NZ Truck & Driver June 2018

NZ TRUCK & DRIVER

FREE GIANT TRUCK POSTER LIFTOUT

| June 2018

June 2018 $8.50 incl. GST

FLEET FOCUS

All good with the Wall of Wood BIG TEST Repaying the faith | FLEET FOCUS All good with the Wall of Wood | FEATURE FUSO fights for first

FEATURE

FUSO fights for first

The Official Magazine of the

Issue 213

g n i y a Rep the

h t i fa

ISSN 1174-7935

A new millennium begins

2000

Y2K passes without widespread computer failures Olympic Games in Sydney Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Queen Mother dies

2001 2002

Bali bomb kills 203 people Brazil wins Soccer World Cup Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

2003

9/11 Twin Towers are hit by passenger planes Slobodan Milosevic arrested over war crimes Wikipedia goes online Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Population of New Zealand exceeds 4 million Saddam Hussein is captured

Boxing Day Tsunami causes widespread devastation First privately funded human spaceflight.

Janet Jackson suffers ‘wardrobe malfunction’ at Super Bowl

2004 2005

Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Five cent coins are dropped from circulation

2006

Space Shuttle Columbia destroyed during re-entry killing 7 astronauts Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Hurricane Katrina devastates New Orleans Prince Charles marries Camilla Parker Bowles Pope John Paul II dies Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Italy wins Soccer World Cup Google purchase YouTube for $1.65m Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

2007

Apple introduces the iPhone Bomb kills former Pakistan PM Benazir Bhutto

Barack Obama elected first African American US President

2008

Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Global Financial Crisis Sir Edmund Hillary dies Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Willie Apiata receives the Victoria Cross, the first New Zealander since World War II

2009

Michael Jackson dies First New Zealand rocket launched into space

First Canterbury earthquake causes widespread damage Julian Assange, co-founder of WikiLeaks, is arrested Chilean mining accident, remarkably all 33 miners rescued

2010 2011

Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

U.S. troops kill Osama bin Laden All Blacks win Rugby World Cup

Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Summer Olympics open in London

Swine Flu declared a global pandemic

2012

Kate Middleton marries Prince William Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Mars Rover successfully lands on Mars Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

2013

Pope Francis first Latin American elected Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, gives birth to a baby boy

Malaysian airliner goes missing

2014

Nelson Mandela dies at age 95 Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Russia is reportedly in control of Crimea ISIS take control of Mosul Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

2015

All Blacks win back-to-back Rugby World Cups Paris terrorist attack

Donald Trump elected US president

2016

Flowing liquid water found on Mars Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

NZ highest ever Olympic medal tally UK votes for Brexit Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

2017

Team New Zealand win the America’s Cup Facebook hits 2 billion monthly users

ONE THING HASN’T CHANGED SINCE 2000.

Jacinda Ardern becomes Prime Minister

Isuzu Trucks No.1 in NZ

Thank you for 18 consecutive years at No.1 in New Zealand.

ISZ13508_18Years_NZTD_FP_R01.indd 1

14/03/18 11:18 AM

CONTENTS Issue 213 – June 2018 2

News

46 Fleet Focus

The latest in the world of transport, including….FUSO NZ to get “the most advanced Japanese truck ever made” next year; Tesla electric truck rival Nikola lands an 800-truck order; trailermaker Pat Mear passes

22 Giti Truck Tyres Big Test Hawke’s Bay livestock fleet operator Graham Lowes admits that it was a leap of faith to buy a new Sinotruk C7, given that its S7 predecessor hasn’t been a huge success here. But he’s confident he made the right decision – to the extent that he’s happy to have us test it on a working run over one of the toughest roads around… the Gentle Annie

39 Transport Forum Latest news from the Road Transport Forum NZ, including…..Government makes moves towards using road user taxes to subsidise rail; Expect Trains level-crossing safety campaign adds a life-sized locomotive billboard to help get its message across; operators urged to nominate worthy contenders for the 2018 NZ Road Transport Industry Awards

MANAGEMENT Publisher

Advertising

Trevor Woolston 027 492 5600 trevor@trucker.co.nz Trevor Woolston 027 492 5600 trevor@trucker.co.nz Hayden Woolston 027 448 8768 hayden@trucker.co.nz

EDITORIAL Editor

Wayne Munro 021 955 099 waynemunro@xtra.co.nz

Editorial office Phone

PO Box 48 074 AUCKLAND 09 826 0494

Associate Editor

Brian Cowan

CONTRIBUTORS

Kevin McKay reckons that when he and wife Megan took up an offer 12 years ago to move to the East Coast to run a tipper, it was just dumb luck that it put them smack-bang in the middle of things…. just as the region’s current logging boom began. Now, their one truck operation has grown into a fleet of 17

FEATURES 67 FUSO fights for first

80/ PPG Transport Imaging 81 Awards Recognising NZ’s best-looking truck fleets….including a giant pullout poster of this month’s finalist

81 Truck Shop New products and services for the road transport industry

89 TRT Recently Registered

Editor Wayne Munro joins FUSO for a fact-finding trip to its factory and test track in Japan – and finds some interesting parallels between what’s happening with the make here….and at home

New truck and trailer registrations for April

83 Lifting its game Publisher Trevor Woolston is in the Republic of Ireland to see first-hand the huge new, state-of-the-art factory just opened by Combilift – manufacturer of the Straddle Carrier and an innovative range of other lift trucks

Gerald Shacklock Mike Stock Trevor Woolston Robin Yates Rod Simmonds

ART DEPARTMENT Design & Production Luca Bempensante Zarko Mihic EQUIPMENT GUIDE AUCKLAND, NORTHLAND, BOP, WAIKATO, CENTRAL NORTH ISLAND Advertising Don Leith 027 233 0090 don@trucker.co.nz AUCKLAND, LOWER NORTH ISLAND, SOUTH ISLAND Advertising Hayden Woolston 027 448 8768 hayden@trucker.co.nz

ADMINISTRATION Sue Woolston MANAGER accounts@trucker.co.nz SUBSCRIPTIONS Linley Wilkinson linley@trucker.co.nz NZ subscription $80 incl. GST for one year price (11 issues) Overseas rates on application ADDRESS Phone +64 9 571 3544 Fax +64 9 571 3549 Freephone 0508 TRUCKER (878 2537) Postal Address PO Box 112 062, Penrose, AUCKLAND Street Address 172B Marua Road, Ellerslie, AUCKLAND Web www.alliedpublications.co.nz PRINTING & DISTRIBUTION Printer Nicholson Print Solutions Distribution Gordon & Gotch Publication: New Zealand Truck & Driver is published monthly, except January,

by Allied Publications Ltd PO Box 112 062, Penrose, Auckland

Contributions: Editorial contributions are welcomed for consideration, but no responsibility is accepted for lost or damaged materials (photographs, graphics, printed material etc). To mail, ensure return (if required), material must be accompanied by a stamped, addressed envelope. It’s suggested that the editor is contacted by fax or email before submitting material.

