RETRO TRUCK
Truck & Driver August 2019^85
is one of the UK’s oldest runways,
initially used by the Royal Flying
Corps, predecessor of the RAF. A
local driving shift remaining
within Lincolnshire’s county
borders was planned and, thanks
to its many Second World War
airfields, the area is still referred
to as ‘Bomber County’ by locals.
Later in the day, our journey
would fittingly pass the famous
Dambusters 617 Squadron
memorial in Woodhall Spa.
Vince’s family were originally
involved in fruit and vegetable
retailing. “I worked in a shop at
first but I always preferred to
drive,” he notes. Vince started
with a local builder’s tipper before
moving onto six- and eight-
wheeled rigids. After tramping
with the latter ERF, only then was
he allowed onto an artic.
The company Vince was
working with folded just a month
into the coal strike of 1984. Vince
was then offered a job at Enderby
Transport and took it on the
understanding that a Mercedes
be sourced for him. True to form,
an ex-F B Atkins Mercedes 1632
arrived. “In the July of 1985 my
boss, Mr Carter, put his arm
around my shoulder and told me
I’d make a great owner-driver. Hesold me the Mercedes and, as
they say, the rest is history.”
By mid-1986 Vince started
working on European tipper work
for Romac and by February 1989
he’d upgraded his Mercedes to a
new 1644 tractor unit. “The
Romac work continued until
1990/1991 and I then formed a
working partnership with Eric
Mattheeuws Transport in Belgium
that would last almost 20 years.Automobilia
“In around 2000, EMT bought out
an English company and part of
the deal was a left-hand-drive
Volvo FH12.420. That truck
started my relationship with Volvo
Trucks and Automobilia, Zarren.
“When I wanted to change
my truck again in 2003, an
Automobilia salesman had a
one-year-old Volvo FH 500
registered RKJ 418. It was sold
to me on a handshake and the
people at Automobilia were
wonderful,” Vince recalls.
The Volvo FH then did 14
years’ Continental work, regularly
plying across a huge area from
Denmark in the north to Portugal
and Italy in the south.
“It always pulled a
tipper trailer and I visited... that equates to 1,308,364 miles