Putting a poultice on.

Seeing as how the forums a bit quiet, what with the silly season upon us, going back over a few old posts and also Hi Beams post on Caringbah Haulage got me to thinking about some of the tales (tall or otherwise) about some of the antics they used to get up to in the "bad old days".
I was only a callow youth at the time, and a few of the stories I had heard, but maybe never actually witnessed.
Before the days of everything wanted or needed for next day delivery, quite common for blokes to take 3 0r 4 days to chuck a load on, another couple to get to the destination, another couple to then unload.
Was a well known subbie from Adelaide used to start off with a load of steel plate on the deck (and on a closed bogie, or at best a 9"1" spread), a layer of fire bricks and then around to places like Cable Makers to top it off to about 14 foot high. Used to have a mate up the mountain who he'd get to go out in his car and check if they were weighing at Mt Vic. If they were (hanging around weighing) he'd head off up the Putty Rd. cut out the back of Jerry's Plains and go round in a big circle and come out way the hell the back of West Wyalong.
I actually saw his truck pulled up on the side of the road at Howes Valley, and it had rained for a while, trailer sank into the deck. Took a grader and a backhoe to drag him out and get him going. Fair bit of pudding on, and on a cab over KW with a 8/71 in it.
Another bloke used to load for Brisbane out of that well know transport yard on the old Hume Highway at Enfield, had an old cab over AEC, pretty early girl, may have even been something like an old tank recovery unit, big heavy gear hooked up to one of those elephant fruehauf trailers, wouldn't like to guess what it would have tared out at.
Liked to have been loaded and on his way by a Thursday night, due in Brisbane Monday morning. Used to boast he could get to Brisbane and only spend about 100 miles on a main road/highway.
Story goes that he was sprung around the back roads of Kankool (Willow Tree) where they made him unload and had to re-distribute the load over another two truck/trailers.
Quite a few well known Hauliers from the Southern areas of Sydney were well known that their trucks wouldn't leave the yards until they had at least a 40 ton payload on. Some of the lengths some of them would go to do a dodge around the main roads avoiding the "scalies". both fixed and mobile were quite amusing.
So, if your got a yarn to add, we won't mind if it's a bit embellished, let a few of us know. Haven't heard a good story for a while.
As I said, virtually something that has gone, along with button-up boots. Customers demand overnight service, authorities have virtually strangled the "hot loads", blokes themselves don't want to spend any longer than necessary delivering a load, time means money.
So I would imagine other than heavy haulage specialised loads, not too many could either spare the time or the effort to put on a "poultice" these days.
Dave

As a youngster I'd go with dad and his truck owner friends to the Rocklea pub any night to see the "new" models and ask how they were performing.
Not big hp stuff, just Leyland Bedfords, repowered Commers and the like.
There must have been dozens of trucks parked all over and a lot of the drivers were well charged by the time they headed West.

Spornes from Blakehurst NSW didn't mind putting on the pudding in their immaculate green B model Macks. Single drive bogie trailer. 40 ton seemed like a nice number. Sometimes had to wait a day or two for certain weighbridges to close

SIX POUNDS FIVE YOUR HONOUR?


Jack Ashlie was sitting in the pub at Hexam enjoying a quiet ale one day when out of nowhere come the scales and set up camp over the road. Ashlie is not particularly worried, he was legal, i.e. unloaded. It had been a long trip and Ashlie was out of clean clothes so he's got his suit on. Now Ashlie's suit was a thing to behold, 25 years out of fashion and well pressed from being kept under the seat, if you take my meaning.
The scales are not being kept very busy but there are a steady stream of customers and Ashlie is enjoying the show with no chance of being weighed himself, when along comes a young bloke in an 80 pulling a spread and obviously over the limit. Ashlie takes pity on him and decides to intervene.
Borrowing a hat and walking stick he wanders across the road and impersonating an elderly member of the public engages the scaley in conversation. What are you doing here? he wants to know. Weighing this truck says the scaley. How? says Ashlie. On this portable weighing device replies the scales. At this Ashlie takes on a wounded air and says just 'cos he's old and drunk doesn't make him stupid and you can't weigh that great big truck on those silly little things.
The DMR type thinking he is dealing with a member of the public rather than a criminal type truck driver keeps his cool and explains it all to Ashlie in words of one syllable and invites him to watch. The invitation is taken up and proceedings carry on apace. As the scaley bends over to place the "weighing device" under the back axle of the spread Ashlie takes two paces backwards and drop kicks him under the trailer. The scaley bangs his head and is knocked out.
Ashlie rips the scales out from under the truck and tells the young bloke to shoot through, this he does, he has already seen Ashlie in action once! Ashlie calm as you like returns to the pub amidst the cheers of the multitude and has another beer. The scaley wakes up and goes for the police, who, despite his pleas of innocence arrest Ashlie for assault.

