mark h:
0You won’t want a job at our place then
Looks the dogs…bring on the bling
mark h:
0You won’t want a job at our place then
Better than any fleet spec poverty shopping trolley. But them drivers get jealous real quick.
mark h:
0You won’t want a job at our place then
See I don’t mind these at all. They’re a bit blinged but not completely over the top whereas the one that made me start this post had literally hundreds more lights in all places.
Moose:
Don’t mind a few extra lights myself, though them cheap Ring yellow lights under each corner of the bumper look absolutely crap and when combined with a knob on the steering wheel and a “living the dream” statement speak volumes about the driver!
Yeh this thread has really shone the spotlights on those with the micro ■■■■■’s ,perhaps that’s why so they can see to have a ■■■■■ 
,and all this about rigid drivers wtf wants to drive an artic when they can just burn round in a rigid .
Moose:
Don’t mind a few extra lights myself, though them cheap Ring yellow lights under each corner of the bumper look absolutely crap and when combined with a knob on the steering wheel and a “living the dream” statement speak volumes about the driver!
Not an advocate of ‘‘living the dream’’ by any means mate, no extra lights or bars on my motor either, but if they were offered to me by the firm and paid for by THEM, with no stipulations, I’d snap their hands off, because yeh they do look good as well as being useful. (No chance btw as my firm are tight as arse holes and combined with the fact that we have idiots spending 2 to 3 grand on crap themselves 
…I kid you not)
Only replying to you btw, to take you up on the steering knob thing, I’ve used my knob for driving for about 25 years (yeh ok leave it 
) and would not be without it.
It just makes things easier I reckon, ok my driving aint so bad that I NEED it, but after getting used to it, it would just feel very strange without it now I reckon.
Dr Damon:
syramax:
each to their own, live and let live etc , but I do get annoyed when I get stuck behind a bin wagon doing 50+ along a trunk road (in the dark ) with all his " working " lights / beacons flashing away for no reason . surely the driver can see them in the mirrors ■■?Of course they can see them but I think it must make them feel special because they have flashing lights. Trouble is everyone else thinks they are childish [zb].
Same with recovery and wide load wagons that use their lights when empty. Special? Special needs I reckon.
First of all, allow me to report and repent. I accidentally ran from Stone to Marston Green with my beacons on last week, pulling a curtain sider of empty pallets. I know, shoot me now for I’m a bit of a spanner.
Secondly. I can understand a bit of extras on a cab but mainly in the paint and buttons to press department rather than all these bits you bolt on outside. I have beacons and front grille strobes, do I really need them, no. Do I do 1-2 jobs a fortnight where they are a plus, yes. But mainly I have them because they don’t cost a massive amount, make the vehicle look a little more finished off and don’t affect the fuel economy of the wagon. Plus I’ve wanted that particular button to press in the cab since i first passed. Its my Big Boys Toy as well as my office and bedroom and mentally, I’m about six years old!
Now this I don’t understand:
20130818-IMG_3164 by Nicholas Smith, on Flickr
A nice paint job I can understand, I probably wouldn’t go that far but its different strokes for different folks and doesn’t affect the weight or the fuel economy,
400kg ish of beef bar with its own customised paint job, roof spots, weird front mudflap things, 300 additional marker lights across the entire vehicle, chrome wheel trims rather than Durabrights. That costs a fair bit of money and probably adds 700kg to the vehicle overall. This is all on an 18t old DAF 85 which probably weights in at 7500 including the wet gear, plus probably 4 tonnes of body. That gives you a total payload of 6.5t, and at over 1350kg a Vauxhall Astra these days that means that you are overweight with more than 4 on.
Ignoring the discourtiousness of dazzling half of the M6 with your stage lighting setup every time the sun goes behind a cloud, I can’t see that it makes any business sense. Driver retention can be aided by a bit of airbrushing and ticking the leather seats option, oh and by not being cheap with the overnight parking budget. Brand recognition and public perception can be had with a well run handful of fleet spec motors, just look at this one:
20130818-IMG_3117 by Nicholas Smith, on Flickr
Then there is the one that got my personal best in show when I shot truck racing a few years back:
20130818-IMG_3212 by Nicholas Smith, on Flickr
Now look at this one:
20130818-IMG_3084 by Nicholas Smith, on Flickr
From what I can be certain of there are £6650 + VAT of extra lights, beacons, air con units, full width catwalks and kelsa bars on that (yeah, Im bored and spent all that time on kelsa’s website to figure it out). I cant find a price for the round indicators under the wing mirrors (which btw I hate. They are a good idea, but they are so old in design now they dont fit with the look of a single truck currently available.) and that sun visor is a custom job so no price available for that. Also I don’t know whats been done in the way of high bars, low bars, air bars and chassis bars at the back but I could quite safely add another grand on for that. Which is convenient. Because what that comes to is 10% of the outright purchase price of a new Renault Range T. Or put another way, 57 days pay for a driver on £35k a year.
