Bewick:
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Aye Larry and Gerald, the “drum job”, IIRC Victor Blagden’s name changed to Rheem Blagden and in around 1970 John McGuffie started running a change over at Penkridge with a firm from Kingswood, Bristol ( can’t just recall the name) John loaded 20 ton of paper ex Henry Cooke at Milnthorpe for usually Midsomer Norton and swapped this trailer at P/ridge for a load of new 45 gal drums from Rheemco Bristol for Albright & Wilson Whitehaven. The tractor unit he first used on this traffic was an “H” reg Atkinson 180LXB, then a Scania 80 both of which he bought from J W Graham of Bass Lake. I’m not just sure when the Bristol job stopped but a drum manufacturer in Aintree called Brabys started supplying A & W and John managed to obtain this job to A & W which by this time had increased to two or three loads per day. In mid '74 john was struggling a bit and I was interested in developing my business with the addition of more localised traffic and his main work slotted in nicely to our operation. So I bought his 7 40ft flats complete with a set of “drum sticks” and sheets and ropes on each trailer. Brabys were great to work for and Harry Thompson the Despatch manager ( how’s that name for coincidence Gerald!) really appreciated being able to pick the phone up and get immediate contact with a Hauliers traffic desk ! Apparently trying to contact John was a nightmare as he never had a proper traffic office, and no Mobiles in those far off days ! We ran the drums out of Braby’s for approx. 8 years when the job dried up as A & W went over to more bulk tanker movements and away from packaged product. But it was an excellent job while it lasted and got us into traffic ex W.■■■■■■■ mainly ex Workington Steel and to a lesser extent out of A & W. But our rates for our traffic from Libbys and Henry Cookes in Milnthorpe to South Lancs, Cheshire, N. Wales and the W. Midlands were higher than the W. ■■■■■■■■ traffic so often we just shot home from Whitehaven back to Milnthorpe where we had plenty of excellent rated traffic to go at ! The shot is one of a Buffalo demo we ran for a while in '76 and it has just pulled into the depot with a load of green D/A’s which were the main colour of drums we delivered to A&W. And no the Buffalo didn’t figure in our fleet purchases our drivers hated it ! Cheers Dennis.
I am certain it was Blagden/Rheem Blagden had a drum factory in Burton-on-Trent up to the late 70’s/early 80’s. Draycott Transport from Draycott-in-the-Clay (■■■■■ Brothers) - who have featured on this forum somewhere - had several lorries on contract in there for many years. Loaded exactly the same as the one featured in the photo.
One of my Mercedes Benz 1820 Box vans parked next to Bassenthwaite Lake. The locals,
including Dennis and Gerald refer to it as Bass Lake. Nice place to stop for your 45 minutes
Tacho break. The Mercedes is eastbound toward the M6 Motorway. Ray Smyth.
Another photo parked up alongside Basssenthwaite, as Ray says a nice place to stop for your 45 minutes. Did this run quite a lot for Bulmers over to Eastmans at Workington either tipping, loading or both usually back to or from Teesport.
Bulmers had a nice fleet but are another fleet no longer with us now.
Hi 55 years ago last Thursday when I started driving aged 21 on a Leyland Comet triple deck livestock wagon running from Cockermouth to all points south the A66 alongside Bass Lake was not a great deal better than a sheep track with a lot of sharp bends cambered the wrong way leading to the contracting muscle movements in my nether regions. We continued right down to Kendal over Dunmail Raise on the A591 which was much the same back then.
Cheers, Leyland 600
Uncle Joes Mint Balls…Keep you all aglow…Give them to your Granny…Watch the bugger go. (Mike Harding)
Van picture,courtesy of Mushroomman on Trucknet, other pictures courtesy of Wigan World,& Google Earth.
Hello Ray, the Uncle Joe’s van I think came from the Crich Tramway Museum website so the credit must go to them.
I can’t remember where I saw these two but I have a feeling that were from the Wigan area.
mushroomman:
Hello Ray, the Uncle Joe’s van I think came from the Crich Tramway Museum website so the credit must go to them.
I can’t remember where I saw these two but I have a feeling that were from the Wigan area.
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Hello Mushroomman. The White Horse Pub is on the A6 at Westhoughton. The Ford Thames lorry is heading toward Manchester.
Just away to the right, off picture, is where the Metal Box Factory was, it is now the site of many private houses.
The Foden lorries have Bolton Reg. numbers. Kind Regards, Ray Smyth.