Next day sees Ashlie before the beak. The word of the police and the scaley is taken and Ashlie is fined five pounds with twenty five shillings costs. The beak then asks Ashlie if he has anything to say. Ashlie, with the weight of the world upon him slowly repeats, five pounds your honor, twenty five shillings costs, six pounds five your honor? Then he brightens up a treat and a huge grin covers the worn old face and he asks, If I give you twelve pound ten can I kick him again? Ten pounds for contempt thunders the beak but Ashlie reckoned it was worth every penny. :woohoo:

Love it! Any more takers?

My First Interstate Transport Trip.

It was another night at the Hollywood Hotel on the corner of Hunt and Foster Streets in Sydney. Jack Ehret, a former motorcycle racer and dealer was drinking with the "Sydney Motorcycle Push" who gathered nightly at this quaint watering hole.
I knew Ehret by sight but did not know anything about him. At some stage another bloke walked in and spoke to Ehret. About forty pounds ($80) changed hands and the other bloke (Lucky Hawkins) left.
Ehret then advised that he had just sacked Lucky and supposed he would need to find another worker. "What did he do for you?" asked young William, his eyes mesmerized by the 40 quid. "He drove my truck" said Ehret. I asked how long it had taken to earn that 40 quid "3 days" said Ehret . Billy was hooked! "Look no further" I said "I'm your man". "Can you drive a truck?" said JV "No" I said "but at thirteen quid a day I can learn very quickly". "Right O" said Jack "I'll give you a start".
Next morning I gave notice at Hazel and Moore (10 pounds a week), the Triumph, Norton and Indian Agents and prepared to become an interstate truck driver.
The first week was spent fettling the lorry and listening to JV running down drivers in general and Lucky in particular. I knew however that this would not happen to me.
The truck in question was an L model International 190 of 1952 vintage that had been heavily modified over the years. It had started life as a bogie drive pulling a petrol tanker, then like many others, had been reduced to a single drive to maximize the loading in keeping with the stupid "group" laws of the era. Later a "silly wheel pusher" had been fitted, once again to take advantage of the ever changing weight laws.
A "silly wheel pusher" was a steering axle with the king pins welded up that was fitted in front of the drive axle. Later on proprietary axles became available with single or dual wheels.
The '90 as she was known had come new with a 120 hp petrol engine which Jack had replaced many years before with a 4/71 GM. This was a very common conversion in the fifties and sixties, many of these engines came second hand out of agricultural machinery.
As tyres improved slightly and the roads improved, also slightly, bigger loads were carried and the 471 was found wanting. Jack found a 671 which had worn out a tank and a sawmill and fitted it to the '90. It was to the best of my knowledge the only '90 fitted with a 671 on the road. Come to think of it I do remember another one but it had a bogie drive Mack rear end and a 9 speed roadranger with a four speed aux box behind it.
The horsepower had now gone from 120 to about 200 with no modifications to the gearbox, differential etc. This meant the driveline was fragile. Big shoulders but skinny legs you might say.
The other important thing that had not been modified was the brake design. It was vacuum over hydraulic, a widely used system of the era and probably sufficient for the original design weight of the truck, about twelve tons gross. From memory the brake linings were only about 3 or 4 inches wide on the drive, none on the pusher and about 2 inches on the steer.
The cabin sported a non adjustable, but very comfortable bench seat. That was the only good thing you could say about the cab. It was small, hot, rattled and let in dust, rain and insects depending where you were. It would have been only about 1.4 meters wide so all your gear had to be carried in tool boxes under the trailer.
The trailer was a 34 foot bogie or tandem Wolfe. It was the only one I ever saw. It was a strap trailer. These were very light and copied horse drawn vehicle and railway wagon design. It was fitted with a strange suspension equalizing system between the axles that was also used by BPW on their pusher axles. The dual wheels were mounted on 8 spoke spiders. The brakes were four inches wide vacuum mechanical, an excellent system when used with a petrol engine but very marginal when the vacuum was supplied by a vac pump fitted to a diesel.
At last a part load was offered, so off we went to Hadfield Forge in Alexandria on the Corner of Mitchell Rd and Sydney Park Rd and loaded some castings for a quarry in Adelaide, the prime contractors were Blair and Reiber whose premises were on the corner of George and Allen Streets in Waterloo. Jack kept the truck there too.
