Thanks mate. Its amazing how many pics of Towmaster there are out there when you dig a little. Was this one on scrap book memories?..What about that wind deflector eh? 
Just got myself a negative scanner, so here are the original two Sheerness pictures in better quality…along with two more I found.
I can now confirm the date is January 1986. (Despite the sun). At this point Sheerness had about 16 Mercs, which were gradually ousting the ERF’s. There were only 8 ERF’s left, and the Volvo. In the second picture the ERF is either XEV968 or 970X. These were some of the last B Series delivered in March '82, the FFE’s were some of the first C Series delivered in June '82.
In the third picture, the Merc in the distance is one of the XKE/X Contract hire vehicles. In the fourth picture the Volvo is WFC917X, and the ERF is RHD511X, the only RHD Sheerness had.
Incidentally, the ■■■■■■ was my own, not a company car and had been used by a TV rental company, its actual owner was Marley Vehicle Leasing of Sevenoaks, who also had an office on the Eurolink Estate in Sittingbourne in those days.
The Transit was not ours either, but a loan from Canterbury. We had EJD701V. On this type of van if you went backwards with the tailgate down, it would lift the back wheels off the ground, meaning you weren’t going any where!
Nice to see the Volvo F7 pic, i’d forgotten all about that one. Ive been trying to post up the large framed photo i have but cant seem to bring the size down. Its far too big to fit on my scanner so ive taken a photo of the photo and tried to do it that way. Will try again later.
Hi fellar’s, These pics are fantastic. It’s great to know that these old nostalgic images are out there somewhere 
The pic with the Volvo in it reminds me very much of how a lot of drivers would just ‘abandon’ their units rather than park them up properly. I seem to remember the Doncaster yard looking like a wagon jumble sale many times 
The image with the contract Merc is a good example of some smart roping and sheeting. I recall the left of the 2 sheeted loads being called a ‘camel’ for obvious reasons.
I have also noticed a very obvious theme in all the images on this thread too…all the wagons, without exception are no nonsence, no frills, and very workmanlike looking. In my view, this is a testiment to the firm, and the work ethos of its drivers! By the way, I can almost here the laughs around the yard when that ATS van reversed itself of the floor
I recently found the below image, but dropped a knacker when trying to save it, and as you can see, its way too small. I tried to blow it up, but just lost clarity…sorry:( . I have tried trawling for it again, but so far to no gain. I will keep looking. I can tell you that it was on an A plate (1984 I think)
Below is a model I made of what a Towmaster unit might look like today in 2012■■?
Cheers.
I’m glad you’re liking the pictures. I wish I had wandered round snapping the units now. Still hindsight eh?
In the early days of the 38 ton conversions we were called out to this yard by a subbie with a fixed tag axle on the back of his ERF. He had parked the unit up in the dark and driven up onto the railway sleeper/wheel stop. Of course his drive axle was off the ground, and he wasn’t going anywhere. Someone suggested calling us out to jack the truck up and remove the sleeper. Our fitter called base and said ‘Can we do this - the driver hasn’t got a puncture or anything he just wants the truck jacked up’ Easiest call out that fitter ever earned!!
That picture of the A reg Merc is a Sheerness truck, with another kent truck from A Wood following it.
tyreman:
I’m glad you’re liking the pictures. I wish I had wandered round snapping the units now. Still hindsight eh?In the early days of the 38 ton conversions we were called out to this yard by a subbie with a fixed tag axle on the back of his ERF. He had parked the unit up in the dark and driven up onto the railway sleeper/wheel stop. Of course his drive axle was off the ground, and he wasn’t going anywhere. Someone suggested calling us out to jack the truck up and remove the sleeper. Our fitter called base and said ‘Can we do this - the driver hasn’t got a puncture or anything he just wants the truck jacked up’ Easiest call out that fitter ever earned!!
That picture of the A reg Merc is a Sheerness truck, with another kent truck from A Wood following it.
That’s a cracking anicdote that mate, made me laugh out loud . I can almost hear that unit having its pods revved off by a puzzled looking driver…priceless . Did you ever do any work in the Doncaster yard then 
, I know that they used ATS up here too, and one of their sheds was just down the road, over the other side of the River Don. I have loads of pics of the Doncaster yard that I took recently. It’s still there, and the wherhouses are still in the came colours as they were back in the 80s. In fact, the yard is changed very little, and is currently being used by a chemical firm. As a point of interest, the old boy in the gatehouse also used to work for ATS at the time, and he regaled me with tales of when they used to come into the yard and do some trye work on the wagons.
