Trans Arabia /S. Jones of Aldridge:A few pics

ronhawk:
Well KB why don’t you tell us of the interesting times that we all like to read , instead of the lies that you print ,the 95 ton road train coming down Tief is my particular favourite

Oh Ron
What are we going to do with you?? That small chip has turned into a 25kg sack!!! On your nxt trip out stop at the Fish and Chip shop and drop it off!!! Life is to short

You have got to a good age without much poor health by the looks of it - keep it that way.

I had a near miss in 1990 and at recent visit to my doctor( she’s v nice) I commented that I had had a good 20plus years run and maybe that’s it, no she said we will sort another 20years but I doubt if my Kees and legs will take it!! Enjoy the time we have left - I have certainly enjoyed my retirement so far although a bit more pension would be nice thinking of that 15 year transfer plus 6 year pension with S Jones was paying!!

Your memory is letting you down!! I employed drivers to drive, engineers/mechanics to service and repair, clerks and accountant to do the paperwork, cook to feed us, tragic manager to manage the traffic and a GM to oversee and ensure there was enough work paying the correct rates and ensuring we got paid so that I could pay the bills including your wages. Oh then there were the shareholders!! They got paid last if there we any left!!

I did very little driving in Saudi - just a bit of shunting and help with the container runs at night if we were short of drivers.

“Taif”. Notice the spelling !! In the comment I wrote I do not think I said I was driving and in fact was not and nor would I as I do no not believe I had or have the expertise to do that.
I was sitting in the passenger seat watching with great interest how it was achieved by one of my famous five drivers - as I remember v low gear, exhaust brake mostly and a Little brake - the worst part was after the police check point as you are still descending quite steeply A I remember driving the Blazer up t hat section thinking the thing was looseing power. So no I was not driving

This experience for us both was not to be repeated and I decided that road Trans south to Khamis/Abha etc were a no no

So get rid of those spuds - get a life and go were you planning to appear in Grand Auto with that Trans Am maybe also smoking one of those King Edward cigars that came out of the ------ container!!!

I also planned to bring a Trans Am(new) back to the uk but bought a new Datsun 280 ZX.(RHD) and ship it home via P & O In a container that a Bently came off - we Kept it for some years - Mrs B drove it - got rid when you could not buy Dunlop run flat tyres any more and rust was appearing

I also fancied driving a big Merc car home!! Dreams

Keep cool

Ken b

Firstly I apologise unreservedly to Wirlinmerlin for the words I wrote ,although they where true the have no right to be aired on your thread , but I was only writing true words that have been cast in stone and can’t be undone , the Trans Arabian truck keeps rolling, just like the Mac that crashed into the mountain ? It’s was rebuilt !!! and this thread keeps rolling , with good ? I hope that Pope Martin will give me the blessing to carry on spelling mistakes and all Ron

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Right, now we have that all out of the way it’s ever onwards, ever upwards.
Ronaldo, regarding that picture you recently put on featuring that A series with 40 tons sitting on its back. I remember when I first came out there, I couldn’t understand how in heaven’s name the kit didn’t break in half with the incredible overloads. Coming from a tanker background, I was used to weekly problems of cracking chassis necessitating the fitting of flitch plates, 5th wheel failures, king pin failures and regular broken springs. During my three years out there, we must have had instances of broken springs but I can’t say I remember any. At the time, I remarked on this to you Ron and you told me that the seeming rare incidence of stress failure was because metal never cooled down. Makes sense of course when you think about it.
Regarding mountainous roads, my only claim to fame is surviving the one way mountain section during Mad Sunday at the TT races, (as well as having that famous tee shirt for the Abqaiq road of course, de rigueur for everybody in the eastern province on a trip home, even if they had never been off the Aramco compound!)
Aunty Ral took me a tad off the beaten track a couple of years ago when she insisted we hired a crappy old petrol/gas midget Chevrolet saloon and travel up from Bucharest to Brasov then on to Transylvania via that famous mountain road called The Transfagarasan. Clarkson of Top Gear fame did an episode about it and ranted on, along the lines of it being one of the most fantastic driving roads in the world. All I can say is “Clarkson, do it in a midget Chevi that struggled to breath long before 6100 feet!”
I enclose a picture or three for your interest. And yes I know, it’s not a patch on your hairy adventures but for me it was a jolly jape, especially as I had delectable company. ( Pass a pig’s trotter over, I’m feeling a bit peckish!)

