FLEET FOCUS
HOW THE
WEST WON WAS
From fulfilling a mechanical apprenticeship with Perth Isuzu dealer Major Motors in the 1970s to building a major national plant hire business incorporating a brace of Isuzu trucks, Doug Brooks has witnessed the complete rise to domination of the Japanese truck brand over the past 45 years. Brooks Hire has invested heavily in the F Series 350hp models with Allison automatic transmissions.
30
o c t obe r 2020
W
hen the founder and CEO of Brooks Hire Service started his mechanical apprenticeship with Major Motors in 1972, Isuzu trucks were little more than a fleck on the far horizon in Australia. In those now distant days British Bedford trucks and light commercials ruled the roost at Majors, but it didn’t take long for the keen-eyed young Brooks to recognise the superior quality of the Isuzu products when they started rolling into the workshop during his third year. “There was a lot more attention to detail on the Isuzus compared with the Bedfords,” Doug says. If there was a hose that ran along the chassis of the Bedford he recalls, it would be P-clamped every 1.5 metres whereas with the Isuzu it would be P-clamped every 300mm. “It actually took longer to work on the Isuzus because you’d have to undo all the extra P-clamps, but in saying that the hoses wouldn’t chafe like they did on