For the next two or three days we toured the greater Sydney area loading bits and peaces for various freight forwarders, Vaughan, TNT, Jackson and Jewshaw are names I remember. We finished loading at Ansetts under tight security, they had just lost a load of cigarettes stolen from the yard. At last we had our load of general for Adelaide. All 25 tons of it. This gave us a gross weight of about 38 tons.
This as you may have gathered by the reference to pre decimal currency all
happened a long time ago, in fact it was 1964, I was 18 years old and keen to see Australia and get paid to do it. Jack's offer was 18 pounds a week or 16 pounds all found. On advice from a friend I opted for the 18 quid. He reckoned Jack's idea of all found was a pie every so often.
We left just on dark on a rainy windy night that Jack said would keep them weights and measures and road tax blokes off the road and bode well for the trip. Jack liked cold dark wet nights.
I had learnt the following in my short career already:- How to change tyres, 1 flat already, how to swear at the truck, how to defend the truck if anyone else swore at it and how to hate enforcement persons, scalies, police, road tax collectors etc. whom, except for the police, whom I already hated, I had yet to meet.
After what seemed a very long time we pulled up in Parramatta and checked out the load, tightened ropes and tarps and off we went, the 671 howling and screaming as only GM's can.
We headed out along the Windsor Road to Windsor, turned left and went to Richmond, from Richmond we took Bell's line of road via Kurrajong and Mt Tomah to Bell. Arriving at the bottom of Kurrajong, Jack, who had kept up a running commentary on what he was doing and why, stopped the truck, engaged low first gear and proceeded up the hill. This rather doglegged route was taken to avoid the awful grind over the mountains via The Great Western Highway
This procedure was followed for the next 3000 miles that the trip, which wound up being Sydney to Adelaide, Adelaide to Brisbane, Brisbane to Sydney, took.
This section of the trip had taken about four hours, giving us an average speed of 20 mph. Not bad when you consider the terrain and the fact that the top speed of the truck was 43 mph. Of course there had been little traffic to Parramatta and virtually none after we left it.
Jack had a sleep on top of Scenic Hill near Lithgow and I was detailed off to keep watch and interview any eastbound trucks that stopped and seek information about road conditions ahead and if and where they were weighing or where police or road tax collectors were.
In due course favorable information was to hand and off we went again. Boy was I glad to be back in the nice warm truck. In a very short time I would be cursing that stinking hot truck.
From Lithgow the road led to Bathurst, Blaney, and Carcoar with its famous hill Cowra, Grenfell then left onto the Newell Highway and at last some reasonably flat ground. This all happened 45 years ago and I can’t remember a lot of this part of the trip. It must have been uneventful.
At West Wyalong, on the second day, we pulled up at a Shell Service station on top of a hill, it was a little building in a big bare paddock with one tree. Jack told me it was the first truck stop in Australia, run by a bloke called Jim Spence I think. He and Jack were old mates and had a good chat.
Jack then decided that the GM could stand a tickle up and proceeded to remove the tappet cover, fish round and find a funny little tool and adjust the injector lift. Knowing what I know now I realize this was probably pill maintenance.
The trip and my career and Ehret’s life all nearly ended here when I depressed the starter (it stuck out of the floor on the passenger’s side) as instructed, without checking that the truck was out of gear. The GM fired, Ehret jumped away from in front of it and the truck nudged a tree, grunted and stalled. Ehret grunted a bit too. He swore a helluva lot too. I learnt how to use words I was only slightly familiar with in many new ways.
Quite soon we left West Wyalong behind and headed ever onward. Rankins Springs was gained about midday and Jack declared that it was too hot to travel. By the time it had cooled down we were too drunk to drive. Nothing daunted we struggled out of town and away from temptation and slept beside the road as was the norm in those days.
After a short sleep we drove on and passing through Hay about midnight it was time for young William to have a steer. With some trepidation I climbed behind the wheel and off I went with strict instructions not to drop the button on the overrun or change down going uphill, but to wake Jack if this was necessary. I told you the driveline was weak didn’t I?
About half an hour later as I weaved all over the road fighting the worn out steering box and my own inexperience another truck caught me up and proceeded to flash his lights up and down repeatedly. I knew this meant he wanted to pass so flicked my lights and pulled to the left. He would not pass so eventually I pulled over and got out.