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Thanks Martin for your forgiveness I will say three Hail Mary’s tonight and kiss the wife ! your travels ? I have been following with interest !! Ron

I have written before about JD saying that he was an Unsung hero of T/A and this is very true ,he was the man they called Do’ctor Truck the work that JD had in Jedda was hard , repairing the truck and trailers in the street outside the Villa , from the street with no pit he kept T/A rolling together with the help of the Telford burner the trucks where serviced and repaired to a high standard. Talking to JD about our times in Jedda , And extra time he served with Trans Arabia !!! His honesty shone through He was and still is a great lad ,pity his time was not appreciated as promised , I can only give praise to this man for his loyalty to Trans Arabia , and thank him for the photos that will appear on this thread Ron

JD told me about this " Shipment "that when Jonnie Mathews drove off the tarmac approaching the port barrier into some uneven sand ? He felt the load of this boat start to tip !!! To stop this going over he kept going until he regained control and went through entrance with the guards shouting after the paperwork until he found some even ground , well done JM he was a great lad , Ron

Outside the T/A villa Jerry Cook talking to Zieds driver ,there tractors where impressive, Bill Smith in the background asking me how the axle was coming along on the trailer , that was nearly cut in half , you can clearly see the the road where we crawled about changing oils etc , the best time about working here was you could go upstairs and make a cup of tea in the cool canteen this felt great , the tea was very welcoming , this was where the Jake Brakes where fitted to the ■■■■■■■ engine, repairs to hubs, axles , clutches , cab resprays , brakes relined , Mac subframe welded etc etc it was all systems go JD photos thanks Ron

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Salaam Alykhum Ron !!! ah The Riyadh Flyovers how will I ever forget !!! My first ever trip a 20 box full to the gunwales with scaffold pipes bound for Ras Tanura I was a bit windy of the Tonkas as they went wingin past a bit to close for comfort and clipped the edge though i was going to roll but just glanced off the trouble was I did,nt want to lose sight of the other truck he knew where he was going … mind you it was,nt long before you acclimatized and got used to things and could throw your weight around a bit better ■■?

Inshalah… PS did you ever come across a driver with Zahied Tractors called Ed Quirie ( a Scots bloke ) Ex SARAMAT

Looks like you are about to overtake that Merc? Backsplice ? Let him go let him tally let him sink awr let him swim ? As the song goes It’s best to let him go , I remember following Tony Cope he would just edge into the sand throwing all the rubbish up my front end, the swine ,any thing to stop the boredom on the strait desert roads ,the photo of the Mac is the one on the fly over just can not quite make out the signs? if it’s Riyad he’s Coming to Jedda with the reefer ,intriguing ? .the long shadow Tells me it’s Coming To Jeddah ,That will be a night out at the top of Tief ? " Ave " I spelt it right ■■? John West will know the whereabouts ? "ps the trouble with writing using !! JD s photos is the tail that goes with it is not quite Factual " but this will be Amended when I next get in touch , Ron. ( Don’t jump the gun ) I will find out , Ron, “Thanks Stevejones”

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gr8 pics and stories fellas :smiley:

Hi all,

It’s odd what remains in your memory - and what doesn’t! I can’t remember that flyover at all. Just can’t bring any picture of it to mind. Yet I remember roundabouts in Jeddah with giant sculptures on them, like the bike. I can picture that easily enough - no photos though.

I lived in Jeddah for a while in 1976, while working for Douglas Freight, but bought Paul Kerr’s Scania from him in early '77 over in Dammam and started pulling for SeaLand. After that, visits to Jeddah were only deliveries and return load collections, and later when I was Transport Manager and GM for Caravan, sales visits to avoid empty running.

Also, I was told that Idi Amin lived there after having been deposed in Uganda, and was often seen with his guards, jogging along what I remember as the corniche. I never saw him.

KB has the correct (if any translation is ever correct) spelling of Taif - in my opinion. The Arabic T in Taif - الطائف‎ is actually a sort of th sound, said with your tongue behind your top teeth, but not quite as positive as ‘the’. Sorry, bit ■■■■, but I did try and learn the language out of interest.

