In the late 60s early 70s when everyone was driving AECs , GUYs , Seddons etc. did the word get around that Volvo’s F86 & Scania’s vabis were vastly superior motors(comfort wise) to ours- as they were just starting to appear on our roads, or didn’t anyone take them that seriously?
Just to give you an idea, I will always remember riding with my Dad in his new AEC Mercury car transporter summer of 68, coming back M/T up past Newport Pagnell northbound, Now the ulw of said AEC was 12 tons with an M/T trailer and as I looked back through the rear window one of Sammy Williams Scania Vabis 76’s, came past like we were stood still and he had a load of coil onboard, as a 14 year old then, I thought they were a bit special.
1972 I drove this MAN, interstate in Australia for a while, I believe its a 1968 model, I can not recall seeing many in the UK. 
tonyhogi:
In the late 60s early 70s when everyone was driving AECs , GUYs , Seddons etc. did the word get around that Volvo’s F86 & Scania’s vabis were vastly superior motors(comfort wise) to ours- as they were just starting to appear on our roads, or didn’t anyone take them that seriously?
I don’t think drivers had much say in what they drove then or now, the Volvo F86 was popular for its lightweight, ease of maintenance with a tilt cab and acceptable to companies, it was never the fastest thing or even the quickest to stop, but it did have a lot of admirers, bosses and drivers alike. In my own area the Vabis was not such a common sight but think the marketing was done by the hauliers talking amongst themselves, but again then as now, they wanted to try something new, before their local competition, especially with promises of good fuel consumption.
I was fortunate that I was brought up in a pub and on a Friday or Saturday night there were at least 15 regular customers I remember who were in road haulage, in fact I cannot remember what the others did, unless they were drivers for these men I had no time for them 
Hiya …now don,t shout and screem at me. I think that maggi dutz was here in 1966 a year before Volvo
and scania, Iam not saying they was any better than other but i think they may be one of the first.
they was the most ugly thats for certain at that time.I was at teck college in 66 (15yrs)and had a commercial
motor mag and was truck mad. one of the lads ripped out a demonstrator advert and filled it in unknown
to me, The next thing i knew i,d got a demostrator drive at Adams Butter who was operating from Leek where i lived.
Adams had a demo but never run one as they was AEC crazy
I got a stack of info about all there models but they have been thrown out now.
John
Dieseldogsix:
Just to give you an idea, I will always remember riding with my Dad in his new AEC Mercury car transporter summer of 68, coming back M/T up past Newport Pagnell northbound, Now the ulw of said AEC was 12 tons with an M/T trailer and as I looked back through the rear window one of Sammy Williams Scania Vabis 76’s, came past like we were stood still and he had a load of coil onboard, as a 14 year old then, I thought they were a bit special.
The same thing happened to me on the A12 dual carriageway just after Gallows Corner. I had on a light loaded ERF 180 ■■■■■■■ artic in heavy traffic ,he was outside lane fully freighted with sheet steel . I pulled away going to give him a run for his money but he left me for dead in the space of a few seconds ! I had never seen anything like it ;that was one of Sammy’s, probably the same one ?
I think that Maggie D and Merc 1418s and Scania 76 were all running over here around the same time before Volvo’s the Germans were as under powered as our wagons but the 76 did go a bit and when the 110 first came out it had problems with the prop shaft as it had a tendency to twist and the clutch was hardly up to the job as I know Bradshaws of Lincoln used to carry a spare prop shaft as one of their drivers told me when I was running with him in my highwayman on low loader work he had a bit on me top end but not on hills though he was also geared down. When Pickfords took the Siddle Cook heavy haulage vehicles into their fleet they had a “G” reg F88 which was rated somewhere between 80 and 100 tons but it was geared down to around 38 mph but was fine as it would do all that it was required to do. By the mid 70s I was on tank work and driving a Crusader and these pulled far better than most of the continental wagons and would leave them for dead from a standing start as the fuller was a far faster change than the syncro boxes of the continentals or the ZF constant mesh box which some used. The foreign manufacturers soon caught up and past our designers and we were soon left so far behind there was no way back for them as you cannot get a British wagon now all this as happened in under 50 years.
