SEVEN UP!

The Volvo F7 was the International Truck of the Year for 1979, and for good reason, but remarkably it only had a shelf life of just seven years, which means good survivors are quite thin on the ground, but Richard Thomas in Walsall has a truly fine example.

For a start it’s a relatively rare day cab tractor unit, of which very few survive in the UK, and secondly it’s been restored to look like the promotional trucks Volvo used in its initial publicity over four decades ago.

The truck is the F717 model, which was the basic 4x2 32-ton tractor Volvo sold in the UK. It was introduced in 1978 to replace the popular F86 model and has the 217hp TD70F intercooled 6.7-litre straight six engine. The same engine was also available as the