Behind me was the flashest truck I had ever seen and getting out of it a very clean and tidy bloke , not your usual scruff in overalls and thongs. This bloke was well dressed enough to go out to dinner. He greeted me without looking at me with “sound asleep again Jack?” Then when he realized it wasn’t Jack apologized and said Ehret usually drove along slowly having little naps as he went. I explained my lack of experience and lack of skill with the steering box and he laughed and replied he wouldn’t steer the thing round the block let alone interstate.
He then told me how to let it hang down onto the low side of the road and keep just enough pressure on the wheel to keep it going straight. Jack had woken when I stopped and finally got out to see what was wrong. “Gooday Terry” he said. “Where you going?” Terry replied that he was going to Adelaide and Ehret told me not to stand around talking all night and went back to bed.
I told Terry to go around me as he was faster but he said he would stay behind and keep an eye on me in case I got into trouble. He was driving a bogie drive cab over Peterbilt for Blair & Reiber at the time. Over the years we worked on the same run and at times for the same people.
This was the start of a friendship that was to last 44 years until his untimely and early death in 2008.
Mildura was passed through in darkness and we found somewhere to sit out the heat of the day with no hotel in the vicinity and so were rested well for the for the next nights work.
The next night was to be a long haul. We had to get through Blanchetown before daylight as they had been weighing fairly regularly of late. It was also necessary to get past Parafield as they were inclined to weigh there too. This was a big ask 400 klm with a top speed of 70 kl/ph
Just on daylight we made it to Gepps Cross and pulled into the Hotel grounds to sort out our paperwork and make enquiries from others as to where these places were and how to get there. That’s how it was done. You didn’t buy a street directory, there was no GPS, and if you got really lost you rang a cab, if you could find a phone, and the cab went in front and you followed.
Adelaide was stinking hot that day but we got all our freight delivered and arrived at The West Thebarton hotel on the South Road at about 5.15 and parked across the road. We thought there would be plenty of time for a couple of beers and a counter tea. Don’t bet on it. The pubs in S.A. closed at six o’clock in those days. Just as well, the beer was terrible. I drank a 15 oz beer and then a scotch. Jack had two beers we both woke up sick next morning. I was curled up inside a spare tyre cuddling a couple of long handled dogs on the back of the trailer. I have tried S.A. beer once or twice since. It has not improved.
Next morning found us at a service station/loading agent somewhere in Adelaide. The deal was that they found you a load so you fuelled up at their pump. Ehret let it be known that it would take about 250 gallons (1000+) litres to fuel the 5 44 gallon and one 20 gallon drum on the ’90. A good sale even today.
In the fullness of time (about 3 days) a load was offered and off we went to load 25 tons of salt and two cars. What a hoot. Bill was the chief loader/unloader. When we arrived at the salt works the loading bloke asked how many lumpers did I want? I said how many have you got? He explained that there had to be two men on the truck, so if I helped they would supply one lumper if I did not want to help they would supply two. I said two would be good, then came the kicker, lumpers cost a zac a ton a man. For our twenty five tons of salt that would be 25/- or $2.50. This was enough money for 40 litres of fuel. I settled for one lumper.
The salt came in 50 kilo bags. I weighed 57 kilo. It was rock salt. The bags were hard, rough and sharp. They came off an elevator at shoulder height and I was meant to take them on the shoulder and walk down the trailer and put them in place. I did about a dozen and the lumper said to get out of his way and keep an eye out for the boss and he would load the trailer.
This he did in no time flat. It was one of the most marvellous things I had ever seen. He seemed to catch the bag on his shoulder, twitch this way or that and the bag would land exactly where he wanted it. I have seen other lumpers as good over the years especially a little bloke who worked at the flour mill in Sydney. He was incredible. 50 kilos if that about 5 feet or one and a half meters tall .
The load had to be envelope tarped, and when I had folded in the floor tarps I woke Jack up to show me how to tie the cap tarp on. He looked at the time and was more than impressed with my industry. We tarped the load had a shower and set off for the Chrysler factory to load two cars. These were placed by forklift so were an easy pickup.