Copyright: Articles in New Zealand Truck & Driver are copyright and may not be reproduced in any form – in whole or part – without permission of the publisher.

Opinions expressed in the magazine are not necessarily the opinions of, or endorsed by, the publisher.

NZ Truck & Driver Magazine

Net circulation – ended 30/09/2017

12,141

www.nztruckanddriver.co.nz

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Truck & Driver | 1

NEWS

Nikola scores huge Bud backing

As part of the deal with the brewing giant, Nikola will build 28 hydrogen refuelling stations along key Anheuser-Busch delivery routes

TESLA ELECTRIC TRUCK ARCH-RIVAL NIKOLA HAS scored a huge deal – to convert American brewer Anheuser-Busch’s entire truck fleet to renewable power by 2025.

The brewer, owner of brands including Budweiser, says the order will run to as many as 800 trucks. While Tesla is staying true to its battery electric concept, Nikola Motor Company long ago switched its focus to long-haul trucks equipped with hydrogen fuel cells that produce the electricity to power them.

Nikola reckons its tractor unit will have a range of 800 to 2000 kilometres, with a full load of hydrogen taken on board in just 20 minutes.

The deal, jointly announced by Nikola and Anheuser-Busch, will help Nikola build its hydrogen-fuelling network – with the establishment of 28 fuelling stations on key Anheuser-Busch delivery routes part of the agreement.

Nikola has already pledged to build its own nationwide network of hydrogen refuelling stations, CEO Trevor Milton saying the aim is 700 North American stations in the next 10 years. The 28 stations will be open to all Nikola operators.

The companies say the first Nikola tractor units will be delivered in 2020 and the trucks’ advanced surround vision will help improve safety as well as seeing Anheuser-Busch’s fleet begin the switch to renewable fuels.

“At Anheuser-Busch we’re continuously searching for ways to improve sustainability across our entire value chain and drive our industry forward,” says Anheuser-Busch CEO Michel Doukeris.

“The transport industry is one that is ripe for innovative solutions, and Nikola is leading the way with hydrogen-electric, zero-emission capabilities.

We are very excited by the possibilities our partnership with them can offer.”

Trevor Milton says that “Anheuser-Busch has a long history of investing in progressive, sustainable technology, and we are excited to partner with 2 | Truck & Driver

them to bring the largest hydrogen network in the world to the USA. “With nearly $US9billion in pre-order reservations, we are building to order, not speculation, and are very excited for what’s to come.”

“The Nikola hydrogen electric semi-trucks will begin testing with fleets in 2019 and begin full production in 2021,” says Milton.

The partnership with Nikola will contribute to Anheuser-Busch’s recently announced 2025 sustainability goals, which include reducing CO2 emissions by 25%. Once fully implemented, the carbon reductions gained from these 800 trucks will reduce the brewer’s carbon emissions from logistics by more than 18% — equivalent to taking more than 13,000 cars off the road annually.

Emission reduction has been a longterm focus for the brewer. In 2006 it joined the US Environmental Protection Agency’s SmartWay Transport programme and in the last 10 years has cut its total energy use in US breweries by more than 30%.

The order is a victory for Nikola over Tesla, particularly since AnheuserBusch had previously ordered 40 Tesla electric tractor units.

Meantime, Nikola has also reportedly filed a $US2billion lawsuit against Tesla, accusing its rival of breaching design patents by copying the design of its Nikola One and Nikola Two tractor units.

In the lawsuit, filed in Arizona, Nikola says it sent a cease-and-desist letter to Tesla last November pointing out features on the electric Tesla Semi that resembled features on its own trucks, including the wraparound windscreen, mid-entry door and aerodynamic bodywork.

It demanded that Tesla delay the public unveiling of its truck until the infringement issues were settled – but Tesla did not respond, says the papers.

And Tesla boss Elon Musk unveiled the truck soon after.

Nikola said the introduction of Tesla’s truck has caused “confusion in the market” and hurt its ability to attract investors and partners. T&D

NEWS

The new heavy-duty FUSO uses a MercedesBenz drivetrain and bristles with active safety features

Best-ever FUSO on its way A NEW FUSO HEAV Y-DUTY FLAGSHIP, WHICH IT reckons is “the most advanced and best-quality Japanese truck ever made,” will be launched in New Zealand within the next year.

The truck, launched in Japan last year, has a strong European influence, built around its Mercedes-Benz engine and transmission.

It will give NZ FUSO buyers an unprecedented choice, because the Euro 6-engined model will sell alongside the current Euro 5 HD range….and the newly-launched Enduro lineup.

The truck will be launched in mid-2019 in 8x4 and 6x4 tractor unit and rigid variants, with the 10.7-litre OM470 engine – part of the Daimler Trucks group’s global heavy-duty engine platform – rated up to 460 horsepower/338kW and 1622 lb ft/2200Nm of peak torque.

Although smaller and lighter than the current OM457 12-litre engine, the new 10.7-litre produces the same peak power and torque, with better fuel efficiency, FUSO says.

There’s no manual transmission option with the new model – instead using Merc’s G330-12 or G230-12 OD AMTs, with FUSO Shiftpilot software that includes eco-roll and soft-cruise for fuel efficiency at cruising speeds and a rock-free mode for extricating the truck from low-traction offroad situations.

FUSO says that a bigger, 520hp/382kW (Mercedes-Benz) engine will also be offered with the new-generation premium truck, but says it can’t say exactly when…although FUSO NZ managing director Kurtis Andrews is confident it will be sometime next year.

But the most remarkable attribute of the new model – sold in Japan as a Super Great, but as yet unnamed for the NZ market – is its arsenal of active safety features, including Active Brake Assist 4, which will automatically brake the truck to a halt to avoid (or at least mitigate) a rear-end collision…

with no input from the driver.

Its Proximity Control Assist and adaptive cruise control system, which uses radar to maintain a set distance between the truck and the vehicle ahead, breaks new ground by including a stop and go function – meaning that in stop/start traffic, it will automatically bring the vehicle to a stop, then restart when the vehicles ahead move.

There’s also a lane departure warning system, side-guard and lanechanging assistance systems that monitor blind-spots and Active Attention Assist – which monitors a driver’s face and eyes for signs of inattention or tiredness.

Its XtraVision LED headlights complete the safety package, which FUSO NZ is evaluating – balancing its cost against customer benefits, says Andrews: “If we tick all of the boxes, it obviously moves the price – and we have to keep it competitive. But we believe the market is shifting to a highly safety-conscious mindset.”

