25th - 29th February 2008

Monday.
0630 Start. In a bit earlier than normal to load up the cab with the essential basics, kettle, mugs, tea etc. a map, gloves and hi-vis should keep me out of trouble until later on. The truck seems to be in one piece and has actually been washed by the bloke who was driving it last week.

But it won't start, it all seems healthy enough but the starter won't crank the engine not even slowly. Initially I thought it was a flat battery but it didn't seem quite right. Then I realised that it had been left in gear and it was trying to trun the drivetrain. Luckily there was just enough air left in the tank to get the clutch down and we're in business.

It's nice to be back in my seat again, and it's nice to have 420hp on tap rather than the 250hp in the old 3 series last week. I'm not going far for now, just down to Sandon to load at Jovic Plant. It's one of their moves, and first I'm given an Avant shovel, and then a skiploader. Bothe are loaded, secured and the ramps are folded before I get told that there is a 1.5t mini digger to go as well. Down come the ramps, the skiploader gets shunted over and the mini loaded alongside. It's nearly 0800 by the time I leave and I head down the A12 and take the M25 heading for Wembley, it's no surprise that the traffic is heavy and I eventually arrive on site at 1000.

There's some TV filming going on with a car on a trailer rig that they use for the in car shots, it's coming and going and some bloke decides to take it on himself to direct me to whereabouts I should go to unload. I'm delivering to a tennis court contractor who is completely unconnected to the filming so I find my own suitable place and unload there. The mini has got a mind of it's own and slips and slides and threatens to fall down the gap between the ramps. I manage to skid the tracks back on squarely by taking the weight on the bucket and slewing the body (which cannot move, and forces the tracks to slew instead)

Once I'm done I head back out along the M1 and stop for a 15 at Scratchwood, before pushing on to the A12 where I stop and enjoy a half hour snooze in the sun. Back at the yard I restock the cab with the lesser essentials, other maps, spare clothes, tools and the like.

Tomorrow's load is ready so I make my way over to Great Baddow to load a Unimog, it's not quite ready but they never are here until you start hanging around, there's always just a couple of little jobs to do.

Back at the yard and I'm done for the day at 1700. Distance 245Km

Tuesday.
Eyes open, 4.30am. Too early. 5am, still too early. 5.15am right OK that'll do. In at the yard at 0545 and on the road by 0600. I'm heading for Leicester and if all goes well I'll be clear of the M25 by 0700 and away from the worst of the traffic. It didn't go well, heavy traffic at J27 and not very good until clear of the M10 at just after 0730. The rest of the slog up to J21 was OK and I'm heading for Leicester Forest West to a farm just off the A47.

It's easy enough to find, and I'm soon in the 'Mog and running up the air before unloading, there's a fair amount of smoke but it runs OK and I leave it parked in the corner. It's new owner arrives and seems happy enough and I'm off and on my way at 0930. I need to get over the other side of Leicester for the A47 and decide that the A46 dual carriageway might be the best way around the top, I'm not sure if it was or not as there was still a fair bit of ring road before getting the A47.

By now I'm down to a little more than half hour left and I'm sure I won't make the next stop so I call my site contact and tell him I'll be there at 1200. The A47 is a nice surprise, I thought it'd be a slow arduous s/c road, but it's a nice clear road with long sweeping bends. And plenty of decent sized laybys to stop. With 15 minutes left on the timer I pull into one around 1030 for my 45 break.

Whilst I'm stopped I pull the paperwork for this move, it's collecting a 3CX from a barn on an airfield. I'd had a quick look at the map, but reading attached directions from the auctioneers there is a short cut along some minor roads, it also mentions trucks so it would seem like this could cut the corner providing the two railway bridges aren't stupidly low. Once I'm on the move again it's about 5 minutes to the turn off the A47 and I discover that the railway bridge is far from low.




Having just come through it once, I make a left turn and go back through.

Into the village of Harringworth.

I'm heading for Laxton and on the look out for for what I now know to be the former RAF Spanhoe airfield, home during WWII to up to 100x C47 Skytrain / Dakota transport aircraft. All that's on offer today however is a windsock, a barn and a Polish Pekaes wagon.



