Formidable Foden

Sandbach warrior works on in heavy plant hire guise.

- Dave Bowers

For a working truck used to haul heavy plant items from site to site, this 1998 Foden S106 looks to be in pretty good order. Furthermore, it has proved to be an excellent choice for whatever tasks are required, as its owner John Brown explains: “I bought this truck a few years ago and it has been used to transport all of my heavier plant items which I use for my own work and also hire out to customers. For example a Caterpillar D3 on wide tracks, or a Ford 5000 tractor also sitting on a set of wide tracks, or when the Foden is carrying my two Muir Hill 101 winch tractors both at the same time. The Foden is coupled to a 1979 King extendible trailer with a beaver tail at the back which can be raised and lifted out of the way when you need to get in or out of any tricky spots!”

In addition to shifting plant, this S106 has come in handy for carrying materials for John’s own ground works jobs such as concrete panels, and the low-loader trailer finds some use at weekends carrying some of his extensive collection of tractors to show events. John says: “You can get stuck with the trailer sometimes if it has not been loaded correctly, although this is sometimes unavoidable in terms of what needs to come off first on multiple drops. But it pays to put the heavier items on the front of the trailer to provide the best traction to the drive wheels on the tractor. Sometimes, on very sharp bends, we have to use the winch tractors or a digger to lift the trailer round a corner of the bend.”

John does a fair amount of recovery work for customers using this Foden S106, together with a Cat D3 fitted with a Broughton winch, and the Muir Hill 101 tractors. These tasks can involve recovering JCBs which have become mired, stranded combine harvesters where ground has given way, and rescuing various items of farm and forestry machinery.