Davis buys Davis
Page 21
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• Two of the Davis brothers successfully bid for a large number of tanker trailers and Leyland tractive units at an auction of part of the Davis Bros. fleet held at Measham on Tuesday. The 105 lots presented for sale by the receiver Jackson Pixley and Co. Ltd.. London, following the liquidation of Davis Bros., fetched just on £24,000 in 2+ hours.
Mr. Frank Davis was unable to tell CM in which fleet the vehicles would be operated. They acquired calcium, spirit and black oil tankers at prices between £55 and £360 and a number of Leyland Beaver tractive units of 1962/63 manufacture at around £600.
Hauliers and dealers had come from as far afield as Limerick, Aberdeen, Lincoln, Bristol and Holyhead to attend the auction. About one-third of the lots were knocked down to operators who paid between £170 and £365 for Northern tandem-axle trailers made between 1962 and 1964.
Highest price of the day was £1,700 for a 1964 ERF 64GX and the lowest trailer price—£15—was for a Scammell singleaxle trailer. About a dozen vehicles were termed non-runners, without wheels, engines or perhaps logbooks and were bought at anything from £35 to £175 for a 1960 Leyland tractive unit.
Apart from the ERF, other higher prices were paid for a 40ft Northern tandem-axle trailer for 38 tons gross which came under the hammer at £570 and which, according to Mr. Harry Gems of Northern Trailers Ltd., would have cost Davis Bros. approximately £1,600 in 1962/63. A 1962 Scammell tractive unit went for £575, and a 1963 Leyland Beaver for £525. Newest vehicle in the sale was a 1966 Morris FJ K360 which fetched £560.
Dealers from Newry, Northern Ireland, Stoke-on-Trent and Hertford bought the majority of the Northern trailers which were not plated and were only fitted with two-line airbrakes.
Looking round the vehicles before the sale the consensus of opinion seemed to be that, with some exceptions, it would cost a lot to bring them up to the requirements of the new plating and braking regulations.
On the following day, the remainder of the Davis Bros. fleet was put up for sale by Southern Counties Car Auctions Ltd. at Farnborough. There were some 116 lots, ranging from a 1965 Leyland Octopus 4,000gal tanker with three wheels missing (described in the catalogue as a "non-runner") to a 1966 Mercedes-Benz articulated tractor.
Mr. Davis was also present at this second sale.