Pete my first trucks were TK Bedford’s and when these went for MOT we did all the spring bushes as a matter of course, I used a chap who worked for Early Eggs at Cadnam as they ran all TK;s so he knew what likely faults they would encounter. My mates dad ran an ex USA six wheel petrol GMC as a lime and chalk spreader, he used to go to Salisbury test centre where they had a purpose built concrete ramp. You had to back up it and they used it to test hand brakes but don’t know if this was just in Salisbury.
Of course nowadays our local test station at Botley does no more truck tests, my present truck gets done at Scania’s as it is close to me and handy. They do a pretest check and then the test but it is the same examiners that once worked for the test station at Botley and a lot of them were only retrained farm workers so there was often arguments with presenting fitters and them as the testers thought they knew more than the proper qualified fitters.
Not a cheap exercise nowadays either, Think it costs Scania about £900 a day for a tester regardless of what he tests,you have to pay for a lane on top of the fee and the testers don’t always turn up and in this case you may lose your slot which can have knock on effects, not for me gladly as I don’t use my truck every day so not so important, how things have changed over the years, cheers Buzzer.