HauHeti 121ftmonth report
Page 55
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POR about £7,500 W. & A. Fullerton Ltd of Glasgow became the owner of the first Seddon Atkinson 200 in Scotland.
It was so new then, it was exhibited at the Kelvin Hall Show before the company took delivery. The vehicle was licensed in February 1976, and joined Fullarton's fleet hauling general merchandise around Glasgow and into western and central Scotland.
That was last year. Now the 200 is a year old, passed its MoT test in January ("without any difficulty at all", the company secretary says admiringly) and has a surprisingly low 13,000 miles on the clock.
The low mileage reflects the fact that the vehicle has been used primarily for local work. It's been up to Aberdeen once, the secretary, Alexander Thomson, says, and down to England once. Mainly it is used for deliveries in the Glasgow area, a punishing stop-start constant gear changing operation.
The 200 joined a company whose fleet is made up almost entirely of Seddons, primarily the older 354s. It was a difficult scene to follow, because Fullerton was well pleased with its vehicles.
"We've had a very good mileage out of them over the years," says Mr Thomson "and also good service when they've needed spares. We've never had any difficulties with parts. We've never had a vehicle held up, which is really the thing that gets under a haulage contractor's skin, having a vehicle sitting waiting for spares.
"We have in the past had different makes, but in the last ten years, I'd say, we've standardised on Seddons. They produced the kind of vehicle we needed: an 8-10 ton flat platform vehicle, of fairly heavy construction."
When the 200 was added to the fleet it was assigned to a driver who was used to handling the 354s. It took him a short while to get used to the new lorry, according to Mr Thomson, but he likes it now.
"It was different from the old Perkins 354 engine, the gear ratios were different and so on. But really, it's just the same as changing a car; it might mean staying longer in second gear perhaps, or it might mean changing into the top gear sooner, that sort of thing—it's all a case of familiarisation."
Fullerton handles warehousing and distribution for the timber and whisky trades as well as haulage for other concerns. "We don't actually carry whisky," Mr Thomson says quickly. "What we do is handle cartons for the whisky trade. When we carry bottles they're empty. "We carrya certain amount of building products: panels, partitions, that sort of thing. And we haul steel and engineering materials for what we presume is the oil industry up north.
"About 80 per cent of the work of the 200 is local. The reason being that about 80 per cent of our work is local."
So it can carry, in a week, products as varied as heavy steel or timber which load it to full capacity, or lighter loads of cartons that fill the platform area but are much lighter.
"The vehicle," says Mr Thomson, "has been no trouble whatsoever. We've had no breakdowns, or anything out of the ordinary at all. It's regularly serviced, and we're fortunate that we have a staff of pretty experienced drivers. The chap who's on it now, for instance, has been driving for 30-odd years.'!
The only time the lorry was back at Seddon Atkinson was when it was new, for the initial service. Since then, according to Mr Thomson, it's never been off the road. It is, he admits, rather unusual for a new vehicle of a new design, to be so trouble-free.
How does he get the best from the 200? Well, basically, he says, because it is loaded to capacity but never overloaded, driven by the same man and serviced regularly.