Unlike many vintage machines of this age all the working lights, brake lights and indicators are intact and fully functional
Helping this process from his base at Terrington St Clement, not too far from King’s Lynn is Malcolm (Mally) Howling, the proprietor of R W Howling & Son haulage contractors. Mally is the son part of R W Howling and Son taking over the running of the family concern after his father and lifelong business partner passed away three years ago. Now 51, Mally carries on the business of hauling sugar beet from neighbouring farms to the British Sugar factory at Wissington some 25 miles away during the harvest. In the summer months he then swaps the bulk trailer for a curtain-sider to deliver salad crops to markets further afield. This isn’t an entirely single-handed operation as his mum Glenda still looks after the bookkeeping and daughter Emily helps out around the haulage yard and office. Long term friend Adam Hannay
“It’s got plenty of grunt and easily penetrates the sugar beet in the clamps.”
contacted the Voice to see if we would be interested in visiting Mally since, for the last 21 years, he’s been the proud owner of a BM Volvo LM841. Of course we said:- “Yes” and promptly paid him a visit to see the machine in action! Despite its 40 years the old girl is in
fine fettle. The LM841 model was actually manufactured between 1972 and 1978 and featured a six cylinder engine – the first 3 years of production saw the machine fitted with a D50B engine and the last three years with the larger capacity D60A
version. In all, 2291 units were produced between these years. Mally’s machine is serial number 2439 which, according to our friends at the Munktell Museum in Eskilstuna (where the machine was actually manufactured) we established that it was produced in 1975. Museum curator Leif Anväg is fairly certain the machine left the production line in February that year. “In 1975 we produced serial numbers 2381 to 2828 – in all 447 machines that year. According to what the factory could produce in a month, this would indicate that Mr Howling’s machine rolled off the line in February,” says Leif.
Mally told us that the machine had two previous owners having bought it from a Mr Roger Fowler who purchased it from its original owners and haulage contractors, D & R Hankins (Manea) Ltd. “It had quite a hard life before I acquired it, clocking up around 12000 hours” says Mally. “The engine was in need of new pistons and liners, so I set about getting that done straight away and since then it hasn’t put a foot wrong,” he continues. “It’s not the easiest thing to work on – I guess ease of maintenance wasn’t thought about back then but nevertheless it’s been a brilliant piece of equipment. Apart from carrying out the work on the engine I’ve only needed to replace the water pump. It starts first time every time, even when it stands down from daily use outside of the beet
THE VOICE MAGAZINE No26 2016 23
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