There is any number of threads about long-haul, really long haul, really really long haul and the “so long we’re still measuring it” haul. They’re all worth reading and dreaming about, but as an antidote (and a bit of a giggle), what’s the shortest haul you ever did?
To qualify, you have to have actually gone past the yard gates and out onto the public highway, arrived at the drop, unloaded/ loaded/ reloaded (whichever) and gone back to the yard (and loaded/ unloaded/ unreloaded, whichever), which means yard shunting doesn’t count.
(For the record, mine was a 2 and-a-quarter mile round trip between the factory (that made metal boxes for firearms and fireworks) and a rail yard and back - loaded from the factory, return empty. Rinse. Repeat 24 times)
Doesn’t really count but when I was doing pallet network, we’d quite often get pallets for neighbouring units. They didn’t even get loaded on a truck, just delivered on fork lift or if we were feeling energetic and it was a nice day we’d walk it there on a pallet truck.
Newcastle docks ( Newcastle just north of Sydney. not Newcastle up north… for Toll… the Hunter dredger used to dump out at 20,000 tons at a time onto a massive drainage area… once it was dry we used to load it and run it to the conveyor belt so the sand could be loaded onto the waiting ships.
3 buckets with the loader, about 25 tons… second gear, 3rd, 4th… stop over the hopper grid… dump the air… tip… roll forward… 3rd, 4th while the body was coming back down… 3 buckets with the loader… 4 trucks 24 hours a day…
Drove a Cat D8 22a with blade crossways on the low-loader and took her 500yds (no more) down the road to the bosses brother’s farm. 3 days later - return trip - booked a night out but refused and called a cheeky git. The farmer slipped me 10 bob though. Jim.
When I was on Pickfords the depot was only a few hundred yards from English Steel Corporation in fact if you stood at the gate you would be able to see a wagon coming out of their gate, and Davy Roll Company was only around the corner and Firth Browns was across the road but you had to go round the block to access it and it was common to bring loads in to the warehouse for transshipping or storage especially just before holiday shut down, it was quite common to bring 2 or 3 case rolls in for export if other wagons were out in a couple of hours.
Another customer was Robert Jenkins Wortley Road Rotherham where we would move a few loads from 9 shop to 20 shop which was about 50 yards away on the other side of the road and the 9 shop was a very awkward place to reverse into if you did not know how to approach it but I was lucky and the old hands Sam and Eric taught me that you were better to reverse in from the road than turning round in the yard
cheers Johnnie
200 yds. Came out of the terminal with a full load of black oil, down the hill to the traffic lights, braked, the lid catch on the tank broke and a fountain of the stuff shot out of the manhole. It closed the road for quite a few hours.
grumpy old man:
200 yds. Came out of the terminal with a full load of black oil, down the hill to the traffic lights, braked, the lid catch on the tank broke and a fountain of the stuff shot out of the manhole. It closed the road for quite a few hours.
One of our customers’ premises is about 400 yards from our yard as the crow flies (although the road route is about twice that). Normally it’s scheduled as just one of the drops on a longer run, although I have on occasion been given it as a one-hit “second run”.
I have also done a single load from our yard into the one next door (road distance from our gate to theirs - 150 yards) although that wasn’t done as part of our core business - I was simply taking a few pallets of packing materials which had been stored temporarily in our warehouse.
I used to do a shunt from the Coca Cola factory in Edmonton to a warehouse 500yds up the road, you pulled into the loading area, product was forklifted on the trailer straight off the production line, pull the curtains and then off to the warehouse, open the curtains, unload and repeat.
It was quite lucrative as we were on spot hire rates and it was 73quid a pop then, easy to do ten shunts a night and with other lorries doing that job alongside people loading for customer deliveries you would spent more time drinking tea than actually doing any work.
Being on tippers we did plenty of loads almost within sight of the quarry so doesn’t really count I guess? Shortest regular job was seven loads of dust a day to Hulland Products, about 25 minutes each way, some lads were on that solely for 20+ years.
I used to run cigarettes from Shed 10 to Shed 15 a distance of about 200yds at the massive TDG(Pinnacle) storage depot in West Hallam
We were paid a hour and a half tip and reload do 8 loads a day start at 6 done for midday 12 and a half hrs pay
8 at basic 4 at time and a half and half an start and finish
As much tea as you could drink and a couple of hrs kip cos we didn’t want to run back to the yard too early
Used to go on hire to the council highways occasionally with a tipper, and haul from an excavator. Load one side of the road on a widening scheme and sometimes literally tip the load on the opposite side of the road. That was short haul, and bloody boring.
Cheers Dave.
windrush:
Being on tippers we did plenty of loads almost within sight of the quarry so doesn’t really count I guess? Shortest regular job was seven loads of dust a day to Hulland Products, about 25 minutes each way, some lads were on that solely for 20+ years.
Pete.
Only seven,Pete? We used to do 18 or 20 a day AP stone from BG Fauld down to Tutbury station! You mention Products - we also used to do about 20 a day from the quarry face, over the fields just below Products, into the plant at Blue Circle Mercaston. Face shovel driver there was a miserable auld b****r named Captain Hadfield (Captain was his name, not his rank!)
Ste46:
Only seven,Pete? We used to do 18 or 20 a day AP stone from BG Fauld down to Tutbury station! You mention Products - we also used to do about 20 a day from the quarry face, over the fields just below Products, into the plant at Blue Circle Mercaston. Face shovel driver there was a miserable auld b****r named Captain Hadfield (Captain was his name, not his rank!)
Aah - memories - the old days!
Steve
Haha, it was hard enough doing seven loads Steve especially if the tarmac plants were busy and using all the dust! Could easily wait an hour for the last load. I guess you knew Steve (I think?) Allen then, he carted out of Mercaston and his lad Craig drove at Ballidon for a while?
When I had my mixer at Tarmac I did 17 loads to the grain store next door to the plant at Belford. two of us worked the job, one loading in the plant as the other one discharged at the base for the new silo. you could see each other through the chain link fence. Two batchers worked the plant that day non stop. I never stopped all day breaks taken at 15 minute spells whilst loading. Boy what a payday that was for me as an O/D. The icing on the cake was a load for Morpeth on the way home. Regards Kev.
, I think I would fall a sleep , but sounds like you didn’t have time ! 
