Professional Truck Photographer in the making
Our mate Thomas hails from Canterbury in New Zealand, and he loves loves loves taking photos of trucks!
I absolutely love trucks, and I love taking photos of them just as much!
I am 10 years old and I live in Canterbury, which is in the South Island of New Zealand.
I’ve been taking photos of some pretty cool rigs since I was around 5 years old, when my dad gave me my very first camera.
One of my favourite things to do in the school holidays and at the weekends when I’m not playing sport is to go with my dad on callouts in his tyre truck in and around Christchurch.
It’s so exciting when I see a big rig coming in the distance! I can usually tell what company, make and model it is and if I haven’t already got it, Dad will try and pull over if it’s safe to do so, so I can get a photo.
We go to some awesome places and truck yards and capture some cool trucking action!
My favourite truck make is a Kenworth, and I Iike the T909 and C509 models the most.
Here are some of my favourite pictures to share with you, I hope you like them as much as I do.
Keep on trucking! Over and out – Thomas.
‘Nothing Fancy’... I don’t think so!
It’s big, it’s fancy, and it carries a special message.
For this issue we are in Australia for the Top Truck, in a town called Julia Creek situated between Cloncurry and Hugenden in outback Queensland. (Why not see if you can find Julia Creek on a map? Then you know exactly where this big truck comes from).
Julia Creek is home to Tim and Sheree Pratt Cattle Transport, a two-truck livestock hauling business owned by husband and wife team Tim and Sheree Pratt, with loads of extra enthu- siasm and support coming from their three children, Abbie, Sam, and Bronté. It’s a family affair!
You can tell the family has a great sense of humour because our poster truck, one of two Kenworth C509 model trucks they own, is called ‘Nothing Fancy’! That will be the day.
The big blue and white Kenworth runs a Cummins X15 motor producing 448kW (600hp), with an 18-speed manual Eaton Roadranger transmission behind it.
It needs all that power and all those gears, because hooked behind are three huge Haulmark cattle trailers.
The truck carts cattle all over outback Queensland and into the Northern Territory. To keep the 62 tyres – plus spares – rolling through the vast country, the Kenworth carries 2000 litres of fuel on the truck, plus an 800-litre tank of fuel on each trailer. This fuel can be pumped into the truck’s fuel tanks when it’s getting a little low. It also holds 300-litre of Diesel Emission Fuel (DEF), a liquid used to help the big diesel engine run nice and clean.
To make sure Tim gets the rest he needs out on the long runs, there’s a 60-inch sleep- er on the truck, fitted with an ICEPACK air conditioner. You can see this machine in the pictures, it’s the small square box behind the sleeper on the left-hand side. Its job is to keep the sleeper cool without the need to run the truck’s big Cummins engine. Handy!
On the back of the last trailer you can see the hashtags #speakevenifyour- voiceshakes, #dollysdream, and #doitfordolly. They are there because the Pratt family are supporters of Dolly’s Dream, a programme created by Kate and Tick Everett whose daughter Dolly took her own life as a result of bullying. The Everetts and supporting families like the Pratts, work to prevent bullying in all its forms, and encourage young people being bullied to speak-up.
What great people, what a great machine.
Out on the job!
Ruby spends a lot of time out trucking with her stepdad, Reece. She shares some awesome photos out on the job!
Hey guys! I’m Ruby, I’m 10 years old and live in Balclutha, South Otago, New Zealand.
My stepdad Reece owns Cranleigh Haulage, a rural- based transport company. I’m lucky enough to spend a lot of time out trucking.
I love going in any of the trucks, but mostly the stock truck. I love to get in the back and use my stock whistle! When I’m out trucking, I mostly love the views and some of the scenic routes you get in the middle of nowhere, especially when doing stock.
I also love hanging out in the workshop and doing a bit of truck maintenance.
Other than trucking, I’m really into Moto-X, I’ve even got a motorbike that I get to ride often. I also enjoy art, and love rocks, minerals and all the information behind them.
Here’s some pics of me out on the job!
Talley’s pea run with Jack
Nine-year-old Jack recently went on the Talley’s pea run, and got to see how the peas are harvested, how they are transported, and what happens at the factory.
I went with my friend’s grandad, Greg, to do the Talley’s pea run in a 2018 R480 Scania.
We went down to a farm in Rakaia for the pea harvest. We worked with a harvester, a John Deere tractor towing a chaser bin, and some other Scania trucks. It was muddy!
The harvester picks up the whole plant and shreds it through until it’s just the peas – the rest comes out the back and lands in the paddock. The harvester drops the peas into the chaser bin and then the John Deere takes them to one of the trucks. The John Deere gets very close up to the truck and then the hydraulics push the chaser bin up to drop the peas into the back of the truck. Then the load of peas is ready to go to the factory.
Next, we headed down to the Talley’s factory. At the weighbridge, we got weighed, then a computer records which truck we were in, what we were carrying and who was the driver.
Greg backed up and tipped the load of peas into the hopper ready to go into the factory and be bagged up to be sold in shops in New Zealand and around the world.
Finally, we washed the dusty and muddy truck. Today was a great day in the Scania R480. I would love to do it again.
Trip to Golden Bay
Hey Little Truckers, I hope you have all had a great Christmas and New Year! I have been quite busy these holidays but I still managed to fit a really cool trip in.
On Christmas Eve 2021, I jumped in the cab with Dad, and we made our way over to Takaka, Golden Bay to complete a delivery and load up. We headed off at 6am on a journey of just over an hour, made a bit quicker than last time as the roadworks on the Takaka Hill had finally been completed after damage from Cyclone Gita in 2017.
We made it to the Sollys Depot on Commercial Street where we tipped the trailer load of palm kernel off in the bulk store.
We unhooked the trailer and went to a farm at Hamama. When we arrived, we started to unload the truck load of palm kernel. Palm kernel is popularly used as stock food for cattle. I had the pleasure of meeting a very friendly calf there, who came over to say hello, while Dad worked on unloading.
He tipped half the load off before jumping out and borrowing the farmer’s tractor, to push the kernel up into the back of the shed. He was then able to tip off the other half of the load. He did this because the shed was too low to tip straight into and tipping it off altogether would result in a big mess, leaving the kernel out in the weather! This is a practice for many truck drivers, with some customers often leaving their tractors, forklifts, and loaders nearby for them to use. Drivers being able to drive tractors, forklifts and loaders are skills that many drivers learn early in their career.
I farewelled the calf and we made a quick trip back to Sollys depot to hook up the trailer. Shortly after we bounced on up to the Golden Bay Dolomite plant located at Mount Burnet at the northwest corner of the South Island. The views out to the Tasman Sea and along the coastline, from the deck of the site office there, are beautiful. While I was playing photographer and catching some action photos, Dad got on the loader and packed the bins full of dolomite. This load was headed for Canterbury, between Christmas and New Year. Before heading back over the Takaka Hill with its 360° corners, we stopped back at the Sollys depot for a drink, something off the barbeque, and a catch-up with some of the drivers who were enjoying the staff Christmas Eve shout. We made it back home to Motueka for lunch with the family eagerly awaiting Christmas the next day. All in all, this short half- day trip was efficient and accomplished all that was needed, while affording me a meeting with a very cool furry friend.
I look forward to the next trip!