With our load complete we set off and Jack careful as ever decided the road with least enforcement went through Clare and Burra so off we went. The weather was hot and dry and it wasn’t long before the ’90 was overheating despite Jack nursing it along in low gear with the shutters wide open.
We stopped to top up the radiator and Jack remarked on the speed and neatness of the salt loading. I told him it was easy, the lumper had done it, and then explained the terms. Jack nearly had a fit. He reckoned he was paying me 18 quid, $36 a week to load and unload and here I was subbying the job for 12/6, $1.25
After a while the truck cooled down, the radiator was refilled from a garden hose left unattended in a front yard and off we went. We must have had a good run to Broken Hill because I have no memory of this part of the trip. We got there on Saturday night so found a pub and had a few beers and went to bed for a couple of hours and then making the best of the cool night conditions pushed on to Wilcania. This is where the rot set in.
We must have suffered flat tyres before this but time has erased any memory of them. Now as we left Wilcania we had another and the jack failed. Considering the weights he carried I am amazed Jack only carried one Jack but he did. So here we were up the proverbial creek in a wire mesh canoe. Dear Bill.
We waited a while until another truck came along and I flagged him down, explained the position and asked to borrow his jack. This was no problem, he got it out and gave it to me and I proceeded to change a tyre. While this was happening this bloke we’ll call him the woggy, (he was of southern European extraction and there was no law against saying so in 1964) and Jack got into conversation and discovered both were headed for Brisbane although we were going via Inverell to unload some of the salt.
It was decided on the spot to travel together and then decided to take the River Rd to Bourke. This road as the name implies follows the Darling River. As such it was probably the route taken by the teams when they carried the freight. It hadn’t been graded since I don’t think. The 216klm to Louth took twelve hours, all day. The ground was covered in great 3 pointed goats head burs as Jack discovered when he got out without his boots on. He spent some time pulling them out of his feet which then bled for some time.
We arrived in Louth in time for a beer or two and then as money was tight retired to the trucks for a “boil up”. A boil up consisted of a known volume of food put into a billy and warmed over a fire. It was not always known what would be in the tins when you opened them as quite often they had shed their labels, an intelligent guess could be made by the shape, but tinned dog and plum pudding, for instance came in the same shaped tin.
If the brew looked a bit watery we would chuck in some wheetbix for “body” if it was a bit thick just add water, simple.
While the billy boiled Jack moaned about the lack of fermented or spirituous liquids in the camp. Once again the woggy came to the rescue. He presented me with an eggbeater drill, a billycan and a skinny piece of dowel and a hammer. With these implements, having gained access through a grain trap, I was able to drill a hole in the bottom of one of the barrels of wine he was carrying, drain some into the billy and then stop up the hole. Free grog, you wouldn’t call the king your uncle.
After dinner a short sleep to aid the digestion and off we went in the dark another one hundred klm of hell to Bourke. From there the road led to Walgett on the black soil plains, then on to Collarenebri and then Moree. How many flat tyres? I have forgotten. I do know that over the period of the round trip I changed 32 tyres. As the truck had only sixteen wheels this means that on average I changed them all twice. I wasn’t much of a driver yet, but I was an experienced tyre fitter.
At Moree we parted company with the woggy bloke and swore eternal friendship. I never saw him again however. He went north to Goondiwindi we went east to Warialda and on to Inverell.
As we came down Ross Hill into Inverell, in low low of course, we noticed that at the bottom the road veered left and in a direct line with the road before it turned was a little white church with JESUS SAVES written across the top in large red letters. Ehret remarked that he seemed to be doing a good job so far.
Before arriving at the meat works it was necessary to lift one of the cars off so that we could drive the other one backwards and forwards over the salt as we unloaded it. After taking off ten tons we re-tarped the load put the other car back on and headed to Brisbane.
After unloading the cars we unloaded the salt, but I can’t remember where, and then went to QTT to await a load to somewhere. Queensland Transport Terminal (QTT) was at Rocklea and sold Shell fuel. It was about 5 or 7 acres of parking I suppose and you could get a feed and tyres and tarps repaired there. One or two carriers had their depots there also.