Even if you spread the cost across the five year expected service life of the truck thats an additional £1530 a year the truck has to earn, or £5.89 a day. So we add over a fiver a day to the trucks standing costs, completely ruin the finely balanced aerodynamics the manufacturer spent years getting right and probably knock 0.2mpg off the trucks performance. Based on my numbers for the six months I had the Mercedes, that would add £434 a year to the diesel bill so we are now up to £9,820.00 cost over a five year service life.
Can you honestly say that people will pay £2000 a year more to have their product moved in that over this?:
I particularly liked the Scania( natch!) that I passed in thick fog going uphill on A90 last week- all the lights, not one of them turned on so other drivers could see him, and then a grim determination to show that his speed limiter was better than mine- yep, takes all sorts[emoji50]
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robroy:
Has anybody seen that white rigid (DAF?) van?
I think it belongs to some bed manufacturing co.
You can see it coming for miles, it’s absolutely covered top to bottom in lights.
I bet he daren’t knock the ignition off, with sidelights on anyway, put it that way.curtains with tassles and ties.
Yes! I’ve seen him! In west Yorkshire.
What puzzles me is, that you would never put that much excessive bling and tang on your car (unless you were a teenager), so why put it on a truck? Form follows function.
Bling is fine in the right proportions and some is actually functional like Durabrite Alcoas.
Im still of the opinion though that (in the main) a customer would still rather have his goods moved by a smart well turned out truck than a poverty spec fleet truck which has never had any love…
AndrewG:
Bling is fine in the right proportions and some is actually functional like Durabrite Alcoas.
Im still of the opinion though that (in the main) a customer would still rather have his goods moved by a smart well turned out truck than a poverty spec fleet truck which has never had any love…
‘Poverty spec’ is your interpretation Andrew, I would prefer to call it Standard spec, and if it is clean well looked after with nothing hanging off, driven by a smart well presented driver, I reckon a couple of spotlamps and a ■■■■ lightboard in the back of the cab would not make a ■■■■ of difference to the customer tbh.mate. 
robroy:
‘Poverty spec’ is your interpretation Andrew, I would prefer to call it Standard spec, and if it is clean well looked after with nothing hanging off, driven by a smart well presented driver, I reckon a couple of spotlamps and a [zb] lightboard in the back of the cab would not make a [zb] of difference to the customer tbh.mate.
To bellend RDCs, of course it makes no difference.
To individuals I reckon it does. Several places I go the truck gets compliments from the “customer”, one guy was very disappointed when I didn’t have my sidepipe anymore. Even in the UK at an RDC I had a guy complimenting the truck, 2 minutes of small talk and “no bays available” turned into “get this guy sorted quick”. Had I turned up in a poverty spec MAN that wouldn’t have happened because I’d be just another truck. Hardly earth shattering stuff but it makes the difference.
I’ve found especially in Holland and Belgium you get good crack with drivers who have tidy motors, a mutual respect because you both take pride in your work. Of course, you have loads of pond scum who can’t even wipe down a dash telling us all that camaraderie doesn’t exist any more, must be true for them.
A.
I just love poverty spec ,I had a new merc pick up in 06 ,spec light blue ,arm rest seat ,the biggest engine possible,top tint and cruise ,didn’t bother with other extras , my Foden is very low spec but the ■■■■■■■ makes up for it
I have top spots to try and avoid the suicidal Scottish wildlife
I have beacons on the roof as i regularly run upto 26 metres long
I have airhorns to alert said Scottish animals ( and some car drivers)
And i also have a lobar and leds in my mirror backs because its my truck and i think it looks smart for what it is
I have what I want because I love my job , I do not worry what overs think .
I wont waffle on because I get hate mail , but some people worry about others when they should worry about there selves a bit more . regards JAKEY
if i’m going to buy jewellery I’m going to buy it for my wife not the bosses truck.
and that’s all these lights are, esp the little LEDs, truck jewellery. Is there anything dafter than having jewellery for a wagon?
Bluey Circles:
if i’m going to buy jewellery I’m going to buy it for my wife not the bosses truck.and that’s all these lights are, esp the little LEDs, truck jewellery. Is there anything dafter than having jewellery for a wagon?
Buying jewellery for a woman who’s sleeping with your postman.
A.