I will keep trawling for a better image of the A plate merc aswell as owt els related. . Cheers.
A couple of “odd” Towmaster pics.
The first one is of a unit being painted at Sparshatts, a very young looking John “Pud” Prudhome, who has recently retired.
Thesecond one being a unit having been painted pared up with a batch of other units circa 1987
Hi TDL102, these are a couple of crackers. The livery was a vibrant one, and stood out in any yard 
Sorry dont know the chap in the paint shop, but its great to see these wagons in their working life. When I was wanting to construct a couple of models of their fleet (a 1:50 scale ERF B, with roped and sheeted trailer & the imaginary DAF), I was struggling to find even one picture for ref, but there appears to be loads, and the more you scratch, the more people have.
I wish that I took more pics when I was a kid in the yard, but to be frank, I was too busy roaming round the yard slobbering over the wagons to even think about snapping them. 
Welcome to the thread mate…please post more if you have them
FKR 434 V Was a sheerness truck.i had FKR 426V When these trucks come home there were 16 of them,can’t remember now if all the regs were follow ons.i dont think they where as they came from at least 2 different sources.the yard with the mercs.+trls is def.not sheerness.i have a pic.of the white livery somewhere i will try to find it and post on here.the reg of the truck was AFS 171S if memory serves.
Hi mick.c, welcome to the thread, and to the forum (looking at your profile)…It would be great if you could post that picture of the white livery. I will watch this space. Hope you have enjoyed reading the contributions, and looking at the pictures (I know I certainly am). I would be interested to hear any tales you may have of your time with Towmaster’s, particulalry if they involve coming up to the Doncaster yard, or any contact you may have had with the drivers from there.
I am now in the process of planning and building another ‘imaginery’ Towmaster’s unit. However, this next one is going to be in the traditional, and striking colours of Red & Blue.
FYI - There is also a little bit of relating info on the thread ‘ERF B SERIES, WHERE ARE YOU?’…you may have to go back a few pages for that one though.
Cheers.
I seem to remember one of Tomasters Sheerness drivers won a lot of money on the lottery, or maybe ‘THE SUN’ bingo. It would have been early 80s i think. Maybe someone remembers this?.
Hl hilltop4,can only remember going to doncaster yard a few times once for a union meeting to discuss a pay rise.another time a couple of us from sheppy had a night out there and went to the local pub for a few drinks with some of the local drivers sadly i cant remember any of there names now,and we used to meet some on c/o at j14 on the m1,nights and days.3 of us from sheppy went up on a sat.with 3 units and trls.to leave there and bring home 3 new ones,but when we got there only 2 were ready to come back so i had to return with the 1 i took up,mine arrived in sheppy a few days later which was AFS 171S.we got paid well for that w/e as we booked 14hrs for the sat plus n/o money,and 5 hrs for sun.i also got an 8hr shift c/o as i was going on nights on the monday.we were back in the yard sat,afternoon we used to get away with a lot in those days.no bent running all legit unless it suited us to do a bit more for our own benefit.if only things were the same today.had some good times there with a good bunch of guys.the job was well paid over and above union rates at the time.
The money winner must have won it in ‘The Sun’ as the lottery wasnt around till a bit later.
mick.c - The tales of the yard running up to Donny are great!. I rememebr visiting the yard at Sheppy with dad a couple of times…sadly, I dont remember any logisitics of the visits, just picking up loads. I also recall doing c/o’s at Trowel services on M1 with southern drivers (I assume you boys). These trailers in turn had travelled down from the Broxburn yard in Scotland, via a swap at Washington Services on the A1 with the scot lads.
They were great days. I was only 13/14 years old at the time, but I remember some good characters among the drivers. And like you say, I also dont’t recall any illegalities around the drivers and their times, but I do recall the drivers pushing it to the very limit! 
I think they had to do this to be fair…to go up to Washington Services, do a c/o, then take that straight back down past ‘home’ and beyond to Trowel and then do another c/o before returning home again …they had to go some to get that done in a shift… (And there’s me thinking that BWF 74T was a nippy wagon, when all along it was probably just dad’s driving!!
Did you ever encounter the resident owner driver, who used to sub at Doncaster…a massive fellar by the name of BLOCKER. He drove a big Blue Scania. He couldn’t even spell H&S, never mind adhere to it
Keep the tales coming…lovin em!
