Hello Mark ,as you well know we are now firmly in the SILLY SEASON 
, last thing bookings and that that bull , yes plenty on and not enough hours ,got to top the bank account up now or never 
.
France job still looming ,No date yet though , Dublin trip booked in but most others are local at the moment .
JAKEY:
different job ,top floor flat with the two Mercs .
Hi Steve and mark , my pet hate was flats we done loads of them you be surprised hat comes out so much furniture in a tiny flat like all alladins cave 
,one in London had a piano we had to hire a crane to lift it out over the balcony down to the truck as he didn’t tell us it went on his bill and he never offered us a cuppa 
smallcoal:
JAKEY:
different job ,top floor flat with the two Mercs .Hi Steve and mark , my pet hate was flats we done loads of them you be surprised hat comes out so much furniture in a tiny flat like all alladins cave
In the sixties we had to hire a crane to lift a Grand Piano through glass pannels in the roof of a penthouse appartment in Great ■■■■■■■■■■ Place, London
We had one through a updstairs window many years ago , pass on that sort of thing these days .
Found this picture today at Brs 70 Lincoln farm .
Carl Williams:
smallcoal:
JAKEY:
different job ,top floor flat with the two Mercs .Hi Steve and mark , my pet hate was flats we done loads of them you be surprised hat comes out so much furniture in a tiny flat like all alladins cave
In the sixties we had to hire a crane to lift a Grand Piano through glass pannels in the roof of a penthouse appartment in Great ■■■■■■■■■■ Place, London
I did my share of uprights plus a couple of baby grands, but by far the worst were pianolas - they weighed a ton.
smallcoal:
Hi lads, bet it was fun driving that in the wind with no deflector and just a wall hitting the wind
:-\
Thank you JOHN , I take it your start to miss the game ■■?
JAKEY:
Thank you JOHN , I take it your start to miss the game ■■?
Hi Steve ,to be honest I do miss it as I started it when I was in school and working for Jones when I left but I went into gen haulage and that was that
Re Hatfield’s KM Boxvan
Hi Mark, The body could well have been made by VanPlan. I remember several times visiting Marsden’s before Arthur Rathbone & Co split up to form VanPlan in competition and seing many not recognisable bodies being built, including platform & dropsided bodies
The boxvan body looks like a Kit-body, which they would have just had to assemble. Also I suspect things were’nt going as well for VanPlan as they expected, because Marsdens were more resilient than they expected after loosing their main designer & continued to produce excellent results often surpassing themselves. So if VanPlan orders were not coming in as quickly as expected they certainly would have produced bodies like this.
The total look of the KM with that abortion of a sleeping pod looks awful and it is sad that Hatfields had to resort to using boxvans. However we were no different as prices of pantechnicons increased it was neccesary to re-asses what you used. Our last 9 rigids were Mercedes boxvans which replaced Integrals. As you faced increasing demands to get a good return to capital expenditure the neccesity to cost cut on new vehicle costs trumped a nice looking vehicle, and boxvans were so tempting wth the increase in tilt cabs. At the end of the day as Thatcherism started to bite the sucess of any business was only measured by the bottom line, which I suppose it is still today. And the ‘Hobby’ of running beautiful vans had to face the reality you are a professional running a business to make profit.
We did alter two vans into boxvans First a Ford D series & 2nd a Bedford Vanplan integral. In the next day or two I’ll add a bit description & photos. Also we altered An Atkinson Borderer & Guy Big J we ran into ‘Sleepers’ and although I described VanPlan’s effort as an abortion, when I add these photos you’ll see they made VanPlan’s for Hatfields appear a work of art.
Carl
Carl Williams:
Re Hatfield’s KM Boxvan
{…}
The boxvan body looks like a Kit-body, which they would have just had to assemble.
Perhaps it’s my eyesight Carl, but that Hatfield thing looks like a demountable to me, and there is no wagon so pleasing to the eye that a demount can’t spoil.
Regardless, I agree with your sentiments.
First pic is jwn23l behind a tipper,the second is e360 tth which Johnny brimfield had new both I have driven
Hi Mark, Here is a massive alteration we made to a VanPlan Bedford Panechnicon
The van in the centre in Barrett’s Oak tree livery started life identical to its sister to the left, A Bedford KF Vanplan pantechnicon painted in our cream and brown livery.
In the early 1980s we were approached by Barrett’s the housebuilder, who although one of the nation’s largest housebuilders head office was in Newcastle, where it had been established by Sir Laurie Barrett. They had several schemes to help sell homes including part exchange, free legal fees and they had decided to look into the possibility of offering free home removals. We were in the fortunate possition that we had vans returning empty almost daily from every area of the UK to our Spennymoor base, and therefore were able to bring a removal back into the North East for almost as cheaply as we could offer a local removal from say one area of Newcastle to another. I therefore was able to offer a standard price for removals into any of their building sites based all around the North East. It was further helped that many home buyers were first time buyers and so had very little to move. Also they were often attracted by the layout and furnishing of the ‘Show Houses’ so Barretts also agreed that we store a range of new furniture that was used in the show houses, so we clicked a little extra warehousing & delivering this furniture to the new buyers.
It was agreed in with the price we would paint one of our vans in the Barrett livery which would be used almost exclusively into the new Barrett homes, but of course the biggest glut of removals was carried out using our normal W.H.Williams liveried vans.
So a van was chosen to be re-painted in Barrett’s livery. A Bedford-Vanplan. Full credit must be given to the Late Peter Butler who signwrote most of our vehicles in being able to create in perfection their Oak tree trademark and the first duty of the van was to attend a film shot where it was used in a television advert which was widely shown on Tyne Tees Television to promote this new scheme and also be used in the literature given out at the show houses.
Somme three years or so later the Barrett bedford vanplan suffered an accident that seriously damaged the front of the luton and cab. Bringing it back to Spennymoor we decided it would be uneconomic to return it to Vanplan and get them to replace the front end, which was moulded in one piece, particularly as we were very busy at the time and needed the van on the road. The alternative carried out in our workshops over a weekend was to cut the front of the van away & rebuilt the body as a box-van and fit a standard cab front. The result seen in the picture. Our painters painted and Peter Butler sign wrote together with another Oak tree on the front on the Sunday and after returning to us on a Thursday night was back on the road, looking very different on the Monday morning.
Strange as it seemed a few years ago a photo turned up of it in its final years with only the Hatcher cab roof-light, still written as it had been by Peter Butler to give away its orriginal identity.
JAKEY:
Hello Mark ,as you well know we are now firmly in the SILLY SEASONFrance job still looming ,No date yet though , Dublin trip booked in but most others are local at the moment .
Hi Steve,
Not been on been busy mate …yes it is the silly season…as another mover use to once say to me…cheaky to customer time… and like you say make hay while the sun shines…them vans won’t pay for themselfs 
Got trip to France on week after next…
Nice trip out to Dublin Steve love going out there…last trip I did out to Gallway on the west coast…landed at Dublin from Liverpool P&O lovely boat good food to…spoil the Hoff
How’s that new truck coming along mate must be some way in now ?
smallcoal:
First pic is jwn23l behind a tipper,the second is e360 tth which Johnny brimfield had new both I have driven
Hi John,
How’s things mate…always loved that Bedford 7.5 of Jones’s that body must have been about 2000cuft…she was a fair size body for a 7.5…I think it was an Arlington body on her.
You ready for somemore CM mags mate ?
Regards Mark