The new truck’s active braking system, for instance, is such a powerful tool in avoiding or at least reducing the impact of rear-end collisions, that in a few years, Andrews suggests, “people just will not want to buy a truck without it.”

He is leaning towards launching the truck in NZ with most if not all of the safety package – seeing it as a leader…in safety and in its Euro standards of quality and its powertrain: “I’m pretty confident that this is right for the future. You can either be first, or you can hold off as long as possible.”

FUSO NZ, he adds, is fortunate in that it has this highly-specced new truck…AND it will continue to offer its current Euro 5 range into the foreseeable future: “We’re going to have the best of both worlds…”

FUSO NZ has two prototypes of the new model here for testing in the leadup to next year’s launch. T&D Truck & Driver | 3

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Payments exclude bodywork, on-road costs and include an establishment fee of $500.00. Advertised price per day is based on a 2018 Eurocargo ML120 EEV. Offer is valid until 30 June 2018. Normal UDC Finance lending and credit criteria apply.

25/04/18 9:45 PM

NEWS

Trailermaker Pat Mear passes TR AILER INDUSTRY ICON PAT Mear – the head of a family of trailer builders – has died at the age of 71.

The colourful Mear was a co-founder of Roadmaster Trailers – starting it, as son Jeff remembers, “with little or no capital and no orders…and made it one of the most successful trailer-building companies in the country.”

He described himself as a cow-cockey’s son from Te Kauwhata and related how he got into the industry at the very bottom rung – sweeping the factory floor at Tui Trailers in Rotorua.

He worked a few years on the factory floor for Tui, which became Mills-Tui – then shifted to Roadrunner Trailers, getting into admin and eventually becoming plant manager when it was taken over by Fruehauf.

After 18 years with Roadrunner, in 1991 he decided “by that stage I’d had enough of working for other people…I wanted to have a go myself,” he told New Zealand Truck & Driver in 2001.

Says Jeff: “I think that was the measure of the man. He was never too afraid to do something or try something.”

So he mustered the necessary talent to join him in the new venture as Roadmaster cofounders: He’d be the salesman and MD, Lyall McGee the chief engineer, Bill Lacey the floor engineer and Ross Bell the accountant.

Curtainsiders (which Pat had helped introduce to NZ during his time at Roadrunner) became a Roadmaster specialty, amidst a product line that included flatdecks and tippers, truck bodies, B-trains, semis, four-axle trailers…and transporters.

Jeff went to work for the company from the outset, becoming its sales manager. His brothers David and Brian and brother-in-law Ian Johnson also worked there.

Among the stories being shared about Pat (nicknamed Teapot) after his death on May 6, was one from Jeff (alias Teabags) – that “he was renowned for being accident-prone, my old IVE-278

ons. n.

9:45 PM

man.

“That’s why Neil Peterken (then the owner of Roadrunner) pulled him out of the workshop and put him in the office.

“Oh well, he had trucks fall on his legs – twice! Luckily he didn’t break anything. The other thing was he pulled his hair out of the top of his head with a drill – he had a bald patch for the rest of his life.”

Nine years after it was launched, Roadmaster became NZ’s No. 1 trailermaker.

Pat bowed out of the business in 2012 – three years after son Jeff left the company and bought the troubled Fruehauf business with Phil Watchorn.

Last year, it was second-ranked in the NZ trailer market – behind Patchell, and ahead of Roadmaster.

Pat, says Jeff, “was really proud of me and where I’ve taken Fruehauf, you know. He was really chuffed with that.”

Jeff was able to pass on to Pat “that I had a customer say to me that Pat had led the Mears into joining ‘families whose names are synonymous with trailer building in NZ – the

Pat Mear (foreground) and son Jeff, back in 2001 Steels, the Curries, the Stevensons…now there’s the Mears.’ When I told him that he was proud as punch, you know.”

A second major heart attack about three years ago severely limited his ability to indulge his retirement passion for gardening and rebuilding classic cars.

But to the end he retained a keen interest in the industry – “and he was always criticising the government for changing transport legislation all the time! He was always asking what’s going on and what’s the goss.”

The Mear legacy includes three sons working in the road transport industry – Brian as a truck painter, Jeff and David in Fruehauf – plus grandson Joshua (also at Fruehauf ).

NZ Truck & Driver publisher Trevor Woolston says Pat Mear “was always one of the good guys of the industry and well respected by work colleagues and customers.

“He had a no-BS attitude and got straight to the point when he wanted to get his message across.

“He also had a great love for a beer and sitting down and telling yarns.” T&D

Father and son, Pat and Jeff, at a truck show during their time together at Roadmaster

Truck & Driver | 5

NEWS

A congestion charging scheme for Auckland’s worst routes would be fairer and work better than the proposed regional fuel tax

Evidence regional fuel tax won’t work BP’S PRICE-SPREADING TACTICS IN THE LOWER North Island are a window into the future of Auckland’s regional fuel tax, Road Transport Forum chief executive Ken Shirley reckons.

“We’ve all known for a long time what the fuel companies do to reduce price gaps and spread their pricing around the country,” says Shirley: “The email leaked to media only confirms how blatant that practice is.”

“Unfortunately, in imposing a regional fuel tax on Auckland, Auckland Council and the Government have shown absolutely zero understanding of the retail fuel market and how prices are manipulated and massaged around the regions.

“It is obvious that what will happen come July 1, is that the fuel companies will spread the regional fuel tax out around the country to

soften its impact in the Auckland market.

“Already we have major price differences region by region, so it will be almost impossible for the New Zealand Transport Agency to adequately police it. The Government would have been better off just increasing the general fuel tax, which is applied as a one-off transaction at the refinery, and specifically target that component to Auckland’s transport needs.

“An even better option would be accelerating the development of a fair congestion charging scheme for some of the city’s worst-congested routes.

That would be fair, equitable and truly regional.

“By trying to be cute with a regional fuel tax, Auckland Council and the Government have naively played right into the fuel companies’ hands,” says Shirley. T&D

MyTrucking, EROAD integrate TRANSPORT SOFTWARE SUPPLIER MyTrucking has integrated its job management platform with trucking technology company EROAD. The partnership allows customers to accurately and instantly calculate income per kilometre in a simple report that combines job management data from MyTrucking’s system, with distance, time and spatial data from EROAD. The companies say that “the streamlined process makes life easier for despatchers, administration staff and drivers, eliminating paper and producing vehicle performance metrics reports for each vehicle per day, week or month.

“We launched MyTrucking with the goal of 6 | Truck & Driver

making life easier for transport operators, by replacing paper-based systems with powerful, cloud-based job management software,” says MyTrucking co-founder and marketing director Sara Orsborn.