We soon had a load organised and off to Dalby to load bulk grain. Bulk grain was loaded by putting curtain tarps inside the gates and pouring in the grain. It sounds easy and it was better that loading bags but only just. The grain was unloaded by opening the grain traps built into the floor.
The load was for Sydney 1161 klm. away from Brisbane. We were paid for only 950 of them, Dalby to Sydney. In order to make up for the dead running the usual 25 tons was loaded and off we went again dodging scales and blowing tyres. The drive tyres were 10.00x20’s but the rest of the unit was shod with 9.00x20’s.
At 38 tons gross the weight was probably distributed roughly as follows:-
Steer axle 4 tons. Drive including pusher 12 tons. Trailer bogie 22tons. As you can see steer tyres aside each tire was burdened with about 2.75 tons. Today with 11R22.5 steel tyres we carry about 1650 klg or 1.6 tons per tyre on the trailer. Two tons on the drive and 3 tons on the steer. No wonder those poor little 9.00x20’s went pop all the time.
To further get this in perspective, at the same tyre loading and with bogie drive and tri axle trailer we would be grossing 60 tonnes today. Now you can see why we slept all day and drove all night. The highest tyre loading that I remember was 3.25 per tyre on a single drive B model in 1968. All 10.00x20’s, never even got a flat between Cairns and Sydney.
In order to avoid Willow Tree, where they were weighing, so we were told at Narrabri, we turned off at Boggabri, went down through Mullaley thence to Gulgong then Mudgee. We were easing down Cherry Tree Hill between Mudgee and Lithgow at about 1 in the morning when we were overtaken by a body truck. All of a sudden the air was filled with flying square 5 gallon drums and thousands of tomatoes. The body truck had run out of brakes the driver said later, and he had the idea of running into the back of us to save his truck from bolting. At the last moment he realised how slowly we were going and pulled out to pass. The result was that the corner of his load caught our rear loading rack and back gate.
The result was tomatoes everywhere and about 5 tons of grain lying on the road. We stopped. Bill found a pencil and paper and walked down the road to where the tomato truck had finally managed to stop. Two men were feverishly re-stacking the load. Bill wrote down the name on the truck and the registration number. I then said “How you going? Both nearly fell off the load. I had arrived quietly so as not to frighten them away, so surprised them I suppose.
At my suggestion that they might like to reload my truck also they replied that they were sorry but were in a hurry and would not be able to assist. I then suggested that they give me a lift to Lithgow so that I could report the accident to the police and get the council out to close the road etc etc etc whilst I reloaded. They turned out not to be in such a hurry after all.
The end result of our deliberations was that one bloke stayed to help and the other continued to Sydney. As it would be necessary to obtain some bags to load the spilt grain into we went to sleep until morning. At least I did. Rolled up in a fridge bag and a half tarp I slept until dawn.
When I awoke I noticed that the tarp had ice on it and that a good frost had come down. I suggested to old mate that he should go for a walk and get some bags and shovels. He said it had been too cold to sleep so he had done this already. I then noticed how he was dressed, in shorts and a shirt, and nearly, but not quite, felt sorry for him.
We shovelled the grain into the bags and lined them up along the white line all 25 or so of them, they were only part full as we had to build a wall with them to hold the rest of the bulk on.
We had just filled the last bag with the last of the grain when the army came past. We had stood the bags up along the white line as we filled them. The last, as it transpired, vehicle in the army convoy knocked them all over and gave us something to do reloading them. Bill and old mate who had not been on the friendliest of terms were now united against the army and waited for the next army vehicle with malice aforethought and the mangled gate ready to block it’s progress. There was no next army vehicle. Dear Bill.
We were finally on our way again, this time with 3 in the cab of the 90 as we were giving the other bloke a lift to Sydney to meet up with his boss. Three is a very big crowd in a 90.
When we unloaded and weighed it turned out that we had shovelled up a bit of blue metal as well as the grain and had picked up about half a ton over Dalby weights. The grain agents, Gatenby’s, always paid on Sydney weights so we picked up a bit.
This trip, with its hold-ups and problems had taken about 3 weeks. I still cannot believe that 47 years later I am still driving. But I am.
Jack employed me for about six months and gave me a fair grounding in the trade and I then moved on to Blair and Reiber where I drove an AEC or Ace as they were known for a while.

