
It was better than the crap before and so on and so on.
The old man spent his life in them ,with the best part of 14 16 hrs a day behind the wheel .☹
Netherfield
Member
- Location
- West Yorkshire
Them 11" headlights will be like rocking horse sh!t to find nowadays.
we had one of them CLA 471T no wonder corona had some fizz ! the worst ride in the world!
Cab-over Pete
Member
- Location
- Kenilworth, Warwickshire
I drove one like that for two days. It seemed like the cab was the size of an average dining room and the engine would only rev up to about 1500 rpm.
When the gaffer offered it to me I politely declined and went back to my smashing little Volvo FL6
Cab-over Pete
Member
- Location
- Kenilworth, Warwickshire
No, but if you like to drive something to take pride in, they wouldn’t be for me.
Horses for courses..
were they that bad?