…in Suffolk, off the A14. Home to Leggetts at one end of the village, plus the expanding Hanbury Davies depot at Bridge Farm. This used to be a Loadwell Transport depot (based at Felixstowe in the 70’s), there is still an old Loadwell tilt in the yard, which has recently acquired some serious looking security fencing and lighting and a good 20 truck/trailers (mostly MSC liveried) based there.
I think there used to be another firm based there many years ago (late 70’s?) - Phil Drakard I think the guy’s name was, used to run black F88’s on tilt trailers?
I stand to be corrected though as my memory is a bit hazy…
I did a removal once with a 40’ container in Woolpit. It was on a new development so I pulled into Leggets yard to ask the way. It wasn’t on the map. Bob Legget pulled into the parking in his 4x4. I asked him if he knew the address. He said he didn’t but he took me all over the village in his car & asked the postman. He then took me to the address & back to the yard. He was a real gentleman.
Ah Drakards,yes used to run some very smart and high powered motors,Transcons etc.
Used to go bust on a regular basis as well,if my memory serves me well.
You’re right Drakards used to run a very smart fleet of mainly Volvos although Transcons ,Scanias also made the fleet.
I’ve got some photos of Drakards trucks but don’t know how to post them on here.
Just found this one
I found it onEuro Wheels. Great site
Thanks for the pics of the Drakards trucks, brought back some memories!
Here is a recent pic of Bridge Farm depot as it is now - it’s a mega high security Hanbury Davies yard basically - on the far left, behind the MSC Volvo, is the old Loadwell tilt trailer, I’ll try and get a pic of it another time. Also of interest is just on the far right of the Hanbury’s MAN you can see Tony Manning’s DAF, which is a really tidy motor.
Here’s an aerial photo of Leggetts yard as it is now - a far cry from the old Plough Lane yard that they had when I was a kid.
i remember going to woolpit yard when my dad drove for dowells.
there yard was further down from leggets.
we used to go to a pub in the village.
whenever you got to dowells - alec dowell smoking a cigar would insist on washing the lorry down.
he was mad for washing.
in the corer of the yard was 2 old s type bedfords.
there were about 10 scanias based at woolpit yard mainly non sleepers.
i have some woolpit photos but dont know how to put on screen yet
for a small village a lot of super swedes passed thru
As a big fan of R A Robinson, heres one of EPU “before the smash” taken at Scantruk Stowmarket.
Rod Robinson was indeed from Ipswich and had a great looking fleet, mostly
lhd.
He had a couple of brand new Scania 112’s tag axles and these were lhd too. I wonder why? Considering he never went abroad…
He also had an early 143 Topline and a Volvo F16. Very nice
And heres one I made earlier based on RAR livery with “a few additions”
, but heres some of Loadwells.
