Since a kid they have always impressed me,just there shear size. These are older articles with
mainly 3 trailers. I know there are larger ones now with upto 6 trailers on the mines etc.
Anyone on here ever driven them ?
This one is from 1984 Click on pics to read for better focus.
Stobarts here in the UK run road trains too,also know as wagon and drag to everyone else 
Interesting seeing the Mansells article i worked for a similar company here in Western Australia doing pretty much the same type of work in the deserts of northern Aus and on occasion we teemed up with the Mansell men on rig moves across the top from Queensland to Western Aus a very professional outfit, when loading rig equipment for them you did it their way or you didn’t get loaded and it was a pleasure to travel with them as there was always plenty of help if a problem occurred and the night stops were full of humour around the campfire.
Cheers DIG
The photos are my 2 trucks on a rig move in the Great sandy desert.
Hello Dig
Thanks for posting your pics,would be intresting to know if you are still doing that type of work ?
Do you have any more pictures or stories ?
Heres another article from 1989.Click on each page to read as will focus better.
Good day Deanb
I have been away from the rigs for 6 years now the last one I worked on was on Barrow Island which drilled an onshore data well for the Gorgon project I did a bit of plant operating on that and then moved it to the other side of the island to drill a well for WA Oil all up 7 months and then I retired.
Anyhow heres a few photos I have dug out from the 80s when it was pretty full on in the onshore exploration here in WA, The rigs then were all quite large in physical size around 50 trailer loads but nowadays they are smaller and pretty automated but can still drill quite deep around 30 loads.
We used a variety of machinery to assist in various ways Cat dozers/loaders /graders cranes and winch trucks.
The article on Gulf Transport and the Cadjebut job brought back some memories the Man in the middle of the photo at the front of my KW went from us to Gulf on that job and finished up a supervisor with them,sadly payed the price of working in the sun and died at too early an age of a melanoma .
A bit of a mixture in these pics but you will get the drift ,hard work, hard on the gear and hard on the body but wouldn’t have missed it for quids.
Cheers Dig
Thanks again Dig, great pictures really captures the scene ! That Mack certainly had to work hard
at only 285 bhp !!! Keep them coming. How long did it take to sort the trailer out where the road gave way ? I suppose you had to wait for a digger to unload it ?
Dean
DEANB:
Thanks again Dig, great pictures really captures the scene ! That Mack certainly had to work hard at only
285 bhp !!! Keep them coming. How long did it take to sort the trailer out where the road gave way ? I
suppose you had to wait for a digger to unload it ?Dean
When the truck broke through the track I attempted to accelerate but the 2nd trailer went underground and the sudden stop threw me over the wheel and I got knocked out when the noggin hit the screen so i suppose including my unplanned snooze it took help about 3 hours to arrive with the Cat articulated loader from the rig[about 30kms away] and another couple of hours to unload debog and reload and carry on.
Cheers Dig
Great pics and stories.
Thanks for sharing them. 
Mciver transport was a well known company in Queensland and I feel there is some literary licence in the article as it sounds like the drivers killed more cattle than they carted but its possible their losses were quite high and at the time the story was written as I was in the Dimantina country in 1988 shifting a rig with the Mansell boys and a convoy of Mciver trucks pulled up one night and camped with us and they were agisting cattle from stations in that area as it was suffering drought conditions and those cattle would have died on the property due to the drought no feed no natural waters so the owners would truck as many as possible to better country but because of the weak condition of the cattle it was tough job keeping as many alive as possible during the journey sometimes a thousand miles or more.
Heres a few more photos of the rig game,we had I think it was an MAN on a couple shifts and he pulled the Derrick, he was a battler and our boss took him on for the a couple of rig moves to give him a helping hand regrettably the truck was in poor condition and soaked up the money.
Cheers Dig
Excellent photos again Dig, did the Kenworth have to pull the grader out ?
With regard to the cattle it would obviously make sense to move them due to drought conditions
but you just forget what a huge country Australia is ,a 1000 miles is a long way. I know that Gilders
drivers in the UK would have losses quite often moving animals from the UK to Europe so totally
understandable that there would be losses in Aus, due to the animals being weak,stressed and the
heat !!
Thanks again for the excellent photos and heres a website that may intrest you.
mansell.com.au
DEANB:
Excellent photos again Dig, did the Kenworth have to pull the grader out ?With regard to the cattle it would obviously make sense to move them due to drought conditions
but you just forget what a huge country Australia is ,a 1000 miles is a long way. I know that Gilders
drivers in the UK would have losses quite often moving animals from the UK to Europe so totally
understandable that there would be losses in Aus, due to the animals being weak,stressed and the
heat !!Thanks again for the excellent photos and heres a website that may intrest you.
mansell.com.au
Hi Deanb
I had dropped a load of drummed fuel at a place called Laura River about 70ks south of Halls Creek, I camped at the river and woke up in the morning surrounded by water, by chance I had picked the highest piece of ground around and sat there for 5 days and came across the grader on the way home when it had dryed out a bit about 140ks down the track, it looks like there is someone in it but thats the back of the seat I think, it belonged to a contractor so I guess they would have used another machine as their camp wasn’t far away, by coincidence that grader is only a short distance from the Cadjebut mine site which Gulf transported the ore out of but this was a couple of years before they went into production.
Thanks for the Mansell link he certainly has grown and has his finger in a few pies.
