Hi, im a new member so please bear with me. My late father was indeed a true knight of the road starting his days as a drivers mate with the british drug houses in london then followed by many years with alfred dexter, buckleys of warrington and the walls meat company based in london nw10. As a young kid i used to travel with him on his trips with walls during the nite. He passed away two weeks ago so the old stories he used to tell will be no more. the one thing that i dont have is any photos of the walls lorries for me to see and im desperatly trying to find someone who can help. This forum was reccomended to me so i hope someone out there can help or point me in the right direction.
Hiya…sorry to hear about your dad as we all will agree…secondly welcome to TN its a pitty your dad
could’nt have spent some time shareing his memories on hear with us. also old pals appear from nowhere
to say hello…The photo’s just give Bubbleman a hour or so and he’ll come up with the goods he never fails.
John
Removed due to copyright
Hi Walls 390L As john just says if anyone has 'em bubbs scrapbook has. In the meantime here’s one from Roger Kenney.
(Or was this a different outfit?)…jim
WALLS 390L:
Hi, im a new member so please bear with me. My late father was indeed a true knight of the road starting his days as a drivers mate with the british drug houses in london then followed by many years with alfred dexter, buckleys of warrington and the walls meat company based in london nw10. As a young kid i used to travel with him on his trips with walls during the nite. He passed away two weeks ago so the old stories he used to tell will be no more. the one thing that i dont have is any photos of the walls lorries for me to see and im desperatly trying to find someone who can help. This forum was reccomended to me so i hope someone out there can help or point me in the right direction.
Welcom, in the early 70s used to be on good terms with a driver and second man , they were on nights running from Edinburgh to Warrington, they had an 8 wheeler AEC same as the one on the thread but it was in red and was a Walls meat veh,can’t remember their names as it was a long time ago.
Hi Sorry cannot help with any photos of Wall’s vehicles but have memories of their factory at Godley, Hyde. From the late fifties (when I was a mere child) to the mid eighties ( when I was a fully fledged HGV class1) we delivered all the contract pigs from NE England to the abbatoir in the factory.
We used to do 3 - 4 loads a week sometimes days sometimes during the night.
The lairage was at the far end of the plant and we usually had to pass about 20 AEC 8 wheeler fridges reversed up to docks being loaded with the finished product. If memory serves me right they nearly all had radios fitted (quite a luxury back then)
Hello to all who have replied, yes it is sad he cant tell us any more stories but with a bit of luck i should remember a lot of them. The picture you kindly posted was unfortunatly the ice cream division based at the time in acton on the western ave, i think it the depot was called the friary, the meat lorries were based in atlas road willesden, bridge road in southall, pump lane in hayes and godley in hyde. they also did nightly trips to smarts in redditch and richmonds at evesham.
3300John:
Hiya…sorry to hear about your dad as we all will agree…secondly welcome to TN its a pitty your dad
could’nt have spent some time shareing his memories on hear with us. also old pals appear from nowhere
to say hello…The photo’s just give Bubbleman a hour or so and he’ll come up with the goods he never fails.
John
Thanks john for your kind words and i do hope someone out there can help with the photos.
tyneside:
Hi Sorry cannot help with any photos of Wall’s vehicles but have memories of their factory at Godley, Hyde. From the late fifties (when I was a mere child) to the mid eighties ( when I was a fully fledged HGV class1) we delivered all the contract pigs from NE England to the abbatoir in the factory.We used to do 3 - 4 loads a week sometimes days sometimes during the night.
The lairage was at the far end of the plant and we usually had to pass about 20 AEC 8 wheeler fridges reversed up to docks being loaded with the finished product. If memory serves me right they nearly all had radios fitted (quite a luxury back then)
yes i remember the dopot in hyde very well, i have seen a dozen a.e.c 8 wheelers parked there, they were the supply motors. The night trunkers were artics, a.e.c mandators would run from atlas road changing over at corley or sometimes they went straight through.
WALLS 390L:
tyneside:
Hi Sorry cannot help with any photos of Wall’s vehicles but have memories of their factory at Godley, Hyde. From the late fifties (when I was a mere child) to the mid eighties ( when I was a fully fledged HGV class1) we delivered all the contract pigs from NE England to the abbatoir in the factory.We used to do 3 - 4 loads a week sometimes days sometimes during the night.
The lairage was at the far end of the plant and we usually had to pass about 20 AEC 8 wheeler fridges reversed up to docks being loaded with the finished product. If memory serves me right they nearly all had radios fitted (quite a luxury back then)
yes i remember the dopot in hyde very well, i have seen a dozen a.e.c 8 wheelers parked there, they were the supply motors. The night trunkers were artics, a.e.c mandators would run from atlas road changing over at corley or sometimes they went straight through.
And your right they did all have radios, but the reception was terrible . i can remember my dad fiddling with it from redditch to the blue boar.
Hiya …i can’t be 100%sure but i think Tideswells of Kingsley had a few ex walls motors
they was all fly machines if i’am correct.
John
3300John:
Hiya …i can’t be 100%sure but i think Tideswells of Kingsley had a few ex walls motors
they was all fly machines if i’am correct.
John
Hi and many thanks for that. would there be any photos around of them , are they still operating as a company by any chance ?
WALLS 390L:
3300John:
Hiya …i can’t be 100%sure but i think Tideswells of Kingsley had a few ex walls motors
they was all fly machines if i’am correct.
JohnHi and many thanks for that. would there be any photos around of them , are they still operating as a company by any chance ?
just spoke to the MD at tideswells and they did indeed have three ex walls bodys in the yard that came off of three mk5 a.e.c’s im told.
WALLS 390L:
WALLS 390L:
3300John:
Hiya …i can’t be 100%sure but i think Tideswells of Kingsley had a few ex walls motors
they was all fly machines if i’am correct.
JohnHi and many thanks for that. would there be any photos around of them , are they still operating as a company by any chance ?
just spoke to the MD at tideswells and they did indeed have three ex walls bodys in the yard that came off of three mk5 a.e.c’s im told.
Hiya… i think BMG 312A was a AEC mammoth major with a walls box, not just sure /maybe/ possible.only guessing
John
My first job on leaving school was a van boy for the sausage and pies division (they also did vacume packed bacon) Gloucester depot based at the iced cream factory had two Meat (sausage) vans and one Handy Foods (bacon) They covered Gloucestershire and Herefordshire with another satellite depot at Worcester covering that county. We were supplied nightly form London by (I Think) an 8 wheeler. We rarely meet the drivers unless there had been a problem and they were running late. One memorable occasion was when our area supervisor managed to flog a ton of lard to a Cheltenham Restaurant. They weren’t impressed with handballing that off as all the rest of the stock was in metal trays which the just dragged off 6 at a time.
Also at the Gloucester factory was the workshops where they’d strip an 8 wheeler down to it’s chassis before rebuilding it, quite impressive to a spog like me.
The delivery fleet was a couple of Thames 4D with awkward access and one Commer walkthrough with much easier steps.
Here we are at Bourton on the Water cira 1965
The site at Godley is now Kerry foods,there are just four dispatch bays, I load out of there and is’nt a bad collection and though a lot of redevelopment has clearly taken place it is still a massive site.
The slaughter facility at Godley closed around 1986. After that we took the contract pigs to Malton for slaughter and the carcasses were taken back to Godley for processing.
My old dad was a regular user of bob manleys cafe when he worked for buckleys in the late fifties, does anyone out there have any photos of the cafe in its heyday ?