“The power of this integration takes this a step further, offering our joint customers one simple system that combines distance and billing.”

Customers who use both MyTrucking and the EROAD system will automatically benefit from the integration, at no extra cost.

EROAD NZ general manager Tony Warwood says that the partnership with MyTrucking “gives our joint customers the confidence they are billing every job – which means improved cashflow and improved customer service.” T&D

New Hino GM

HINO DISTRIBUTORS HAS A NEW general manager – Darren Salt, the former southern regional sales manager for the brand, taking up the role in an internal Sime Darby Motors New Zealand management shuffle.

Salt takes over the GM’s position from Michael Doeg, who’s been promoted to another Sime Darby senior management role – as GM retail for the company, taking over responsibility for Continental Cars and City Nissan.

Sime Darby Motors MD for NZ and Australia Pat McKenna, says it’s “very pleasing that, after rigorous internal and external search processes, the two strongest candidates for both of these important positions came from our internal pool of talent.” T&D

CUT ABOVE THE REST WITH BODIES THAT ARE 100% SWEDISH STEEL

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NEWS

Former IVECO NZ country manager Ian Walker (far right), at the ground-breaking ceremony last October for the company’s new NZ headquarters. With him (from left) were IVECO Asia-Pacific executive MD Michele Lombardi, COO Stefano Pampalone and IVECO Australia MD Michael Jonson

Temp boss for IVECO NZ after top execs leave TWO OF IVECO NEW ZEALAND’S TOP EXECS HAVE left the company – seemingly at short notice – prompting a stopgap measure to fill their management roles.

The departure of country manager Ian Walker and his wife Kristi, the company’s NZ product, marketing and network development manager, was announced by IVECO NZ last month.

In a media release, the company said that Ian Walker has “elected to pursue other interests.”

Kristi Walker said, in the couple’s own (separate) statement, that they have left “to take our kids on a year-long travel adventure around the world before looking for that next challenge.

“We wish IVECO NZ, its customers and staff every success for the future.”

The company said it will shortly announce the appointment of a new country manager: “In the interim, IVECO Australia manager Daryl Thornton has taken on business operation responsibilities for the NZ market.”

He was the dealer principal of IVECO Sydney for several years and most recently was IVECO Australia’s network development manager.

The company said that Thornton will be supported by the existing IVECO NZ team “in ensuring IVECO owners continue to receive the consistently high levels of service that they have come to enjoy from IVECO in NZ. Ian Walker, who was the head of Daimler Trucks’ Mercedes-Benz and

Freightliner commercial vehicles business in NZ from 2004 to 2011, joined IVECO NZ three years ago after four years working with Freightliner in the United States.

Kristi Walker joined IVECO six months later – bringing many years of experience with Freightliner and Detroit Diesel in the US. He says he joined IVECO “with no preconceived ideas of the task ahead.

The brand is one of the oldest CV brands in the world and it had become stale in NZ. Our goal was always a three-year plan and we immediately set about turning around the brand’s presence in the market.

“From 2015 to today our volume has almost tripled, our workforce increased by 25%, our market share more than doubled in some areas, and our profits are the healthiest they have ever been.

“These results have allowed IVECO to invest in the new Auckland-based HQ and state-of-the-art retail facility due to open in August.

“It’s been a great journey here at IVECO NZ and we’re leaving the company in very capable hands.”

Kristi added: “ITNZ has some amazing employees – some have been with the brand for decades and their customer following shows their commitment to the brand and their character.

“We thank them for the joy they’ve brought to our roles and their critical involvement in IVECO’s recent success.” T&D Truck & Driver | 9

NEWS

Volvo trucks, cars connect for safety VOLVO TRUCKS IS INTRODUCING A CLOUD-BASED service allowing its trucks and Volvo cars to automatically alert each other about traffic hazards.

The global trucking giant says that in a “pioneering collaboration, two independent vehicle manufacturers are allowing their cars and trucks to share real-time traffic hazard information.”

By rolling out its own version of Connected Safety – a cloud-based feature that Volvo cars have had for two years – Volvo Trucks’ new models sold in Sweden and Norway can now “talk” to other Volvo trucks and cars using the same roads.

If a connected vehicle’s hazard warning lights are activated, the system sends a signal via the driver’s Internet-connected mobile phone to the manufacturer’s cloud. Under the Volvo Trucks and Volvo cars deal, all such safety-related data is shared.

Thus a truck or car that breaks down on the road, or encounters an accident, a broken-down vehicle, livestock or any other hazard, can trigger alerts to every

other Volvo vehicle approaching that location.

Volvo Trucks traffic and product safety director Carl Johan Almqvist says that this kind of “expanded co-operation between different players is one of the most important keys to improved road safety.

“If more vehicles are able to exchange real-time information about the traffic situation, it will lower the risk of accidents. With Connected Safety we are opening the door to the future, with the hope that more vehicle manufacturers will join in.

“A vehicle standing still by the roadside in poor visibility risks being hit from the rear, which can have severe consequences. An alert issued well in advance gives all drivers of nearby cars and trucks the same opportunity to reduce speed, adjust their driving to the traffic situation and avoid a collision,” says Almqvist.

In the future, the cloud-based service can be expanded with additional safety functions, says Volvo Trucks, which will initially introduce Connected Safety on new trucks in Sweden and Norway, where both manufacturers have a significant proportion of new vehicle sales. T&D

W w 2

TRANSPORT TECHNOLOGY LTD NOW UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT. Craig Pierce formally Managing Director of Onehunga Transport Engineering (OTEL) announces, “It is with pleasure that I can announce that I have taken over the company from Paula and the late Geoff Walsh. It will be business as usual at Transport Technology (2018) Ltd.”

A A fle –

To b co an

Le

09 274 8911 • transporttechnology.co.nz 10 | Truck & Driver

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NEWS

A Volvo truck or car encountering a hazard on the road can trigger alerts to every other Volvo approaching the location

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24/04/18 5:01 PM

NEWS

Trainees “in class,” doing the Toi Ohomai NZ Certificate in Commercial Road Transport, Heavy Vehicle Operator course

Cadetship plan to attract school-leavers A BAY OF PLENTY INDUSTRY group is aiming to meet a looming shortage of heavy vehicle drivers, by working with Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology on a cadetship plan for school-leavers.

The Freight Logistics Action Group (FLAG) – working within the Bay of Connections regional growth strategy – has tasked its members to look for potential solutions to address the increasing demand for heavy vehicle drivers in the region.

Toi Ohomai says that the average age of students on its current 19-week course in TranzLiquid MD and FLAG member Greg Pert

12 | Truck & Driver

Tauranga – offering a New Zealand Certificate in Commercial Road Transport, Heavy Vehicle Operator qualification – is 45.

