CRINKLE CRINKLE MEGA STAR

You can just imagine how the conversation might have gone. Gathered around the huge Watford Board Room table in the mid 1930s, the Scammell management would no doubt be discussing production and how things in general were going. “What about making some of these new fangled rigid eight wheelers,” may have been a question. “We already make eight wheelers,” might have been the reply, “but ours are better than the others as they bend in the middle.”

“No, seriously, there seems to be a market for these big rigids – even that new upstart ERF is starting to offer them.” The conversation may have then gone on: “ERF will never last – they’re just an assembler – but I take your point that our flexible eight-wheeler has limited market penetration. It might be a good idea to offer our customers one of these rigid versions as an option. That’s a good name for it – let’s call it the R8 – Rigid Eight – that’s easy for folk to remember. Get young North from Engineering onto it (Scammell’s brilliant OD North) it shouldn’t take him too long to sort one out. We might sell a few but don’t set your hopes too high as I’m sure it’s just a fad – and I doubt if it will last. Everyone will come round to our flexible (artic) version of an eight wheeler in time – just take my word for it.”

Rigid Eight

I doubt if those words were ever said in such a fashion but the bottom line is that Scammell never really put their heart and soul into the rigid eight-wheeler – well not in the 1930s when the model was initially taking the rest of the commercial vehicle manufacturing industry by storm. Then allowed to gross up to 22 tons, you could even