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Memory of the month the way things were (Part Seven)

Quarries near Bristol

One of the other chaps on another Cat D9 was going on two weeks holiday and I was to run his machine for that time, I spoke to him regarding digs and he said he stayed in the Black Horse transport café on the A38 so he booked me a bed for the Monday. The first quarry was council owned I believe and all went well on the first day, when I arrived at the café I had some grub and went to the room allocated and was not happy to see eight beds in the room, well it was too late to find anywhere else by then so I just had to stick it out.  Now I’m a very light sleeper and normally sleep no longer than five hours a night usually less, soon the beds were being filled by large round gentlemen lorry drivers and of course they snored like hell so a rotten night ensued, the washing facilities turned out  to be a cold tap out in the yard with no cover above it, fortunately it was summer, so eat your heart out you modern truckers with loads of horse power, power steering, heaters and beds in your cabs, they were hard men in those days. 

Next day I spoke to a chap in the quarry who pointed me at some much better digs and all was well. On the Thursday evening I finished there and the low loader arrived to shift me to a quarry a few miles down the road ready for the next day.

This quarry was located on the opposite side of the A38 to Filton Airport where they were building Concorde, this curtailed the amount of explosive they were allowed to use, limited to nine pounds per hole barely enough to blow the dust off the rock. 

I was to rip the rock and push it over the face, pretty simple stuff but hard going, as I worked I could see a chap sitting on a five gallon drum outside the weighbridge watching me and this carried on all day, I thought nice work for some people. At the end of the shift I tracked down to fuel up etc., in those days we would get a daily ticket signed for the hours done as it’s easy to forget when doing long days so no arguments later, when I handed it to him he said I’m docking you a quarter hour, why’s that say I, he replied you stopped for a p*** twice today, as you can imagine I was not pleased, I had been going to work on the Saturday morning but I was so annoyed I went home which was unheard of for me as I would work every hour going. On Monday I decided it was time to bite back, even in those days it was not cheap to hire a D9 so any delay would cost money.

Normally when ripping you would be dropping the ripper as you reversed so that it entered the ground, immediately forward gear was selected thus making every second count, now the big Kelly ripper took some time to drop from full height so I backed up, stopped, dropped the ripper then drove forward thus wasting about thirty seconds every round and costing them dear by the end of the day.  This went against the grain and I couldn’t do it for long but it cost him more than the quarter hour hire he thought he had saved and made me feel a bit better.  Funny how some people think their smart when they are not. 

I lived furthest away from Whites yard so rarely visited this meant that I always ended up with old machines as some chaps who lived nearby would smell new paint coming so would be in the office angling to get the new machine, one chap in particular seemed quite successful at this and frequently had a new one, but would not work away from home, so then some other unlucky fella would have to run it who might be unfamiliar with it.  This tended to annoy other less favoured chaps but not me, because although new gear is always more reliable if you put a dent or scratch in it, it sticks out like a sore thumb, I never beat up old gear it just needs a bit more care and attention then they go on for years. The Co-Operator