None of the Saudis I ever met showed any signs of the extremism that we see further North today. They all just seemed to want to get on with their lives and were friendly to us Brits. I remember a Brit punching a Saudi as they got off the plane at Heathrow, just to relieve the frustration he had felt while he was over there. My sympathies at the time were with the Saudi. I always said ‘Hey, you have bad days in England too!’

John.

I certainly can,t remember these days every place I went to …but in the space of a year it must have been quite a few !! lots of trips to Riyadh where it became pretty easy …pull up at the Intercontinental pop into the little supermarket where the Egyptian owner would phone the delivery place and get a guide to come out to get you and while being unloaded sit in the cab listen to Conway Twitty drink a can or two of Vimto have a kip so you could hit the road and get a couple of hundred klicks in before about late evening … usually it was about a 3 day trip there and back …Other places up the coast Yambu comes to mind …then there was Al Jawf and the other way was Am Sulayil that was a long one…we just took them all in our stride …I never had any bother with the locals in fact probably the very opposite . I did one trip with two others where we left the asphalt and went in about 150 /200 K,s there was a clinic being built out there we had 3 40’ boxes full of stuff that was a wee bit rough tail light brackets were snapping off and annoying things like that but I remember the aroma of spearmint when we got there it was a little green patch in the middle of nowhere !!!

John W … I see on your webpage you had a Leyland Reg No DS 5661 I used to have an MG Magnette (Farina shape) DS 5198 must have been from the same district ■■? thought I would throw that in the mix ■■?

backsplice:
John W … I see on your webpage you had a Leyland Reg No DS 5661 I used to have an MG Magnette (Farina shape) DS 5198 must have been from the same district ■■? thought I would throw that in the mix ■■?

Hi,

I bought DS 5661, a 1962 Leyland Comet 4 wheeler, from the garage that used to be on the left as you drove North through Biggar on the A702 (or the 041Biggar as brother Andy used to call it!) It was set back, with the maintenance garage behind, more or less on the next street if I remember correctly.

DS was Peebleshire, so I guess your MG was from Peebles or thereabouts. The Leyland had previously belonged to Dolphinton Creamery - which is now probably like the garage, long gone!

My Uncle who lived in St Boswells also had one of those Farina MGs, they were a nice car of their time.

John.

Speaking of 041Biggar John, do you remember the house alongside that road, when I say house, I think it may have been a bungalow. It stood alone on the left hand side as you were heading north. There was a plaque by the door which read ’ 999 The Nick '.

Also, when I was delivering in Dunoon one time, I passed a hardware shop selling all manner of tools, timber and other such stuff. The name above the shop read ’ Dae It Yersel ', just proving that humour exists north of Carlisle.

Cheers. Eddie.

Meanwhile back in the KSA with the hot Sun burning our backs , in Jeddah ,passing the wrecks that where splattered all over the place ,can any one remember this one that stands out with the ■■■■■■■ engine and fibre glass shell , the hub reductions are a dead give away , yes it was an.6\4 ERF Belonging to P&O It must have gone under a very low bridge !!! Ready to be shipped back home with out the cab ? Ron

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This photo of 116 , shows off my handy work of the Spare Wheel carrier that I fabricated for the driver , notice the cup shaped half moon at the underside and the spinning butterfly to hold it tight , this did not stop the cooling of the engine and can be seen many years latter still doing its job, certainly the most photographed MAC in our fleet Ron :unamused: :wink:

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116 the driver was Eric Bowers , a great lad ,I have just found out he was the driver with the Reefer !! G Ron

Jeddah ,This was where we slept L to R , Ron , John Davies, Tony Tomkins ,our room was on the South corner , the walls where Red hot in the day the AC could just about cope and would just freeze up , no complaints with the digs , only when JD and I went for a shower, separapely of course :unamused: the hot water had been run off , we where always the last in , making sure the rolling stock was Up for it the next day ? And we where Black as the Ace of Spades ! But this kept the Mozzies at bay , but not the ■■■■ roaches ! You can hear there wings buzzing in the night they where big and worrying !! where did that go ,checking our boots in the morning you found out ? Ron

Looks like a good place to pull over ! JD dropping the trailer ,to attend the blow out on Taffy Bills Mac, The heavy loads in this heat took its toll on tyres and men, Ron

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