And Adrian Bowen, group manager – road transport and warehousing at Toi Ohomai, says it’s “vital” that the Institute works with the industry and schools to establish how driver training and a cadetship will work for all parties.

He says that the Institute’s biggest barrier to attracting young people is the current driver licensing laws: “This is a challenge due to the fact that when school leavers do not have a full car licence for the mandated period, it prevents them from progressing to a Class 2 qualification.”

If they haven’t started the process of getting their Class 1 learner licence when they turn 16, the amount of time it takes to get their car licence becomes a drawback to potential road transport industry employment.

Adds Bowen: “We now have a greater understanding of the different requirements the industry has and may need to change how we deliver the courses. We may have to change the structure of the programme and deliver it in bite-size chunks over the term of the cadetship,” he says.

While the Institute offers schools a Year 12, level 2 course in logistics and distribution, there is currently nothing offered for someone in Year 13 wanting to follow a pathway into the road transport and logistics industry – “so this is where a cadetship could start to be delivered and

support a pathway into the industry.”

Such a cadetship programme, he adds, will most likely be delivered in three phases – introductory skills, industry skills and entry-level operator skills.

One of the challenges that remains, he says, is selling the industry and promoting its educational pathways to school students.

The cadetship plan has been welcomed by Mt Maunganui-based TranzLiquid, which employs 50 drivers – MD Greg Pert saying that “industry has to step up and be prepared to follow through and have belief in driver training.

“We have a responsibility to train them and can’t have the attitude that it’s someone else’s job.”

He and son Gareth, both FLAG members, say it’s imperative to get young people into the industry. Says Pert senior: “Freight transport is the lifeblood of the NZ economy. If you can’t get goods to market, where is the country’s wealth going to come from?”

He advises students to ensure that they leave school with a full driver’s licence: “It doesn’t matter if it’s the only skill you’ve got, if you have the right attitude you’ll make it.”

Gareth Pert says that with the right calibre of training, drivers can quickly learn all aspects of the job: ‘We see it as an apprenticeship. It’s all about setting values and attitude built by your business. After 18 months, with a Class 5 licence, you’re earning good money quite quickly.” T&D

NEWS

Ferry, truck biz renews, rebrands A KEY HAUR AKI GULF TRUCK AND FERRY OPER ATOR – running freight and passenger services from Auckland to Waiheke and Great Barrier Island – has renewed its trucking fleet…and rebranded it.

The SeaLink Group’s logistics arm, formerly known as Freightlink Cartage, has now been renamed SeaLink Logistics.

The trucking fleet has also been rebranded in the same red as the company’s five ferries that carry passengers, vehicles and freight between Half Moon Bay and the Wynyard Quarter to the islands – with over 6000 return trips a year.

“Using the SeaLink name for all our operations was a no-brainer really,” says SeaLink Group CEO Mark Gibson.

“It makes it easier for customers to understand what our business is.

We operate one supply chain – passengers, vehicles and freight.”

SeaLink Logistics ships freight to the major building suppliers, supermarkets and liquor outlets on the islands, as well as many smaller businesses. On the return journeys the ferries carry island produce, recycling material and waste.

In addition, SeaLink Logistics vehicles operate on Waiheke Island as well as around Auckland, picking up and delivering ferry freight.

SeaLink Logistics has upgraded much of its fleet to coincide with the rebranding, with 16 new trucks, vans and trailers, valued at over $1million.

Gibson says that, despite regular cleaning and maintenance, the old fleet had succumbed to age and sea spray: “Several of our fleet were due for replacement. They don’t have the easiest life, being regularly exposed to salt water spray on the trips to and from the islands – so a new, more reliable fleet will be great for our operations.”

The new additions, all Isuzus, include four Isuzu FVZ1400 6x4s – two curtainsiders, a fridge truck and a crane truck – two FRR600 4x2 curtainsiders, two EXY 460 6x4 tractor units and a long-wheelbase Mercedes-Benz 316 Sprinter van. There are also seven new trailers.

“Customers can deliver freight to our East Tamaki warehouse for us to transport to the islands or, for Waiheke customers, we can pick up from around the Auckland area,” says Gibson. T&D

Regulatory ove r A “SIGNIFICANT LACK OF REGULATORY OVERSIGHT” has been exposed by the situation that led to the New Zealand Transport Agency revoking the certification of more than 1400 heavy vehicle drawbars, drawbeams and towbars.

This is the conclusion drawn by Road Transport Forum chief executive Ken Shirley in the wake of the mass revocation of towing couplings certified by Nelson’s Peter Wastney Engineering.

Shirley expressed appreciation for the way the NZTA handled the situation – and particularly for “doing all they can to assist operators with replacement and re-certification as quickly as possible…”

And the fact that it “will compensate operators for those costs.” The Agency agreed to cover the costs of the re-certifications “and any necessary repairs in order to mitigate the impact of the revocation action on vehicle owners.”

But, Shirley adds, “the industry is disappointed that NZTA’s auditing 14 | Truck & Driver

and accreditation processes did not pick up the problems with Wastney’s certifications much earlier. The sheer number of vehicles affected shows a significant lack of regulatory oversight.

“Through no fault of their own operators are having to take vehicles off the road. This will bring with it a substantial loss of earnings and may make it very difficult for some companies to maintain operations.

“Road transport operators are the victims here and while I encourage them to pursue lost business costs from Peter Wastney and his insurers, NZTA must take some responsibility for this and make sure they get on top of their regulatory failings,” says Shirley.

“I am extremely concerned at the impact it will have on the operators affected. Road freight transport is a competitive industry with very tight margins and it is not inconceivable that the loss of their vehicles could send some operators broke.

“What is so concerning is that NZTA’s accreditation, auditing and

NEWS

Both pictures: The integrated branding of the truck and ferry fleet was shown off for the first time in April... with the truck and trailer fleet heavily renewed as well

e rsight at fault certification processes have been found to be so badly lacking. The question must be asked, how did so many vehicles get certified over such a long period of time without NZTA having any oversight?

“This is the second time within two years that NZTA have been found to have failed in their auditing responsibilities. I would have thought that after the weaknesses exposed in the driver licensing system that NZTA would have sorted out its regulatory issues, but that is clearly not the case.

“The engineering professional bodies also have questions to answer over how such poor performance from one of their members could go unchecked for so long.”

The NZTA first ordered the owners of 802 trucks to stop using towbars certified by Wastney Engineering.

Then it also revoked the certifications for 359 trucks fitted with drawbeams and 257 trailers fitted with drawbars certified by the company, due to serious safety concerns.