I think the money winner on towmasters was the wife of gordon kemp.yes the sheppy drivers did do c/o at trowel services then drop the trl into vauxhall lorry park london then c/o trls for one already in there then back to yard or back to yard from trowel depending on where the load was going.
Question,was Towmaster a wholly owned subsiduary of Alfred Bell/Guiness drinks group ? Cheers Bewick.
The unregistered truck in the yard picture was either D209MKM or D210MKM. Both were delivered to Sheerness, but only 210 stayed.
TDL102:
A couple of “odd” Towmaster pics.
The first one is of a unit being painted at Sparshatts, a very young looking John “Pud” Prudhome, who has recently retired.
Thesecond one being a unit having been painted pared up with a batch of other units circa 1987
Bewick:
Question,was Towmaster a wholly owned subsiduary of Alfred Bell/Guiness drinks group ? Cheers Bewick.
Sorry mate, being just a new teenager at the time, I can’t offer too much accurate history on the firm and its 'gaffa’s. That said, I can tell you that Towmaster also did a fair bit of bottle work for Schweppes too. I will stand to be corrected on this, but the way I read it at the time, was that Bells Scotch Whisky used Towmaster Transport for their carrying. Bells were then ‘interferred’ with by Guinness who had their own fleet…result - Towmaster’s very suddenly became surplus to requirements.
Looking back, I now suspect that the Charcon tunnel section work was a valliant effort to keep work coming in when it looked like the Whisky work was drying up (no pun intended ). Sadly, the London sewer upgrades were an exhaustive line of work, and as such were never going to sustain the firm. A real case of ‘too little too late’ if there ever was one.
It is so sad to think that the firm went the way it did, but they were one of many in a similar situation at the time. The mid 80s was a time of take overs, and buy outs, with yuppies on the horizon, greed was good, and Thatcher then threw petrol on an already out of control fire by making Privatisation the way to go and spanking the unions at the same time. Industries were having a tuff time of it. Sorry to bring politics in on it, but we can’t escape the fact that they played a part in the demise of Towmaster Transport. Enuff said…more piccies please
tyreman:
Found this on the Merc NG SK Thread, as you say the more you dig!
Sorry…got so het up on Towmaster being the vicitm of politics, forgot to acknowledge your picture…a nice shot of a wogon going about its business. After closely looking though, I can’t help but wonder how the rear wheel arch’s on the unit worked with the arch’s being lower that the top of the tryres, surely of the driver pulled the covers over, they would scrub on the tyres maybe someone could explain whats going on there. Ta.
hilltop4:
The money winner must have won it in ‘The Sun’ as the lottery wasnt around till a bit later.mick.c - The tales of the yard running up to Donny are great!. I rememebr visiting the yard at Sheppy with dad a couple of times…sadly, I dont remember any logisitics of the visits, just picking up loads. I also recall doing c/o’s at Trowel services on M1 with southern drivers (I assume you boys). These trailers in turn had travelled down from the Broxburn yard in Scotland, via a swap at Washington Services on the A1 with the scot lads.
They were great days. I was only 13/14 years old at the time, but I remember some good characters among the drivers. And like you say, I also dont’t recall any illegalities around the drivers and their times, but I do recall the drivers pushing it to the very limit!
Did you ever encounter the resident owner driver, who used to sub at Doncaster…a massive fellar by the name of BLOCKER. He drove a big Blue Scania. He couldn’t even spell H&S, never mind adhere to it
Keep the tales coming…lovin em!
hilltop4,
dont think i ever came across BLOCKER he sounds the sort u would never forget.i know from talking to the doncaster drivers that we had it easier down south,our longest c/o was from sheerness to trowel services then back to vauxhall bridge lorry park london then swop trls with a dropped one,we always had 3/4 trls in there then bacck to the depot and finish.we where on a garantee of 12hrs,a night.we also used to do day c/o’s at scratchwood sevices and at j14 on m1 then it was tip load wherever then back to yard if time,although most of time we would have a dodgy n/o and be at home.then get a lift back to the truck the next day and that was usually on a towmaster truck.i’ve found a foto of a white liveried towmaster truck a the time it was a sheppy based one,but it did go back to doncaster in exchange for a new s reg.the load on the back was a load of whisky.ant way i will try and post it here.i’ve also got an album on here if it dont work.
