Kevin Monti
Inducted into the Shell Rimula Wall of Fame at Reunion 2009.
Kevin Monti took delivery of his first and only Kenworth on the 2nd August, 1965 from Ed Cameron of Doncaster. It was a Kenworth Model K-125, with a Cummins 335 hp 855 cubic inch turbo motor, and a Spicer model G125 12-speed gear box.
At the time Kevin lived in Kangaroo Flat, Bendigo, Victoria. He traded a 1958 630 Diamond T truck on the Kenworth. For the first 18 months he carted Hardie Pipes to Brisbane from Melbourne on a 34 foot McGrath trailer. Later the trailer was replaced by a Fruehauf 37 foot spread trailer and much later by one of the first Fruehauf 40 foot tri-axle trailers.
Kevin went bush, carting mining gear all over Western Australia, Northern Territory and Queensland. In the middle of 1967 he started working out of Meekatharra to Mt Newman, Tom Price, Goldsworthy, Headland and Dampier. The money was very good so in 1968 he loaded up the family in their 1955 Pontiac and headed to Meekatharra for a new life. Heavy loads, around 40 tonne, made the money easy but he did not know about the "big wet". The heavy rains would close the roads for weeks at a time and when they were reopened the road would be a bog. If you were lucky you could step from the top of one corrugation to the next. It was so bad that after 12 months they went back to Kangaroo Flat.
In the 1970s he changed to fridge/freezer van work working Melbourne to Perth to Darwin back to Melbourne. Then he went bush again with mining equipment. He later diversified and took rock bands and stars such as David Bowie, Rod Stewart and Lisa Minnelli, on tour. Once, in a heavy rain storm, the truck was parked in the middle of the MCG and would not move. He had to put the truck in the diff-lock to get traction. After that it was said, "No more trucks on the MCG."
In 1996 Pat had open-heart surgery and this made Kevin rethink his life and he decided to work the truck carrying farm machinery locally.
In 2006 Kevin decided it was time to hang up the keys and retire. He owned and operated this truck most of his working life.