There's also a forlorn looking tractor.

And one of these, whatever it might be. It seems to be in good order though considering it must be old to have a 3 digit phone number on the side.




I'm there at 1130, could have even just scraped in before my break. I wonder if my machine is a good un as it is locked in the barn. Soon enough a farmer type arrives on his John Deere to open up and give me the key. It's not looking good, a 1988 3CX with broken windscreen and flat rear tyre. Not to mention the battery that won't wuite turn the engine over. My jumpstart pack won't quite do it, but the farmer fella is straight in with the John Deere and jump leads and the old Jake coughs into life.







I get the pile of s#?t outside and decide to leave it running for a while at the risk of using all it's remaining fuel. I also discover that the brakes are next to useless, in fact I think the handbrake lever actually continues and rubs against the wheel rather than pulls a cable operated brake.





I get loaded, finally switch off and leave the Polish driver there with his two tractors on board and the problem of what to do about a 9'6" cultivator. It's about 1230 and I head back to the A1 for an easy run back down to Essex. I call at Cambridge services for fuel and decide to try starting the Jake, it's a gamble but I figure if it doesn't start now there is no point in going straight to the delivery point. It starts OK and I just hope that the battery has enough left for one more start. I'm delivering to a private house in Panfield near Braintree, there's 2 ways to get there easily, one each side of Braintree. Unfortunately they have closed the road the M11 side so it's a long detour round.


The house is one I've been to before, down a narrow lane with a low cable above the gate meaning unloading is only possible on the road.






With the slope of the ramps, the lean of the flat tyre and the camber of the road working together with the dodgy brakes unloading is hairy and it leans alarmingly towards the ditch. Thankfully leaning is all it does and I'm soon able to get rid of the hateful thing before heading back to the yard. Finished at the yard 1645. Distance 486Km



Wednesday.
Yard bound today except for a couple of errand boy jobs in the van.

Thursday.
0645 Start. Off to Sudbury in Suffolk this morning, it's an hour whichever way you go but I always go via Colchester rather than the roundabout route through Chelmsford'd roundabouts and onto Braintree & Halstead. I'm there at 0800 and first job is to offload a bucket that had been loaded on last night, my paperwork had a big note, highlighted and underlined telling me to strap the bucket on! Oh, thanks for that, I hadn't thought of it. Honestly, sometimes it beggars belief.



I'm loading an 8t JCB machine here, but there's a slight wait as it's just tidying up and I roll off site at 0845. Back down to Colchester to pick up the A12 and over the water to drop the machine offf in Dartford.

Back through the tunnel and up to the A12 heading back to Chelmsford, I'm making good progress through my job sheet so I stop on the A12 for half hour in the sunshine. By 1130 I'm on site at Great Baddow ready to load a forklift, there's some confusion as they are trying to get me to load a JCB 3CX for Ipswich which is urgent rather than the forks which are not. A call to our office, who call their office confirms that someone else is booked for the 3CX and is now quite late. That same call also passes me another job for when I've finished.



I'm loading a Manitou MC26-4 rough terrain masted forklift, quite uncommon compared to the number of telehandlers that I have to move. Although curiously this is the one piece of plant that I am actually ticketed to operate. It's only going to Braintree back to one of their sites where they store stuff. I've only got 30 minutes left when I leave so I take the other 30 minutes on the A130 between Braintree and Great Dunmow.

My next job is to collect a digger from the Stondon auctions near Ongar and deliver it to Little Burstead, near Billericay. I've never been to this site before although I know roughly where it is, or not so it would seem. In actual fact it was exactly where I first went, but it was tucked behind some sheds and needed another scout about before finding the place.

I tell the bloke in the yard that I'm collecting a machine for errr, Smiths at Burstead and he seems to know what I need and disappears off into one of the sheds. Quite what relic will appear is anyones guess, but in the end it's a reasonable effort. A 2002 Daewoo 5.5t machine, it's a bit rough and I can't get my head around the quickhitch so I get the buckets loaded by them and I'm off by 1500.