NZTA operational standards manager Craig Basher said the revocations followed an urgent review of the certifications – undertaken after visual inspections of 23 affected heavy vehicle drawbeams and drawbars raised concerns, with at least one drawbar requiring immediate repair.

The revocation orders also followed an NZTA heavy vehicle safety alert in February – requiring the operators of vehicles with Wastney-certified towbars, drawbeams, or drawbars to urgently have them cleaned and inspected for signs of cracks or other failures, carry out daily inspections before use and discontinue using them if any cracks or failures were found.

The alert in turn followed an NZTA investigation after an onroad drawbeam failure in August last year, which resulted in a heavy trailer disconnecting from a truck and striking an embankment on SH6 near Nelson.

Wastney’s status as an approved heavy vehicle certifier was suspended last September and he has since surrendered his certification authority. T&D Truck & Driver | 15

NEWS

The Bison A32 has a lift capacity of 32 tonnes

New Kiwi container lifter KIWI CONTAINER LIFTING MANUFACTURER BISON has launched a new, automated and portable lift system that it says does the same job as much more expensive, fixed, conventional alternatives.

The A32 comprises four mobile lifting columns, driven by electricpowered hydraulics and controlled by a wireless remote. Onboard electronics ensure stability and synchronous lifting.

Currently, says Bison, shippers need to invest “a lot of money” in on-site container-handling equipment or contract out their handling to thirdparty services.

Bison says a common problem experienced by shippers is that traditional container-handling equipment is big, heavy and expensive. This makes it challenging, costly and sometimes impossible for people outside of freight hubs to lift containers on and off trucks and trailers. This, in turn, can add

inefficiencies and complications to logistics operations.

“We want to solve this problem”, says Bison CEO Greg Fahey: “With our growing range of C-Lifts, we’re committed to making it more practical and economic for more people to handle more containers, in more locations.”

Bison is promoting the A32 as a serious alternative to mainstream container handling equipment, offering shippers the freedom to lift containers independently – at times and in places that best suit them. It also delivers a return on investment through lower costs and improved operating efficiencies.

“The A32 is safe, quick and easy to set up, has a lift capacity of 32 tonnes, and it only takes one operator three to five minutes to lift the container from ground to trailer height,” says Fahey. T&D

Forum gives Fonterra thumbs-up New owner at Transport Technology FONTERRA HAS DONE THE right thing by reducing its payment times to small and medium suppliers and contractors, says Road Transport Forum chief executive Ken Shirley.

“Fonterra’s previous policy was blatantly unfair to these smaller businesses and was really just using them as a cheap form of finance,” says Shirley.

“It was quite an outrageous practice and we’re pleased that they have dropped it.

“It’s good to see Fonterra bucking the growing international trend for large companies to extend payment times.

“Over the last few years – and on both sides of the Tasman – there have been a number of examples of larger companies using this kind of corporate bullying to 16 | Truck & Driver

their own advantage and to the detriment of small businesses that depend on them.”

The Forum has, says Shirley, been working on a legislative solution to the issue of deferred payments: “Our proposal is based around the unfair contract term provisions that already exist in the Fair Trading Act. “By extending the provisions that currently exist to protect consumers in consumer-based contracts, to business-tobusiness contracts, large companies would be unable to force small businesses into unfair contract terms.

“We look forward to working to meeting with Small Business Minister Stuart Nash in the next few weeks and working with his officials on this proposal,” says Shirley.” T&D

FORMER ONEHUNGA TR ANSPORT Engineering owner Craig Pierce has bought road transport equipment design specialist Transport Technology.

Pierce, who sold OTEL two years ago, took over the company formerly owned by Paula and the late Geoff Walsh in April.

Pierce owned and operated OTEL for 22 years and is a long-standing member of the New Zealand Truck and Trailer Manufacturers Federation.

He says he’s “excited about this new opportunity to remain within the heavy vehicle industry, albeit on the other side of things now, with design, compliance and certification.”

TTL’s East Tamaki HQ is undergoing a “major makeover.”

The company, formed in 1986, is a design consultancy specialising in road transport equipment design – including truck body and trailer design, accident reporting and body work in all areas of van, curtainsider, flatdeck, skeletal and tanker applications. T&D

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Auckland’s infrastructure needs to keep up with development, says NRC head David Aitken

Less talk, more action… and quickly!

LESS TALK, MORE ACTION…AND SOONER: THAT’S essentially the reaction of National Road Carriers Association CEO David Aitken to the Government’s transport plan for New Zealand’s biggest city.

Aitken’s initial reaction to the surprise news that a couple of major Auckland roading projects had been brought forward into the Auckland Transport Alignment Project’s 10-year plan was positive: “It’s great news.

“But,” he added, “now we need to get on with it.”

The Penlink and Mill Road projects were a part of the former Government’s Roads of National Significance (RoNS) scheme, which had planned for them and another eight new roads around the country…but was scrapped by the Labour Government.

Then came the clarification, via the Government’s draft Regional Land Transport Plan (RLTP), that the two projects would actually not begin for another six or seven years.

That’s another disappointment for the road transport industry, following on from the Labour Government’s dumping of the already-in-planning East-West Link (between the Southern and Southwestern Motorways, bypassing the clogged Neilson and Church streets in Onehunga and Penrose).

Said Aitken in the wake of the Penlink and Mill Road projects’ distant timing: “There’s too much talking and not enough action from both the Government and the Auckland City Council.

“They need to get on with these essential roading projects. Don’t get me wrong, we are totally for the initiatives suggested in the RLTP – but they

aren’t a solution to Auckland’s congestion problem.

“Even if they increase public transport use by 10%, it’s not enough to fix the problem in Auckland. We need the infrastructure to keep up with development.”

Road Transport Forum boss Ken Shirley, who had been calling for further consideration of the RoNS projects by the Labour Government, welcomed the announcement that at least two of the projects were set to (eventually) go ahead.

“There has been a pressing need for the Penlink for quite some time, to free up congestion in the area. Along with that the Mill Rd development will provide greater resilience, especially when there is a blockage on SH2.”

When the Government announced the scrapping of the current EastWest Link project, which had been costed at a whopping $1.85billion, Associate Transport Minister and Green MP Julie Anne Genter said that early investigations into congestion solutions for the area did not identify a stand-alone highway as the preferred or optimal option.

“Money can now be prioritised in far better projects like completing the rapid transit network and accelerating light rail to the airport.”

The NRC’s Aitken has said that he’s still awaiting details on a lower-cost alternative to the East-West Link, which is “the key piece of infrastructure for greater Auckland and easing the congestion problem.”