A couple of years later I worked for Jack again driving a truck he had built using a 331 Mercedes Cab/chassis. It too was powered by a 671 GM. It was a bogie bogie and therefore able to be overloaded even more than the ’90. His last truck, built on an NR Mack chassis, would often gross 90-100 tons on the Mt Isa or Darwin runs pulling a double. I never drove this truck though. Jack died in 2002 aged 79 after a very eventful life in trucks and on motorbikes.



Just a footnote. This trip and the tyre troubles and road conditions were not unusual for the era. The Hume Highway was not all bitumen until the mid 1950’s I am told. The Bruce highway had dirt on it until about 1970. The Newell Highway had huge dirt sections up until the mid 70’s.
A big truck had 200 hp. The biggest 335hp and a fair average was 150hp. The top speed on level ground was about 48 mph or 78kl/ph. Many trucks were not even able to manage 30mph or 50kl/ph on level ground.
There were very few air conditioners or sleeper cabs, no fridges, UHF radios, or other creature comforts. But, as the old blokes told us you didn’t have to catch the bullocks before you went to work, just press the starter.
Ah those were the days! No cameras, no task forces, no DUI, no pill coppers, no air conditioners, no fridges, no microwaves, no limited driving hours. none of those terrible 600hp engines with unbustable transmissions, no day in a motel every week. Crikey these are the good days. MERRY XMAS EVERYONE.
Hi Beam 2018

Great read, Hi Beam! Sort of yarn that should be put in book form. Thanks for the memories.

Well Dun HiBeam
Gr8 yarn
Dunno how U had the patience to hunt n peck @ the keyboard
normally a long post like yours .............. B for U get to finish it
it evaporates into cyber space/heaven/hell n U gotta start over again
good idea to save off (Swipe Copy) incase it pissappears
Njoyd your life on the road
cya

Thanks for a great yarn Hi Beam.

Great yarn hi beam, reminded me of the old GM Brockway stories of years ago!