Wilson Wednesday is back! Back with bang as well, a lot of entries this week from a lot of HC Wilson’s drivers including the illusive but awesome Arnie in R80 HCW. Now Arnie has a bit of a reputation for not hanging around for much so I was dead chuffed to get his photo in today, although please note that R80 seems to already be on its way out of its own photo! Seen here in France today heading down to Belfort. 



Next up is the “White Wilson”, WIL2217 driven by Matt Lamb. Seen here in Wilson’s yard loaded with Caterpilar D6 heading upto to Cannock. Seeing as it’s the only white truck on the fleet, Matt is often mistaken for being an owner driver, but I can confirm he is a fully fledged, long serving Wilson driver. The Scania R620 was already heavily customised when Wilson’s bought it off the South Wests original owner driver Tim Rigby, but driver Matt has added his own touch and keeps the red wheeled V8 is tip top condition. 



N5 HCW driven and co piloted by husband and wife team, Dave and Sue Ramm. Quickly, happy belated birthday to Sue. The big Scania R580 was on relative locals today but never the less still earning her keep and pulling some big machinery about south Essex and North Kent. The lump below is and industrial press weighing in at 110,000kg and standing at 4.38m tall, it was slightly more taxing than the 15,000kg piece above. 





Above is SW51 HCW driven by little Terry Alderton. Seen today on UK manoeuvres from Felixstowe to Pershore. Looks to me like this was lifted from a flat rack onto to Terry’s trailer as that’s clearly not Terry’s high standard of sheeting!

Another R480 Topline below driven by Nick Garlick. I bet Nick was dead chuffed to see the delivery point for his packing cases was near the Dead Sea. Unfortunately it’s only going as far as Felixstowe although I know Nick would have been more than happy to take it overland, it’s only 22 ton and 3.3m wide, a boys load. Well if Nick had started heading east it would have made a great tale. I quoted on a number jobs out to Turkey and even Azerbijan in my time at Wilson’s. For me that’s when it all start getting romantic, big red truck heading east, crossing the Bosphorus into Asia, dust in your air vents and cook ups with the locals, random animals in the road, oh the romance of the road!………………..Pity nick was only heading to Suffolk.



Above and below is part time driver turned office Waller James Cartwright out and about in HC Wilson’s gracefully ageing V8 HCW. More packing cases heading for Felixstowe, at least the UK seems to exporting something. The big case stands at 4.05m high on the floor so one of Wilson’s super low step frames was required to keep it under the UKS height limit of 5 metres. Wheels need a polish JC!





Above and below we have 2 of Wilson’s finest engaged on importing packing cases this time. Both loaded from Felixstowe to Melksham at 4.25m wide. As you can see they were escorted by an accompanying van as the law dictates for all loads over 3.5m wide in the UK. Both Doris DAF and the European Charger have their own Facebook pages, so click on the links and like the pages to start following their activities. Great photos taken by driver Steve Pattison below, with the moody skies against the red trucks it almost looks a bit arty. 







Not all the trucks are on UK work, two of the big boys are out on the continent bringing a pair of transformers back from Germany to Hertfordshire. N50 HCW is a 150ton GVW tractor unit driven by Graham Daniel and WIL 2580 is a 250ton tractor driven by the one and only John Stocks. WIL 2580 is a bit of legend in my own book. The best part of my time at HC Wilson saw WIL 2580 tramping to and from Austria with 90 odd ton of cargo on her back every few weeks. Bearing in mind every time she entered Germany from Austria both truck and trailer had to pass a German TÜV test (MOT type test carried out by the Germans) at the border before the long run back up through Germany, this truck has well and truly earned her name of European Giant. 



Two great photos of N6 HCW driven by Garreth Rowlands, loading out of a multi million pound development in London SW18 today. Great photos showing the dismantling of a tower crane, note the chap in his high viz right above the counterweight at the top of the tower crane. Some view from up there I reckon. N6 is one of the newest vehicles on the Wilson fleet.  The truck is an R560 V8 Scania, which by day looks like another in the long line of red trucks with the big white “W” on the front. But by night she looks a real treat, LED lights to the front, a fully lit big white “W” on the front grill, rear cab perimeter lights and a smaller red “W” mounted at the top of the back of the cab. 

Escort driver Sully sent the photo below in today. Three of the Wilson trucks loaded here in Immingham heading to Lesmahagow, Scotland. All loads over length and over width. 

Last but by no means least we have 3 photos taken by Simon Wilson himself. I have to say they are pretty good photos SW. Especially good is the one of N7 HCW below. A good looking truck with a well matched  trailer and load, all colour coded too. Even though they weren’t all taken today the following 3 photos were taken by Simon Wilson himself. In my book that covers any technicalities over not being out on the road as they are all his trucks anyway! 

Great photos all round today and a big thank you to all drivers who participated, as always it’s much appreciated.