Unfortunately it's now school run time and I have to negotiate both Brentwood and Shenfield, both affluent areas chock full of mums in their 4x4's. It's 1600 when I arrive at the farm and I waste no time in lauching the machine off and getting back out again.

Finished at the yard by 1645. Distance 337Km

Friday.
0645 Start. First stop this morning is Chipping on the A10 near Royston, it seems to take forever to get there this morning but I'm there nonetheless at 0815. I'm loading 2 machines here, the first one is this little 800 roller.



Once that's on board, there's a Hyundai 55, buckets and breaker to load on too.



It all fits on quite nicely and I'm back off down the A10 and off to Braintree on the A120. I'm actually going to Panfield near Braintree, that's the small village from earlier in the week with the awkward diversion. Different job but same problem. It's only the machine and bits off at Panfield and I'm on my way back to Chelmsford with just the roller.

The roller is going to E2V formerly EEV, English Electric Valves and probably a few other company names too. I'm in favour of tipping outside the gatehouse and letting them trundle it in, but unusually for a defense contractor type place they let me in and out to quickly offload with all the usual signing in and out. Suits me.

Next call is down at Maldon, at TCP's yard. I'm loading a 5t Hamm roller, it's a big old lump but nice and straightforward to secure.


I'm Kent bound but have to stop for a 45 before I get too far into the journey. The queue for the tunnels reaches back onto the A2 and I make a mental note to take a different route back. I'm actually heading for the Isle of Grain, one of th efew bits of Kent I've never been before. Considering the size of construction project I'm going to, the Thamesport container traffic and everything else out it's a joke that the dual carriageway road finishes about 5 miles short at a roundabout in th emiddle of nowhere and deposits you on a windy single carriageway road.



It's about 2pm when I get to the site, it's some massive gas storage facility being constructed / altered and a quick look at the map shows that I'm actually only about 20 miles as the crow flies from Maldon, yet an hour and a half by road. I make a sneaky detour on the way back, join the queue for the tunnel at J1a and make my way back to Maldon to load another identical roller and a mobile crusher ready for Monday. Finished at the yard by 1715. Distance 385Km

ex RAF Hercules!

No diary blog this week but this move was sufficiently out of the ordinary so I thought I'd make a special entry.

I had a move to do from a farm to a scrapyard, the details just said FLT. I was thinking that it'd probably be a small industrial fork lift or similar. I've moved stuff between the two places before but never a forklift.

Anyway I roll up first thing on Monday, it's dark wet and very muddy and get told to back up to the barn and he'll bring it out. The beast that rolled out was a Henley Hercules 22, ex RAF. It's a monster that stands 10' high, 22' long and 8' widefrom tip to tail, and can lift about 14 tonnes. Oh and it tips the scales at about 13.5t

It's a container stacker and it's got some work to do rearranging some containers. When I get to the scrapyard, the customer is busy telling his African tenant that if he doesn't get those cars shifted before the forklift comes off he's going to do it for him!

7th - 11th January 2008

Monday
0645 Start. Having had to get a jump start more times than I care to remember, this morning was a nice change as my new batteries were called into service to jump our other 6 wheeler. Once I'm on way it's a local job to start with, back to the farm from last week to collect the dumper that I wasn't able to collect. It's not going far either just a few miles across Essex to Ramsden Bellhouse near Wickford.


Off along the A12 to Colchester, I'm loading a couple of machines from a site near the station. There's a 3t Hitachi and a 2t dumper to go on, and there's one of our 5t machines that is destined to go back to our yard. Unfortunately I can't quite manage to squeeze the 5 tonner on the back without far too much messing about, and it'd have to come off and be reloaded so I leave it for now and head off into Suffolk to drop the two machines.

Once I've tipped in Stowmarket it's back to Colchester to load our ZX50 before hading back to Danbury. Back at the yard the 5 tonner comes off and is replaced by a 120 roller and an 8t JCB ready for tomorrow. Finished at 1645.

Distance 210Km

Tuesday.
0545 Start. Off out early this morning as the first drop is at the gas works at Bow, and I want to beat the traffic. I still hit traffic through Dagenham but I'm there just before 0700 and sit outside until half past before someone arrives and opens up. The two machines are soon rattled off, the chains hung up and I'm off up the A12 / M11 passing all the inbound queuing traffic.