Cheers Dig
DIG:
DEANB:
Excellent photos again Dig, did the Kenworth have to pull the grader out ?With regard to the cattle it would obviously make sense to move them due to drought conditions
but you just forget what a huge country Australia is ,a 1000 miles is a long way. I know that Gilders
drivers in the UK would have losses quite often moving animals from the UK to Europe so totally
understandable that there would be losses in Aus, due to the animals being weak,stressed and the
heat !!Thanks again for the excellent photos and heres a website that may intrest you.
mansell.com.auHi Deanb
I had dropped a load of drummed fuel at a place called Laura River about 70ks south of Halls Creek, I camped at the river and woke up in the morning surrounded by water, by chance I had picked the highest piece of ground around and sat there for 5 days and came across the grader on the way home when it had dryed out a bit about 140ks down the track, it looks like there is someone in it but thats the back of the seat I think, it belonged to a contractor so I guess they would have used another machine as their camp wasn’t far away, by coincidence that grader is only a short distance from the Cadjebut mine site which Gulf transported the ore out of but this was a couple of years before they went into production.
Thanks for the Mansell link he certainly has grown and has his finger in a few pies.Cheers Dig
Thanks for that Dig,bloody hell 5 days sat ! Heres a trip from 1987.
As usual click on each pic to read for better focus !
DEANB:
DIG:
DEANB:
Excellent photos again Dig, did the Kenworth have to pull the grader out ?With regard to the cattle it would obviously make sense to move them due to drought conditions
but you just forget what a huge country Australia is ,a 1000 miles is a long way. I know that Gilders
drivers in the UK would have losses quite often moving animals from the UK to Europe so totally
understandable that there would be losses in Aus, due to the animals being weak,stressed and the
heat !!Thanks again for the excellent photos and heres a website that may intrest you.
mansell.com.auHi Deanb
I had dropped a load of drummed fuel at a place called Laura River about 70ks south of Halls Creek, I camped at the river and woke up in the morning surrounded by water, by chance I had picked the highest piece of ground around and sat there for 5 days and came across the grader on the way home when it had dryed out a bit about 140ks down the track, it looks like there is someone in it but thats the back of the seat I think, it belonged to a contractor so I guess they would have used another machine as their camp wasn’t far away, by coincidence that grader is only a short distance from the Cadjebut mine site which Gulf transported the ore out of but this was a couple of years before they went into production.
Thanks for the Mansell link he certainly has grown and has his finger in a few pies.Cheers Dig
Thanks for that Dig,bloody hell 5 days sat ! Heres a trip from 1987.
As usual click on each pic to read for better focus !
I fear I told a little furphy re the 5 days Deanb ,I wasn’t alone, there were 2 Cat skinners[dozer drivers] and a cook/fuel man come general dogsbody who were to open up a gravel pit at the Laura river site and I had dropped their fuel and my dog trailer was the camp trailer cook house and lounge complete with generator shower and 500gallon water tank so all mod cons,the boys couldn’t push gravel and I couldn’t drive anywhere but we ate and drank ok and after 5 days we headed into Halls Creek in the the camp Toyota 4x4 [each camp had a least one 4be] and the boss flew 3 of us back to Derby [home] in the company Beechcraft Baron the cook went back to the camp to keep everything ticking over gen set and fridges/freezer and it was nearly 3 weeks before I went back to bring my truck out.
Not unusual for that time of year to get cut off for a while so you didn’t go any where without a full tucker box and a change of undies.
Haven’t seen cattle jumped off a trailer like that before,we only had doors on the side of the trailers so all the the yards and loading ramps were set up for road train units .
The 92T and 71 series Detroit 2 strokes were a popular engine in there day, Mcivers had a a heap of them too.
I have a few photos of my cattle train days some where box browny times will see how they scan.
Cheers Dig
Bloody hell Dig, Sounds like you had 5 star luxury with your own cook !!
Keep the pics coming mate !
Heres one from 1992
Great pictures again Dig, going back to a previous post you made. I have to agree i have never seen the cows unloaded without a ramp in any of the articles or dvds i have seen.
When were the photos taken 1970s or 80s ■■
DEANB:
Heres one from 19923
Cracking read chaps (esp Dean B and DIG), keep going.
@DeanB That cover photo is interesting for the 141 mixing it among the usual heavy-duty US metal - I can imagine Scania’s big 14l V8 handling things (provided enough cooling) but I wonder about the drivetrain. Or would it have been retro-fitted with the typical Fuller/ Rockwell combination? Dig? Anyone?
Deanb I have jumped cattle out of trailers a couple of times on inter station work usually from dry paddocks to ones with better conditions so not totally unusual but never seen it done out a rear door like the photo and it looks like they have backed the front up to the rear of another trailer possibly to make a barrier so the cattle head off in the direction they want them to go possibly to water.
The photos were taken during the 79 season ,that KW was brand new that year 400hp phase 2 ■■■■■■■ 13speed RR 4.11 Rockwells made it pretty slippery 117kph but I never used O/D when loaded and dropped a full gear at night tonk along about 80kpm and I still managed to hit over 20 head of cattle that season but arsey no damage.
This pic shows what can happen when your up it at night loaded and you hit a bullock doing a100 ,threw him off the road as he was coming toward me the night before,I spent a couple of hours releasing trapped cattle from the crate about 60% survived it,this was taken the next day when I had loaded and was on my way back.
Cheers Dig
