bird's eye view
Page 49
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by the Hawk • Night spot
Hovering on the brink of going for a truck driving job because of the stories of £50 and £60 a week being made by truckers, I now think I've finally been persuaded to take the plunge. At BRSL's seminar in Sutton C oldfield last week, staff director J. D. Mather said it was difficult to know exactly what was required in overnight accommodation for drivers, but one very successful new hostel near Weedon seemed to have found a formula —it had a stripper performing every night!
• Cash and carry
Talking of driving pay, I see the national dailies have been carrying stories about the big money that is being made by ownerdrivers on the M4 motorway contract. Cube yard rates are stich, it's said, that 30 trips a day (they must be short trips) can earn £60. Drivers running their own vehicles are making hundreds of pounds a week, and even employed drivers can make up to £70 a week. So they all save rapidly to become owners.
The main brigade on the job seems to be Irish, so one can't be surprised if they are really getting their teeth into it. But I wonder how long they can keep up the pace—and how they'll manage when the weather clamps down. It sounds like a goldmine, but I'd be interested to know what the average earnings over a year are likely to turn out to be. Put some away for a rainy day, Mick.
• Up and up
Eagle-eyed J. B. Johnston, Atlas Express training officer in Glasgow, has drawn my attention to a front-cover ad. on CM for October 2, in which the vehicle's load includes a packing case standing on its end, despite being clearly marked "up". As he shrewdly says, how fortunate that the carrier's name is not displayed on the vehicle.
This eagle-eyed columnist, however, has spotted that the vehicle is left-hand drive, with foreign number plates (and tyre pressures). British haulage staffs are vindicated— unless, like me, you drive down East India Dock Road fascinated by the upside-down wineglass stencils on the packing cases.
• Four years on
I was intrigued by the recent CM profile of Frank B. Ford in "Meet". It may well be true that his decision to go for Duple this summer was quite sudden, following the falling through of another deal on which he was engaged, but this was certainly not the first time he has set his sights in that direction.
Back in 1966 when he was sales director of Plaxtons this enterprising entrepreneur got all the figures and analyses done for a bid which he was proposing should be made on behalf of Plaxtons. He even went so far as to get qualified approval from the Monopolies Commission, by pointing out that there would still be Leyland and one or two others in the business.
Be was then particularly interested in the Willowbrook subsidiary because of its experience with all-metal bodies, which he reckons to point the future of the industry. (Timber frame construction is illegal in the USA they tell me, and some think it will be outlawed here, too, before long.) But the bid for Duple did not then go through. Why? Well, I'm told thatthe Plaxton family eventually decided not to take the plunge.
I hear it whispered about the passenger world that the reverse is now more likely—a bid for Plaxtons by the newly constituted Duple. It might make economic sense to rationalize—assuming that it is even a possibility in business terms. But my guess is that most operators would bitterly resent any move that appeared to narrow their choice of bodies.
• True or false?
Drivers always spin a good yarn, but here are two that particularly amused me recently.
A certain haulier had become the subject of conversation. "I know a driver who started there," said one, "and his first job was to go to the docks, pick up some apples and take them to Birmingham." The driver was apparently assigned a vehicle and, after quickly checking it said: "But guv'nor, it's got no ropes or sheets".
"Well," replied the guv'nor, "pinch some, like everyone else does."
The other story concerned a laden lorry which was towing another laden lorry on a rope. It was slowly pulling into a motorway service area when the driver of another vehicle, seeing the other's plight, asked if he could be of any assistance.
"No, it's O.K.", said the driver of the vehicle being towed, "the guv'nor has got the engine out for repair, so he's using it as a trailer until it's fixed."
• Gas again
More about LPG, to which I've referred several times lately. As an experiment an Australian road transport company has, I hear, converted two of its fleet of 53 trucks from petrol to liquefied petroleum gas. If the expected result—of the saving of some $A2290 (approximately £1063) annually on each is achieved, the remaining 51 will rapidly follow in their footsteps.
Botts Transport Pty Ltd, of Corona, New South Wales, is one of the first transport firms "down under" to try Autogas on a selected number of its vehicles—each of which clock-up some 15,000 miles a year. Autogas is the fuel launched earlier this year by the Gas and Fuel Corporation of Victoria.
Ken Craib, Melbourne manager of Botts, says that the vehicles on gas pull better in all gears and generally provide a higher rate of performance. The mileage saving on fuel, though only five or six gallons per trip, adds up to $A540 per vehicle in a year, to which has to be added lower initial price.
In addition to the prime saving of $A2290 the firm expects to save $A320 a year on each vehicle on oil changes, which offsets the conversion cost of $A200 to $A300. They expect to go as far as 30,000 miles on the gas vehicle without changing plugs and points, compared to 8,000 to 10,000 miles on petrol. Engine life is expected to be between two and five times greater.