My next job is some machines for a groundworks company from a site in Panfield near Braintree, I have to ring 10 minutes in advance and their fitter meets me there with the keys.




The machines are dumped right in the middle of a boggy mess and the fitter clears off and leaves me to it. Cheers. First job is to remove the shutters and stow them on the roof of the digger. Next thing to do is to stack the buckets in the dumper.





There's a low cable above the gateway, too low for comfort to get the machine under when I brought it here a few weeks ago so loading has to be done out on the narrow lane outside. The dumper is first on and backed up tight to the headboard. I have to lift the roller out of the mire with the machine and I doubt it'll go up the ramps but I can't lift it on because of the cable so I try anyway and am surprised to find it goes on 1st time.






Once it's parked at 45 degrees, it's time to bring the machine out and nudge it round so it sits square against the dumper.



Normally I'd load the machine on with the boom out the back, but being an 8 tonner (usually only do dumper, roller and 5t) the overhang is too great so it needs reworking.




By being very careful I'm able to slew round and keep clear of the cable, I drop the bucket and find a home to park the arm. Job done.



After chaining it all on there's just one more job, and that's securing the cab covers on the roof.




Irritatingly the roller is coming off at their yard about 10 minutes away. More irritating is that their fitter and both their truck (7.5 & 10t puddle jumper) drivers are sitting there drinking tea whilst I've just spent an hour getting caked in mud. Why they didn't get one of their drivers to collect roller I'll never know, as getting it off involves a fair bit of faffing about to pluck it out of the middle.

Finally I'm off on my way to St.Albans to deliver the dumper & machine, I get there around 1200 and the site access is very awkward and the only space to unload just inside the gate is occupied by a telehandler lifting a continous stream of buckets up and down to the roof. Apparently they can't stop the flow, but I negiotate a 10 minute window. Why they can't use buckets and rope is beyond me but whatever.

My 10 minutes involves reversing in the gateway at a really tight angle, unstrapping / chaining dropping the ramps getting the plant off without sliding into the van just behing the wagon. sweeping off, folding the ramps, stowing the chains and straps and getting out again. It's just about doable.

My original schedule was now off to Chelsea to load some machines but that got cancelled so it's back to the yard for about 1400. After seizing the opportunity for a very quick and fairly shoddy washdown I'm off at 1445, as it's my daughters birthday.

At about 1510 my phone is going, they're desperately trying to get me back in as our lowloader has broken down with a suspected diff failure. They want me to go and collect another unit from somewhere, take it to Bob and drag the knackered one off the trailer, then winch his onto the motor and recover it to Scania at Witham. Any other day I'd have been there like a shot, as well as liking a challenge I'll support my fellow drivers as best I can. Our other driver is also out of the picture as he'd gone for his medical so I expect it got hooked back to Witham at great expense.
Distance 325Km



Wednesday.
0645 Start. Off to Southend first to move a 10t machine about 2 miles, it's a sort of add on job to the planned work but as the next stop is Benfleet it's not too bad.








Next on board is a tractor for a scaffold company, I can usually figure out most things but tractors seem to stump me more than most. I don't get many to do and they all seem to have far more levers than I could imagine uses for, however this one is fairly easy to suss out and it's loaded without incident. Our other driver has also loaded a pair of trailers at a site nearby and we meet up on the A127 and run up to St.Neots together. Our delivery address is just given as Little Barford Power Station but we soon spot the salt & pepper pot type chimneys and we're directed through security and round by the cooling towers. We were only allowed on that part of the site as the other truck is equipped with a Hiab and they won't allow them anywhere near the power end even if the crane is not going to get used. I suppose whilst it's there it could be used.




The tractor is driven off but the trailers do need lifting off, so I lend a hand and we're soon done and stop for a break out of the freezing cold. When our break is over we split and go on to different jobs, my next job is collecting a 5t Hyundai from Bow.


At least it's going in the right direction, this one is going to Boreham near Chelmsford before I return to the yard.