The first 86 I saw up close was when the company I worked for bought one (only one) this would have been about 1970 so it wasn’t one of the first around. It was a hit with the drivers purely because it had a syncro box, light power steering and a quiet engine, infact ‘just like driving a car’ as many drivers put it, now compared to what they had before in the British makes it was on first appearance and use, a cut above. However it wasn’t the all singing dancing machine of the future, it had problems, blown head gaskets for one and other niggles I can’t recall, rear hub seals I think on this particular model. True the bigger brothers were superior but they were never really intended for British tramping work which was still the main bread and butter work of most UK hauliers .
Scania always had a good powerful engine so they were bound to blow dust in the face of our Gardner makes, only the bigger ■■■■■■■ lumps competed but still in the same shake, rattle and roll UK makes (despite the love we have for them on here). Around this time the old favourites AEC, Leyland etc were trying to produce newer engines and not doing very well and as has been said the Merc and Maggie had been around before, the Merc’s being known then as ‘German Bedfords’, nuff said, and the Maggies were still a bit of a novelty with the air cooled engine so were treated a bit wearily. I just believe it was a critical time in British Transport when the UK motors were feeling tired and old hat and this allowed the Swedish makes especially to sweep in looking and handling better than the current, Mandators, Guy’s, Seddon’s etc, despite the fact they would still break down just as the UK jobs did but once the trend had started those clever men from Sweden capitalised by offering better after care, breakdown/parts cover and deals many owners couldn’t turn down. The UK vehicle industry never recovered. Franky.
I used the M1 around south Yorkshire everyday in the late 70’s and can vividly remember RJ Norman’s bonneted Macks hurtling past everything.
Jerry
my father has told me of the foreign motors ran by entress transport of swansea during the early 1960’s.they had at least one of the pig ugly deutz’ that my mate 3300 john refered to and i am led to believe the first scania vabis in the uk?,a left ■■■■■■.bill entress got increasingly frustrated at leyland and atki’s attitude and started buying foreign motors,to my knowledge,once he started doing that he never bought british trucks ever again.
regards andrew
No doubt about it, the foreign lorries were, from a driver’s view, a better lorry, but that isn’t what made them so popular, that was a combination of big discounts & long lead times from the British manufacturers, people were waiting over a year for a new Atki with a Gardner lump so when the Volvo/Scania/Merc salesman knocked on the door with the offer of immediate delivery for half the price, you can see how they got their foot in the door, it all got much worse for the British manufacturers during the mid 70s with all the industrial action from the militant unions at the assembly plants, the rest is history…
newmercman:
No doubt about it, the foreign lorries were, from a driver’s view, a better lorry, but that isn’t what made them so popular, that was a combination of big discounts & long lead times from the British manufacturers, people were waiting over a year for a new Atki with a Gardner lump so when the Volvo/Scania/Merc salesman knocked on the door with the offer of immediate delivery for half the price, you can see how they got their foot in the door, it all got much worse for the British manufacturers during the mid 70s with all the industrial action from the militant unions at the assembly plants, the rest is history…
I remember hearing some story about a haulier who had a few Volvo F86 in the fleet, they were delivering steel into the motoring monolith of Longbridge, they downed tools about foreign built trucks bringing materials into the factory. I imagine the same thing happened around Patricroft, Leyland and Bathgate.
3300John:
Hiya …now don,t shout and screem at me. I think that maggi dutz was here in 1966 a year before Volvo
and scania, Iam not saying they was any better than other but i think they may be one of the first.
they was the most ugly thats for certain at that time.I was at teck college in 66 (15yrs)and had a commercial
motor mag and was truck mad. one of the lads ripped out a demonstrator advert and filled it in unknown
to me, The next thing i knew i,d got a demostrator drive at Adams Butter who was operating from Leek where i lived.
