A three-axle XF105 Space cab delivered by Carlisle dealer Solway Daf to Sam Ostle & Sons Limited of Kirby Stephen is the 400th Dutchman to join the long-established Cumbrian fleet.
Sam Ostle, who runs the business now owned by Turners of Soham with his sons Ian and Tony and grandsons Neil and Mark, bought his first Daf in the early 1980s. Since then he's operated every tractor model to come out of the Eindhoven stable, including the renowned 2800 and 3300 models, the CF85, this year's 'Fleet Truck of the Year', and the XF105 'European Truck of the Year'.
Although the Sam Ostle fleet is relatively modest in size - it reached 26 at one stage, but is now just 14 - a policy of annual replacement has resulted in a lot of Daf's seeing service with the company over the past quarter of a century. The 400th tractor is an FTP (that's the one with the weight-saving little wheels on the second axle) XF105 which will be used on bulk powder work with a Feldbinder trailer and will average around 90,000 miles a year. The FTP is particularly suited to bulk tanker and tipping work as the aforementioned smaller lifting axle allows almost another 500 kg of payload! Now click through here for more.....
It was nice to see the name Sam Ostle again.
I new Sam many years ago when he provided the best and most economical service you could ask for. It is 25 years since I last had any contact with Sam so it is nice to see he is still working hard at it. "Keep at it"
just looked on google to see if sam ostle is still knocking about i used to watch him race the stocks he and his wife got me a board painted up of his car hand done by ged clampits mechanic if i remember rightly if you see him say hi for me cheers