Back at the yard the lowloader trailer is now headed by a Blue Volvo FH12, although it's the second unit today as the clutch went on the first one. There's some tinkering with the other 6 too, trying to work out why the batteries are draining. I enlist a spare machine driver to give me a lift back from Witham as my car is booked in the garage there, whilst I'm on my way there I get a call to ask if I can get a new battery for the other truck. When I'm there I get told to got to Truck East and bring our unit back as it's now ready.

It's a new one to me driving a bobtail unit, and I have to confess to thinking "Cor it don't arf go" before realising that yes it should do really. I also decide that the R series cab is hugely more comfortable than my cramped P series. As a result of bringing the unit back my clock off time is now 1715 rather than 1615, so I've gained an hour and run my car in for free.
Distance 393Km







Thursday.
0645 Start. Unbeleivably I'm off to St.Neots again this morning for a completely unconnected job, for some weird reason by 0730 as I'm approaching Stansted I can barely stay awake so I hit the layby and doze off..................................until 0800. It's the same route as yesterday up the M11 and across on the A428 passing the power station and up into Eaton Socon.


I'm loading blocks here. 15 packs but they are triple stacked on the pallet making a total of 5 lifts. It still takes over an hour as the site is small and they're buried around the back somewhere.



After 20 minutes of travelling time I'm on site to tip them in Bedford, and unloading is much swifter. We have been contracted by another plant firm to do this move who have been given the job by the groundworker (who have their own wagon too) At no point has anyway considered that it would be a lot cheaper to get a local haulage or plant firm to move these on a 4 wheeler and save 4 hours of travelling back and forth. We could have subbed it out ourselves and skimmed 4 hours off the top.




Thy build some odd looking houses these days. The top one has got a hotch potch of little windows and the bottom one has got imitation bricked up windows. And almost certainly a false chimney.



I leave Bedford and head down the A1 to the M25 and head inbound for Bow again to the gasworks to collect the roller and 8t machine. I just manage to get them loaded before the rain and have another half hour there as I've only got a short while left on the clock.




The roller is dropped at Lavenham Plant in Cold Norton, the machine back to Jovic plant at Chelmsford before I return to Danbury. Finished at 1615.


Distance 341Km



Friday
0645 Start. My job sheet for today has a hand written entry on the bottom, it's loading a couple of dumpers at nearby Hazeleigh and taking them to site at Braintree. It says "Do this 1st" and it makes sense as I'm heading to Braintree anyway. I arrive at the builders yard at 0700 and it's all locked up. There's some activity about 0730 but no-one really knows too much and eventually I get some sense and get 2 brand new 3t dumpers loaded about 0800.


By now the traffic is horrid, made worse by the filthy weather no doubt and I roll onto site at Braintree about 0915. The dumpers are off loaded and they announce that they've got a roller to go to Dunmow as well. It's only a CAT 120 roller so on it goes and I'll get shot of it later.



My next job and the original one is loading a new JCB 8t machine from Greenshields JCB, it's going to one of our customers and will probably end up being moved by me in the future. It's only a local run to Bocking where I swap it for a Part Ex machine, one of their Kobelco 8t machines. That's one dog that I haven't got to move anymore.





I'm back at Greenshields within an hour or so, and then it's just me and the roller which is dropped off at Dunmow on my way down to East London.



My next job is a collection from a school in Manor Park, I'm threading my way through narrow roads with cars parked all the way along each side right up to the junctions. It's a good thing I'm not in a 8 legger as I'd really be struggling. I get a call chasing me wondering I'm taking so long, apparently the handwritten note on my job sheet says "Do this last" not 1st but the handwriting is pretty bad and I even ask the guy on site what he thinks. He can't be sure either so I'm claiming that one.



I have to block the road completely for about 20 minutes whilst I round up the buckets and load our ZX50. Because the corners are so tight I have to load it well forward so the tag axle will stay raised to give me a fighting chance of getting out.



Back at the yard I refuel and offload thsi machine and replace it with an identical one ready for Monday. Finished at 1615.

Distance is approx 250Km but I can't remember.