Adams had a demo but never run one as they was AEC crazy
I got a stack of info about all there models but they have been thrown out now.
John
hiya,
Don’t know anything about Maggi’s but when doing a bit for Killingbeck in the late 60s arrived in the yard one evening to see what looked like a new Maggi sitting on a little low loader they used for carrying units about, i was driving an old ex-Shell Scammell long nosed job with the gate change, first thoughts was we’re getting some new motors and there was a possibility i might be getting a replacement for the old hard work draught box i was tramping about with, when i asked was we getting some new motors the then main man Robbie Killingbeck retorted brought that thing from Hull today and it broke down and it was unit only no trailer no weight and the air cooled thing had overheated and a cylinder liner had lifted adding and it’s going back tomorrow John Killingbeck seconded that and added if it’s not got a Gardner it’s crap John was only in his early 20s at that time but he was a wizard with Gardner engines and i believe he stuck with them till he shut up shop.
thanks harry long retired.
Hiya Harry, I bet you remember Bradley’s of Accrington with their bright red International Harvesters in the late fifties and early sixties in the days before the Haslingden by pass 
.
The Jag Joe who I met from Blackburn ( there could be two of them 
) used to work for Bradleys along with I think Jimmy Smethurst. I was told that Bradleys got their motors from Canada and I was then under the impression that International were a Canadian company.
mushroomman:
Hiya Harry, I bet you remember Bradley’s of Accrington with their bright red International Harvesters in the late fifties and early sixties in the days before the Haslingden by pass
The Jag Joe who I met from Blackburn ( there could be two of them
hiya,
Yes Mushroomman remember Bradley’s very well those motors were absolute crap would’nt pull the bedclothes off you and if i had to drive those things i would’nt have wanted to get out of bed, don’t know whether he got any of his motors from Canada but most of them i know came from Doncaster where they was cobbled together by International Harvester used to hate getting behind them going up Salmesbury if you was’nt on the bit of dual at the start you was lumbered until they turned onto the by-pass and we went straight on into Blackburn, heard Joe Jag worked for Bowkers at one time but never when i was there.
thanks harry long retired.
Wheel Nut:
newmercman:
No doubt about it, the foreign lorries were, from a driver’s view, a better lorry, but that isn’t what made them so popular, that was a combination of big discounts & long lead times from the British manufacturers, people were waiting over a year for a new Atki with a Gardner lump so when the Volvo/Scania/Merc salesman knocked on the door with the offer of immediate delivery for half the price, you can see how they got their foot in the door, it all got much worse for the British manufacturers during the mid 70s with all the industrial action from the militant unions at the assembly plants, the rest is history…I remember hearing some story about a haulier who had a few Volvo F86 in the fleet, they were delivering steel into the motoring monolith of Longbridge, they downed tools about foreign built trucks bringing materials into the factory. I imagine the same thing happened around Patricroft, Leyland and Bathgate.
I heard the same thing, no wonder it all went down the pan, bet those workers (or their sons & daughters) would gladly unload any lorry today, no matter where it was made 
heard the same thing, no wonder it all went down the pan, bet those workers (or their sons & daughters) would gladly unload any lorry today, no matter where it was made
Er,no! they were put out to graze by Thatcher along with all the other lame duck industries & are probably 3rd generation unemployables .
Thats a bit spitfeful harry you are talking about the centre of the known universe.
theres always two sides to every story, fred
Hullo All,
About this Union thing, foriegn lorries not being used for tipping and loading in British factories. That is exactly what happened with MAT, at the Oxford depot. As everybody will know MAT always had 110 Scanias, that is until some bright spark at British Leyland at Abingdon looked out of his window one day and saw them loading. They rang up MAT to tell them they were banned from the site with the 110 Scanias, two days later MAT were in there again in full swing with six Brand new Crusaders all based at the Oxford depot.
Cheers, Archie.