Bird's Eye
Page 49
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iewBY THE HAWK
Bingo!
THE ROYAL Society for the Prevention of Accidents has presented safe driving awards to 79 drivers of Tate and Lyle Transport Ltd., Silvertown depot. And to one of the drivers, Joe Nicholson, went the Institute of Advanced Motorists' certificate for its commercial vehicle driving test. Mr. Nicholson, I gather, won a free advanced driving test by showing a fine example of courtesy and consideration in London traffic. His courteous act was spotted by the Institute's chief examiner, William Spinks, and the London Evening News. And 57-year-old Mr. Nicholson says that since he was spotted for the free test, he seems to have had nothing but good luck. Proof? He gives the following wins at Bingo: June 2: himself £18, his wife £2. June 3: himself £200. June 6: his wife £4 10s. June 11: himself £8, his wife £3. June 17: his wife £20. June 20: his wife £4.
Uncorking the Bottle
NO LONGER need heavy commercial vehicles negotiate the narrow streets of Tuxford. Last week Stephen Swingler, joint Parliamentary Secretary to the MoT, opened the seven-and-threequarter-mile-long Tuxford by-pass on Al. The Great North Road is rated by Mr. Swingler as a "very good example of what road improvement really means". He said at the opening: "Al was hardly the right rating for this road before the present series of improvements began. One might as well have called this the Great North Bottleneck". Mr. Swingler devoted much of his comment on this £3m. bypass to what he called "a remarkable machine" used to build it. It is an American slip form paver which lays concrete road slabs in finished form in a continuous process. He said: "This is modern press-button engineering with a vengeance. At the moment the only machine in this country is the one which has been working on this road. It was first used experimentally on the Cromwell by-pass."
So That Was SLT
REGULAR readers will now have stopped making rude guesses at what SLT stands for (a pastime, I can assure you, indulged in by some quite surprisingly senior people) because last week's issue revealed that the initials refer to Super Load Teamsters from York. I was one of the happy party of operators, dealers and Press whom York Trailer Co. invited to Richmond, Surrey, to demonstrate examples of the new range. York also took us back to London in the late evening by river launch, but that is a quite different, and very much gayer story! One of the features of SLT which York was keen to stress is the Selectalode tandem bogie which can be moved over a range of 3 ft. 6 in. This is done at 6 in. increments, with four spring-loaded pins engaging with aligned holes in fixed and sliding members. This is a neat way of adjusting wheelbase to get axle loads right with different types of traffic and it has most promise, I think, for operators with regular, but different, out-and-return loads. Hauliers to whom I spoke at Richmond were obviously keen to examine anything which promised relief from the £200 threat for overloading, but they had a common doubt: would the drivers use it? At the moment the driver has to apply his trailer brakes, leave the cab and pull the operating handle for every 6 in. movement. One haulier told me: "My older drivers would do it if I told them to, but some of the younger fry that I'm having to take on these days to get my loads shifted just wouldn't want to know". Another plug for the Training Board?
Bigger and Bigger?
"TNFLATIONARY pressures in the national economy will hasten the advent of heavier commercial vehicles and bigger payloads." This prediction could well apply to Britain. It was made this week, however, in regard to the US. Speaking was Zenon C. R. Hansen, president of Mack Trucks Inc. "Increased efficiency is the only weapon the haulage industry has to fight rising costs. More and more State and Federal officials are becoming aware of this fact of life," Mr. Hansen declared. As evidence of the recognition by Federal officials of the importance of providing carriers with greater legal hauling capacity and flexibility, Hansen cited a report by the US Bureau of Public Roads. It disclosed that an analysis of truck operating costs showed that reduction of such costs could be realized by increases in the gross weights of these vehicles up to a maximum of at least 75 tons!
Second–hand low
-LP
ELGIUM and West Germany are at Common Market loggerheads over second-hand commercial vehicles. The Belgians say they have received massive exports of second-hand vehicles from the Germans at very low prices—disrupting the Belgian market. So it has reduced the authorized load of the goods vehicle to 80 per cent of that for the same vehicles when new—as "a safety measure". Germany is furious. It says this measure amounts to a quantitative restriction and is thus contrary to the EEC treaty. The commission itself feels that to reduce the authorized load is no guarantee against accidents and that in any case this measure should not be applied exclusively to imported vehicles. Coldly, it has invited the Belgian Government to present its observations before giving its "motivated opinion".