Spending a lot of time crunching numbers and I’m leaning towards a good paid day work but it’s 1.5 hour commute each way.
I know there’s tramping options out there for that sort of commute but I just wondered if anyone had bought a camper to stay in during the week (when tramping isn’t offered) but the job suits you better
Cheers
PT14:
Spending a lot of time crunching numbers and I’m leaning towards a good paid day work but it’s 1.5 hour commute each way.I know there’s tramping options out there for that sort of commute but I just wondered if anyone had bought a camper to stay in during the week (when tramping isn’t offered) but the job suits you better
Cheers
You’ve answered your own question mate, go tramping.
Got to be a cheaper option than buying a camper 
…as well as all the tax, insurance fuel and running costs plus depreciation.
Sleep for free in their vehicle, and get paid for it in subsistence…no brainer imo.
We had Agency guys come down from Yorkshire and NE.
Monday to Friday / Saturday camper van it all week saved on the travelling,moved about when work dictated
robroy:
PT14:
Spending a lot of time crunching numbers and I’m leaning towards a good paid day work but it’s 1.5 hour commute each way.I know there’s tramping options out there for that sort of commute but I just wondered if anyone had bought a camper to stay in during the week (when tramping isn’t offered) but the job suits you better
Cheers
You’ve answered your own question mate, go tramping.
Got to be a cheaper option than buying a camper
Sleep for free in their vehicle, and get paid for it in subsistence…no brainer imo.
Yeh, your pretty spot on.
I don’t know why but I’m pulling my hair out, I can’t seem to find any tramping job that pays at least what I’m taking home tue-sat.
Doesn’t make sense, I’m not asking for gold coins because I have to sleep in the cab but I thought at the very least I’d get what I’m earning on days.
Maybe I’m reading the ads wrong and not accounting for OT, but normally OT is talked up and added to the proposed wage (to hook you in)
16 years ago I did this very thing as my wife was expecting our 1st child & we was living in Surrey in a small flat, on my wages we couldn’t afford anything else & the work around us for HGV was non existent or poorly paid, so we brought a transit camper van & I went to work in Northamptonshire where the wages were over £3 an hour more with X1:5 after 48 hours, we did this for a year until we sold the flat & brought a 4 bedroom detached house for less money, I sold the camper for the same price I paid for it, i also sold my car to keep costs down, the biggest lesson I learned was to buy a spare battery & the winter months were grim, had a couple of chats with the TM over me parking in the company carpark !!
A local lad who was a self employed driver/plant operator bought himself an old cheap caravan to site at whatever quarry he was going to be based at if he knew it was for several weeks work and a distance from home. Not so much to outlay financially with that.
Pete.
PT14:
Spending a lot of time crunching numbers and I’m leaning towards a good paid day work but it’s 1.5 hour commute each way.I know there’s tramping options out there for that sort of commute but I just wondered if anyone had bought a camper to stay in during the week (when tramping isn’t offered) but the job suits you better
Cheers
I thought i had heard it all, what’s next a tent or sleeping in the car
Is this a genuine post do people really do this, like how big is the difference 1 or 2 quid a hour
I think the op is falling into the trap of believing the myth that the only lorry drivers who earn a good wage are trampers .
I worked at a place in mid-Kent about ten years ago and one of the drivers, who was Scottish, used to drive down from Scotland and then spend 3-4 weeks at a time working four-on four-off before going home for a few days, when he wasn’t away in the truck he used to live in a Mazda Bongo in the yard.
I suppose I do something similar in living on my boat and working in the east Midlands when technically my home address is in Kent.
I find that round here anyway, day work pays a couple of quid an hour more than tramping which rather negates any financial advantage in doing nights out.
recently noticed someone living in a citroen c4? blacked out windows a tartan curtain across the front - and im quite jealous!
PT14:
Spending a lot of time crunching numbers and I’m leaning towards a good paid day work but it’s 1.5 hour commute each way.I know there’s tramping options out there for that sort of commute but I just wondered if anyone had bought a camper to stay in during the week (when tramping isn’t offered) but the job suits you better
Cheers
I just thought maybe it’s a father ted moment and dougal is telling him what to do
Harry Monk:
I worked at a place in mid-Kent about ten years ago and one of the drivers, who was Scottish, used to drive down from Scotland and then spend 3-4 weeks at a time working four-on four-off before going home for a few days, when he wasn’t away in the truck he used to live in a Mazda Bongo in the yard.I suppose I do something similar in living on my boat and working in the east Midlands when technically my home address is in Kent.
I find that round here anyway, day work pays a couple of quid an hour more than tramping which rather negates any financial advantage in doing nights out.
Mazda Bongo! Was he a dwarf?
I did that for about two years, I have a converted transit high roof, and spend three nights in it when I was working 4on-4off on days. It certainly beats commuting, but only you can decide if you want to do it.
Harry Monk:
I worked at a place in mid-Kent about ten years ago and one of the drivers, who was Scottish, used to drive down from Scotland and then spend 3-4 weeks at a time working four-on four-off before going home for a few days, when he wasn’t away in the truck he used to live in a Mazda Bongo in the yard.I suppose I do something similar in living on my boat and working in the east Midlands when technically my home address is in Kent.
I find that round here anyway, day work pays a couple of quid an hour more than tramping which rather negates any financial advantage in doing nights out.
We had a lad from Scotland (a Tarmac o/d) driving his six wheeler at our quarry in Derbyshire a few years ago Harry, he had just bought a new truck on the Tarmac scheme and then they sold the plant he was based at! So Tarmac sent him to our area as we had work and they needed repayments! 
Instead of kipping in the truck he rented a flat locally and drove back home to his family at weekends. He was there for over a year and then I left so could have been there for even longer?
Pete.
2 things .
1 if your the only one that drives the truck. And it has a bed…maybe you could just sleep over on there?
Or 2 I’d be tempted to take your bike test get a moped/motorbike.
Even on a 125 you can.whizz through the rush hour traffic get home quicker. And won’t cost that much to run
edd1974:
2 things .
1 if your the only one that drives the truck. And it has a bed…maybe you could just sleep over on there?Or 2 I’d be tempted to take your bike test get a moped/motorbike.
Even on a 125 you can.whizz through the rush hour traffic get home quicker. And won’t cost that much to run
The OP doesn’t say whether it’s 90min in traffic, or a m-way bash. Either option is very different on a bike in August and January.
I know a chap who does something similar, he works for a company in Northamptonshire in the summer and then drives to Portugal for the winter, if he’s back in the UK on a weekend he’ll drive off to see relatives.
Also I believe camper vans don’t lose are great deal of money.
There is a regular advertiser in our free paper on the costa blanca seeking spanish resident lgv drivers to work for several weeks at a time in the uk.I think he is cambridgeshire based.Don’t know if there are any takers.
We have a number of drivers that live in the car park at my place around 6 at the moment, one of them even spends his spare time their doing conversions from vans to campers, and a fine job he does as well.
On the Tv programme about Ainscough crane hire,
a few of their lads stopped in vans or stripped out people carriers for the odd night.
I once nearly took a job which was effectively day work,
but were happy for you to use the sleeper cab in the yard at night.