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Two Strokes
I have lived in Maidstone all my life and when I was young upto 1951 I lived in St Peters Street and about 500 yds away was the Tillings and Stevens factory (The building is still there) this street was one of the busiest in the town with 2 breweries and the Sharps toffee factory. all day long they would test the the engines and the testbed trucks would come and go . I would often cadge a slow ride down the street to the works on these and the "Vulcan" trucks built oposite T&S, just a chassis with ply panel and pespex to shield the driver with flying helmet like a pilot (I wonder what health and safety would say today)When I first started proper driving in 1963 at "Reeds Corrugated Paper" "Tovil we had Commer pantec's with these engines and for our use they were I belive a joy to drive ,full width seat in cab etc and climbing Wrotham hill in the dark with the fireworks a joy to behold. Jesse Ellis also built lorries in St Peter st about 1900 ...Regards. Alan
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