Dennis Stuperas - Trucks, Cars & Corn Flakes

In-depth

3 Nov

Dennis Stupuras from Kilmore, Vic retired in 2013, after 43 years behind the wheel. Dennis began his career driving for his father, taking cars up to Sydney and returning with, of all things, Kellogg's Cornflakes or All Bran. Interestingly the Cornflakes weighed about 11 ton, All Bran weighed more – up to 20 ton.

Dennis' first truck was a 1964 Commer Knocker. By the time he parted with the Commer it had had a Perkins, and two GM's in it, and he had driven it for 13 years – until 1983.

"I was 20 when I started and drove for my dad from 1970 until 1979 when I bought the truck from him and went out on my own. A licence was easy to get in those days. I went to Moonie Ponds, went around the block with the cop, backed up a bit, gave him a dozen stubbies and got my licence.

"It was an 18 hour trip from Melbourne to Sydney. You had the Hole in the Wall, you had Picton, Razorback, Mittagong and Berrima. Casula to Marulan was a big drive in itself."

Back in 1970 mandatory rest breaks hadn't yet been invented

"You'd just get in and drive. Sometimes you'd go straight through, sometimes you'd take your two days to get there. I'd load the Kellogg's product, tarp her up and head home. There was a lot of tarping in those days.

"We had a rigid and trailer - a setup that would allow us to take seven cars up to Sydney, where we'd load both decks with Kellogg's and come back. That's why we had the combination. If you had a semi there was no way in the world that you'd get seven cars on it - you weren't allowed the length."

**… Corn Flakes (or All Bran) to Melbourne**

Was the pressure from the companies the same back then?

"No. You'd do your own thing. You'd load on the Monday and get to Sydney whenever you liked. Same coming back. Cornflakes don't go off, we all know that!

"We serviced the truck ourselves and rebuilt the motor on the side of the road more than once - gearbox, clutches, whatever. One particular time we were in the Perkins at Sylvia's Gap, just before Tumbalong and we did an oil pump. The motor locked up, tore the clutch out of it and everything. She was a total rebuild. So that was a couple of days work on the side of the road."

Dennis drove the Commer until 1983, when he bought a 1981 model F10 Volvo and drop deck trailer with a mere 100,000 km on the clock.

Dennis’ first Volvo was so reliable he saw no reason to change brands

"It was a great truck, so much so that I stuck with Volvos until I retired. The last one I had did 2.1 million kilometres and I never touched it, except for two turbo's and a couple of clutches. Apart from the first Volvo they were all brand-new. I would change them over every four or five years - apart from the last one which I kept for ten. By changeover time they had usually done around 1,000,000 km. My son is a Volvo mechanic which helps."

Dennis' was always a one truck business, with his son helping out from time to time.

"My father had seven at one stage but that can cause more problems than you want. The one truck supported me and my family comfortably.

5. Cubico was a family run business - which makes a difference according to Dennis..jpg

"I was lucky in that I never had to look for work. I worked for Shields Transport, doing the cars at first, then I started working direct with Kellogg's. In 1984, Cubico snaffled all the Kellogg's business so I got a job working for them instead of direct. That cost me a little bit of money. I used to do other work as well, carting egg fillers to Sydney, Brisbane, Rockhampton and Toowoomba. When that folded in '84, I started working for Cubico both ways. In the late '90's Cubico sold out to Mayne's. Then Linfox bought the Cubico side of things from Mayne's, so I finished up with Linfox until I retired.

"Linfox treated me okay but he never did let me onto his beach! With Cubico, it was a family run business and you were treated like one of them."

All up, Dennis estimates that he has driven around eight million kilometres, and in that time has only been involved in one accident.

"..... And that wasn't my fault. I was coming out of the Hole in the Wall at Picton, and a bus came around the corner on the wrong side of the road. I stopped but he didn't and he sideswiped me."

How about fines?

"Oh, heaps. I could wallpaper the whole house with them. In those days at least the fines weren't too bad – $15 or $20."

Although a died-in-the-wool Volvo fan, Dennis still remembers the ‘Knocker’ fondly.

“The old Commer knocker motors were the easiest to fix up on the side of the road. There were no heads, there was only the side plate. You could pull the pistons out without taking the sump off - take the bottom cotter pin out, tip the rocker over, pull your piston out, tip another one in, put everything back in and away you go. A couple of hours was all it would take. They were a unique and brilliant design."

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