The UK and Ireland are unique in the use of the C coupling. All the rest of Europe, the whole of America, North and South, Australia, New Zealand, the whole of Asia and as far as I know Africa use palm couplings. As far I’m concerned, they are all wrong, horrible, wobbly, leaky things.
Glad hands or palm couplings were old fashioned fifty years ago here, and I expect Un Zud. I’ve never used them.
This is what we use to comply with Australian Design Rules.
What more than the Leyland 500 being too small capacity and fixed head ohc was too difficult to maintain, compared to OHV pushrod, did I supposedly say exactly ?.
I experienced them in the 80s on Norfolk Line and i wasn’t convinced. We were still using todays couplings with taps on our trailers and they felt much more secure
Is my dad dead? no he’s tipping at Ferrybridge …….. 4 hours waiting 10 mins to tip ffs
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Old “hands” here in the US always had a few rubber inserts for glad hands. Never leave home without them.
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Ford at Dagenham was worse!
I’d guess that US spec tandem drive bogies are the definition of ‘light weight’ and they had to provide good service or there was nothing ?.
Also spit on them to lubricate the rubber seals before coupling them stop them sticking and tearing.I preferred palm couplings to C couplings on our salt covered roads.
Especially for drawbars where couplings were exposed to road spray and difficult to apply leverage to push C coupling valves.Was always washing them and putting engine oil on them to keep them from jamming.
If you wanted a decent Rockwell tandem-drive rear end for your long-hauler in the ‘70s and early ‘80s, you tended to end up with a bogie slightly over-engineered for the job, and more suitable for heavy haulage or severe on-site construction work.
Rockwell actually made a ‘light-duty’ bogie - the SQ100 - for general haulage 6x4 tractors that was well-suited to our newly-emerging 38-tonners in 1983. Foden, to its credit, seized the day an in early ‘83 was putting optional SQ100s in general haulage 6x4s with Cummins NTE 350 engines and Fuller RTX 11609 9-sp ‘boxes. An impressive set-up (if you can ignore the cable-shift Fullers used by Foden). You have to remember that Foden was still insisting that 6x4 was the way to go for 3+2 artics at 38t well beyond the mid-’80s.
ERF followed suit immediately the same year and was putting the SQ100 optionally in its 6x4 C-series units. Again, ERF was advising 6x4 for 3+2 artics at 38t, whilst, unlike Foden, starting to produce alternative twin-steer units.
I hope that goes some way to answering your question.
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This’ll get carryfast doing cartwheels 
Owner and driver Rod Garrity and his 1972 900T Dodge.
Hopefully that might help to vindicate some of the stick I was getting for daring to suggest that there is a place for double drive on UK trucks.It would obviously be a default choice if we followed the low drive axle weight route.4x2 and 6x2 seems to be a cost compromise rather than best possible solutions.3+3 44-48 tonner seems the ideal artic configuration.I think Foden and ERF had that idea spot on.But as usual let down by the vagaries of the UK markets and legislation.Also obviously no chance of that thinking being taken up by the heavy single drive Euro type thinking.
3+3 44t trucks is of the post 2000 era. I was specifically talking about the 3+2 38t era of the ‘80s. Double-drive certainly had a place on trucks involved with construction sites, forestry or even M/E work where collections or deliveries were accessed by offroad desert tracks.
Snow is a slightly separate argument, as the Scanweigians use 6x2 in snow for better traction. Now that we have air-dumping and all sorts of equipt just beginning to arrive in the ‘80s, the rules will always be on the move.
The really interesting part about the mid-’80s is that Foden, no less, were not making off-the-shelf 6x2 units because they saw 6x4 as the way forward into the 40t + era. They claimed that maintenance costs were lower with a tandem-drive and that it was cheaper to keep a tandem-drive bogie in working order than to keep a wide-spread, twin-steer arrangement correctly set up. They argued that rear-steers rely on air suspension and complicated load-sensing to maintain traction at the drive axles and to apportion braking effort correctly, which meant a lot more to go wrong!
They claimed that tandem-drive was not only a simpler design, it was one that automatically produces better traction and more effective braking. Instead of having to apportion the braking effort correctly between three differently-loaded axles, you only have two axle-loadings because, of course, the tandem-drive bogie compensates.
They also argued that everyone was jumping on the twin-steer bandwagon for the wrong reasons: because they all had a lot of investment tied up in their own 11 or 13-tonne drive axles and they had to use them! The only way they could do that at 38t was to go for twin-steer.
Foden also argued that if the vehicle is set up properly, there should be no directional stability problems in slippery conditions. I’ve read several Foden and ERF 6x4 road-tests of the ‘80s and they behaved more or less like 4x2s under braking and steering in the wet. The S106 and ERF’s C-series were outstanding. So it probably depends on the make. I’ve read some ropey accounts of 6x4 DAF 2800s, for example.
I’ve drawn up a list of pros in support of using a 6x4 unit on long-haul work to the Arabian Gulf in the ‘80s. It is, of course, only my preference, a matter of opinion and some of it subjective, so not set in stone. I added item No. 10, CF, after reading your comment about the rear bogie’s footprint.
Justification for 6x4 running on long-haul TIR tilt work at 38t
1. Precedence: worldwide use of 6x4 units for decades on general haulage.
2. Attitudes: 6x4 was considered by some manufacturers to be the answer to 3+2 running a 38t in the mid-‘80s.
3. Traction: 6x4 is good for off-road deliveries and poor weather conditions.
4. Ride: 6x4 gives a better ride.
5. Weight distribution: 6x4 ensures better weight distribution and makes for more versatility if using different trailers.
6. Stability: a 6x4 sits very securely on the road.
7. Braking: 6x4 configuration gives superior braking and better performance on steep, mountainous terrain.
8. Cost: Foden argued that tendem-drive was cheaper to maintain than a twin-steer set-up and had less to go wrong.
9. Handling: a good 6x4 handles as well as a 4x2 in wet conditions.
10. Footprint: a 6x4 imposes less road damage than a 4x2.
11. Presence: a 6x4 looks better than a 6x2 (subjective).
I conclude from the above that whatever subsequent findings, attitudes, costs and trends have accrued since 1983, one would have been adequately justified in putting a 6x4 unit and tilt on M/E work in the ‘80s and even the early ‘90s.
Firstly 3+2 would by natural selection have evolved into 3+3 in the case of 6x4 units just as it did in the case of 4x2 2+2 firstly to 2+3 and then 6x2 3+3 configuration.
While an air dump 6x2 will just dig the then even heavier drive axle even deeper into the soft snow like into mud.It also then creates an even heavier road smashing drive axle than a 4x2 especially if combined with chains.
The rest of the English speaking world got this right.
Bearing in mind there is a recent argument in favour of double drive going on in Norway at least.
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So are you allowed the same mass on an eight tyred suspension group, be it lazy plus drive or bogie drive?
