The Demise of the Pommy Trucks

Steve

I beg to differ on the tool of choice for Middle East operations. Has always been Mercedes since the new age era you refer to. I would say much more than 50% are still Mercedes to this day based in country.

Of course the long range trucks out of Europe (via Turkey as the only option now) are whatever is current in the European long range fleets at the time, There are some pretty flash Mercedes, Volvo, IVECO, Scania, DAF etc running those desert highways.

Lang

There is little doubt that Mercedes dominated the local market for body trucks in the middle east. I was referring to long distance prime movers where both truck and driver were having their comfort and design zones tested. Mercedes were there but not in the numbers you would have thought. All makes represented so it really was a road test shake out so over time the various marques and models changed. Flicking through pics looks like there were as many MAN and Saurer as Mercs in the game. Point of the story was that (apart from a minor showing of ERF EC models) the Poms missed this boat entirely and hence sealed their fate

Steve

Still looking for official figures but I think you sell International (particularly the 180 then 190 in the "heavy" field) and Chrysler short on their presence in the post-war to mid 60's period in Australia.

GMH of course had their Chevrolet/Maple Leaf but you could say their Bedford production was on the British side of the ledger.

This is taking into account your boy to do a man's job on the good roads. The blokes living in misery carting cattle and heavy freight in the outback certainly had to put up with British trucks shaking wood framed cabs to bits in preference to the lighter American vehicles. Some of those old European heavy plodders would have been welcome I am sure.

I think you are right on the Inter 180 as I was talking to an old boy the other day who ranked them well above the Mack B model.

The B model Mack was a game changer for road train work, it halved trip timesand was reliable and cheap to run

It was a accidental truck that accidentally fell into Australia

The Andersons were lovers of Pommy trucks and were firm believers in the Empire and the like
They couldn't get trucks for Western Transport and new of or heard about some disassembled A model Macks the then Mack of Brisbane had

They bought these and assembled them and put them to work, it's been a long time since I have read the story so the details might not be 100%

Anyway I seem to recall that the Macks were only ever a stop gap until better Pommy trucks could be sourced

The QLD Mack dealer was not keen on Macks and Mack wasn't keen on the dealer and a agreement was reached for Andersons to become QLD dealers for Mack

And that was were it all began

But there is even more reason that Mack became so succesful in road train work

Haulmark trailers was owned by numerous share holders, two of whom were Andersons and Buntine

This connection shaped the road train industry for Australia

So back to the topic at hand

The Poms were just were to slow to recognize change, none tilt cabs on Bedfords is just one example of this

There were virtually zero if any import tariffs on Pommy gear yet people would queue up to buy at 3 times or more the price for a Kenworth or Peterbilt that did the same job

When the Poms dumped the Commonwealth to join the EU the tariffs that protected them were soon gotten rid so Australia could gain export markets as it had very few outside the Commenwealth

This opened the flood gates for other countries and better quality, better suited trucks started flowing in

The Japanese trucks were the final nail in the coffin for the Pommy trucks

The ACCO still sold extremely well for decades after this so it wasn't just price but if the truck suited and was built well it would sell

Now this probably sounds like I hate Pommy trucks and the like, nothing could be further from the truth

They made some fascinating gear but unfortunately just like humans, we are remembered for our weak points

The Poms also made some impressive gear, Commer knocker, the Leyland Turbine truck etc, but they never quite got it right when they really had to

It really is a shame

Even the Leyland Crusader with out a tilt cab, the running gear was proven, fiberglass cabs were proven but no tilt cab was a blunder

Then to not introduce a heavy truck until the Marathon 2 was balls up, even the die hard lovers of Leyland had no choice but to shop else were

Dont worry even Mack suffered a similar fate until Volvo bailed them out

Anyway

Paul

Here you go Steve.





And another long distance trip with American truck songs?

Not all pommy trucks but too good to miss.


And a Deutz for Paul



And a beauty from Scania. A full movie.

Back with pommy trucks

Fascinating topic this, been following it for a while, had to rethink a long held view that in some ways we were a bit of a "dumping ground", albeit an expensive one!

I think Andersons were agents for Dennis who did well to sell as many big Dennis as they did as the bigger Dennis never sold well UK.