He said that the NRC could not envisage the East-West Link working on a different route from that which has already been given Environment Court approval. T&D Truck & Driver | 19

NEWS

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The NZI simulation involved Police and Fire rescue crew as well as one of NZI’s Crash Scene Assistance teams

Truck crash demo WHAT HAPPENS WHEN A TRUCK CR ASH OCCURS IS something no-one in the industry wants to experience first-hand.

So insurer NZI has simulated the aftermath of a crash – to show what its Crash Scene Assistance teams do in the wake of heavy vehicle accidents.

The demonstration, staged at the Mystery Creek events centre near Hamilton, showed for instance a heavy vehicle recovery method using airbags to right and protect a truck that’s tipped or rolled.

NZI’s commercial motor vehicle team inflated airbags to support a truck as it was returned to its wheels – reducing the risk of further damage to the vehicle.

Ian Taylor, NZI’s national portfolio manager, commercial motor, points out: “These are scenes which you’re unlikely to be able to observe – unless you’re unfortunate enough to be involved in a crash.

“Our aim was to help our broker partners understand the added value we can bring, at what can be one of the most challenging moments of their clients’ life.”

And Taylor says that while NZI puts huge emphasis on improving the customer’s experience, plenty of money can also be saved in the process, which benefits everyone involved: “Such savings eventually reflect in the premiums customers need to pay for future renewals.”

He says trucks are over-represented in serious crashes due to their large mass, but often it’s not the truck driver who’s at fault: “These crashes can be hugely traumatic for them because of the damage they can do with their vehicle.”

It’s crucial, says Taylor, that “the right assistance is there so the driver doesn’t have to worry about the salvage of the vehicle and can focus on getting the emotional support that’s often needed.

“The involvement of the right people and equipment immediately after an accident can make these situations far less stressful.”

Greg Crawford, GM of Morrinsville-based Orion Haulage, welcomes the use of airbags, potentially saving hundreds of thousands of dollars.

20 | Truck & Driver

“The time for repairs is lengthening now: You’ll be lucky to get a unit back on the road in under 10 to 12 weeks after a crash.”

Crawford says it’s critical to get the trucks back on their wheels and recovered from the scene with no more damage than that already done in the crash.

“The airbag basically minimises the damage to the vehicle when it’s being righted, as the bounce factor provides a softer landing during a rollover.” T&D The demonstration aimed to show NZI brokers what the company’s Crash Scene Assistance teams can do to help “at what can be one of the most challenging moments of their clients’ life”

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High up on the steep and windy Gentle Annie road. It’s a tough test for the new Sinotruk

Truck & Driver | 23

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Loaded to 44-tonnes, the Sinotruk winds its way up and away from Otueae Station on a steep gravel road

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ECOMING AN EARLY ADOPTER OF A NEW VEHICLE BRAND – taking on something that’s new and unproven in New Zealand – requires something of a leap of faith.

A few people did it when Japanese cars and trucks started arriving here 50 years ago and more – taking a chance on vehicles from a non-traditional source….unknown quantities.

The rest, as they say, is history – given 10 years or so and Japanese trucks and cars were setting the standard for mechanical reliability and longevity, even if they lagged behind European products in other respects (such as their level of sophistication).

Chinese vehicles are now in roughly the same place those Japanese trucks and cars were all that time ago.

In the truck world, for instance, the Sinotruk brand has scarcely set the market alight since its local debut a couple of years ago. It’s copped some unflattering reviews, including NZ Truck & Driver Big Tests – and last year just 31 were sold.

Now the brand is poised to make its second attempt to gain a foothold on the NZ market, and the local distributors are determined to leave nothing to chance this time.

To that end, they’ve imported two NZ market prototypes of the new Sinotruk C7 and put them to work with local fleets – one running on-highway with a Hooker Pacific owner/driver.

The other – the subject of this NZ Truck & Driver Giti Truck Tyres Big Test – is carting stock with Ben Allen Transport, based

in Waipukurau in central Hawke’s Bay. Sinotruk’s NZ general manager Allan Bates takes up the story: “What happened is we had a couple built, and Palmerston North truck dealer Ian McAffer had a couple of customers who said they’d be willing to test the prototypes.

“We wanted to try this model out in NZ conditions before we went ahead and ordered trucks.”

Bates says testing the trucks in real-world operations will give the Chinese manufacturer data it can use to fine-tune the Sinotruk for our roads, loads and terrain. After that, he adds, “we’ll go to the factory and say what changes need to be made to the truck for the NZ market.”

Take the automated gearbox for example: The Ben Allen truck runs a Sinotruk 12-speed automated manual transmission and Chinese and Wabco engineers have just visited to see how it works in NZ terrain and with Kiwi loadings, and are modifying its management system to better suit local conditions.

Though the truck is also available with a ZF-designed 16-speed manual and a non-synchro 12-speed manual (on which the AMT is based), the testing and development focus is on the AMT. “In China, a lot of the places these trucks go are quite flat, but here the topography is up and down,” says Bates: “That’s why works and Wabco engineers are coming here...”

Truck & Driver | 25

Bates says the C7 is a totally-new Sinotruk model. It has alloy wheels, disc brakes front and rear, full crosslocks, rear air suspension and the cab is air-suspended: “It’s a European-spec truck and comes standard with all those things.

“Previously we had the S7 440hp which was loosely based on a Volvo. It was the first model we brought in – an eightwheeler that was basically built through a partnership with Volvo. It had similar running gear to a Volvo.”

The new truck, on the other hand, has grown out of Sinotruk’s association with German manufacturer MAN, he says.

In 2009, Sinotruk signed an agreement in which MAN bought 25% of the company, which is 50% owned by the Chinese government, with the remaining 25% held by Chinese investors.

MAN’s partnership with Sinotruk focused on the joint manufacturing of MAN trucks for the Chinese market, and trucks – like the C7 – that would also be suited for export.

It’s no surprise then that there’s a distinctly MAN look about the C7’s cab, and the truck has touches of Euro refinement.

Its heart is a 12.4-litre inline six cylinder engine that develops 540 horsepower (397kW) and 2500Nm (1844lb ft) of torque – the latter available from 1050-1350rpm.

Though it operates throughout NZ, the Ben Allen Transport truck does much of its work on the tough terrain of inland Hawke’s Bay and the central plateau. Its stamping ground includes tough roads like the daunting Gentle Annie, between Hastings and Taihape, where the Chinese truck regularly hauls 44-tonne loads over some of the country’s steepest hills and narrowest roads.

Though the Gentle Annie itself is sealed these days, the Sinotruk still has to tackle ultra-steep gravel roads that descend into the valleys that run off the main road.

The Ben Allen Transport unit was bought on price...plus its light weight and three-year warranty

26 | Truck & Driver

So what led Ben Allen Transport to add the Sinotruk to a fleet composed of such well-proven stalwarts of the livestock cartage business as Kenworths, Freightliners, and Isuzus (it has three of each)?

The answer from company director and longtime truck operator Graham Lowes is pragmatic: “It was $100,000 cheaper than a Kenworth and 1.5 tonnes lighter.” He also liked the fact that the truck came with a three-year warranty.

The low weight gives the truck – permitted to haul 54 tonnes – up to a 30-tonne payload, which Lowes says is exceptional for a stock truck. And yes it has worked at those weights on jobs – including a run up the testing Napier-Taupo road.

So was it a leap of faith to buy the largely unproven truck? “Absolutely,” Lowes confirms – but points out he’s no newcomer to making such decisions: “I did the same when I bought 10 DAFs – when they weren’t proven in NZ. We were the first to dive into them – and look at them now. They’re a great truck…there are thousands of DAFs on the road now.” He does concede that when he first got them, the DAFs did have “a few issues.”

Another consideration in going with the Sinotruk was the mileage the truck’s likely to do: “We’re not getting any more for cartage than we were 20 years ago – so why pay $350,000 for a truck when you’re doing 100,000-120,000kms a year? If we were doing 200,000…maybe we’d need a mechanically highspec truck.”

Lowes is unconvinced by arguments that vehicles like the Sinotruk will put drivers off signing on with a transport company….remains optimistic that’s not the case: “People surmise that you need the biggest and best to attract drivers… that you need the greatest things for driver retention…”

“We’re going to see. Maybe you could say that it is (a Sinotruk disadvantage). But I think that if you treat your drivers right…”

Having said that, he volunteers that when he saw the Sinotruk at the last Fieldays, “I walked right past it. I said: ‘If I took one of these on, I wouldn’t have any drivers!’ Then, all of a sudden, I realised maybe there are horses for courses.

“If I was doubleshifting my trucks and doing 200,000km a year I wouldn’t buy one of these. But then it’s 54t permitted and it gives us a 30t payload – and you can’t do that with a Kenworth.

“The jury’s not in yet, but Sinotruk are prepared to stand behind the product. I’m not worried about the running gear in the truck – all the gear underneath is Wabco.

“But in time I might be worried that little things are not quite as strong as they could be; that some of the fine features of the cab aren’t as strong as maybe they could be. The jury’s not in on that either. There aren’t enough (Sinotruks) around that have done enough kilometres.”

Graham Lowes is satisfied with the way the Sinotruk is operating so far – and he remains confident in its abilities: “Let’s be fair. How many trucks have you tested where you’ve been given a pretty rugged run for it to cover? I could have sent you on an easy run to Taupo.”

Instead he sends us on a job that involves going over the Gentle Annie – no easy route, even for a truck make and model well-proven in the Kiwi setting…let alone for a newcomer from a brand that’s had a bumpy and not-socomplimentary intro to the NZ truck market.

Still, Lowes isn’t looking at the Sinotruk through rosetinted spectacles: “If it doesn’t work out, we probably

wouldn’t buy another one.”

Right now though he’s satisfied with the purchase of a truck that was priced right, was light…and was available.

We catch up with the Sinotruk just outside Hastings. The cabover stands tall, but getting up and into the cab proves to be easy. Possibly because the truck was designed primarily for drivers of a smaller stature, the cab access steps don’t require the stretch you find in some cabovers.

That makes it easy to get into and out of the cab, using the three steps and the two big grabhandles at the front and rear of the door opening.

But there’s nothing small about the cab itself. Once inside, you’re in a wide and roomy space. It’s a high-roof cab and there’s plenty of headspace to allow you to stand up. There’s a good air-conditioning system, electrically-controlled windows, and the European influence extends to the sunvisors – they’re pull-down blinds.

Cab trim is hard black plastic, and it’s a pretty simple interior.

There’s a bunk behind the seats, and cupholders flank a wide central console where paperwork can be stored. There’s a slideout drawer, and a big, highly-efficient fridge between the seats can keep four one-litre bottles of water ice-cold. There’s also a cubby-hole above the windscreen for paperwork.

The floor and the covering over the engine are padded with sound-deadening material.

Truck & Driver | 27

The Sinotruk MC13.54-50 engine delivers 540hp/397kW and 2500Nm/1844 lb ft of peak torque

Regular driver Ben Whaitiri has been piloting the Sinotruk for about “three proper weeks – the first week was spent getting the setup of the truck right.

“We had a few teething issues, like the fuel tank which had been mounted too high…and getting the wiring right. The wiring on the trailer was different to the wiring on the truck.”

Fruehauf set up the Sinotruk’s chassis and built the five-axle trailer, and Delta built the stock crates – 25ft on the truck and 35-foot for the trailer.

Ben has been driving trucks fulltime for about two years. He used to drive tractors for rural contractors, and did “bits and pieces of truck driving…carting silage. I learnt how to drive trucks from that.”

He landed the job with Ben Allen Transport after he and his partner returned from doing their OE: “I’d been overseas 18 months, and my partner Courtney’s father is Graham (Lowes) and he talked me into starting work here part-time. I was on a 530 Isuzu – I got that from new.”

He’s not enamoured of any truck driving other than carting stock: “With stock you get to go places where other drivers never get to go, and it’s never the same place.”

The number of loads also varies day-to-day – “sometimes one, or sometimes five or six. I haven’t been north of Auckland, but I’ve been right down to Gore, Te Anau…. I work six days, and usually we get Saturday as our day off.” That’s spent “hanging out” with Courtney and their 18-month-old son Baxter.

A few days before we test the Sinotruk, an engineer from the factory in China spent a day riding with Ben, diagnosing what was happening with the gearshifting and seeing how well the AMT was coping with NZ roads.

Says Ben: “He was over here to change the transmission speed a little bit and (overcome) the delay in acceleration. They hadn’t had any of this type of automatic (in previous trucks) in NZ and needed to work out something for our roads.

“What he did has made a big difference.” The acceleration delay has been halved and the shift speed increased about 50%, he reckons.

He finds the Sinotruk’s roomy cab “quite comfy. It’s got air suspension but it doesn’t rock and roll too much, like a Volvo will.” The air-suspended ISRI-style driving seat adds to the 28 | Truck & Driver

comfort.

Legroom? “You wouldn’t want to be seven feet but I’m tall enough and I’ve got plenty.”

Visibility rates highly: “There’s not much of a blindspot and you can see right back past the right-hand and left-hand sides.

The mirrors are awesome…but it took me a few days to get used to the curved lens, because everything seems to be so far away.”

He was contemplating removing the overhead left-side mirror, mounted high on the front of the cab – but has now decided that “it’s actually quite handy. You can use it to drive the truck right up to the fence (in stockyards).”

Ben says the cab is “very quiet, which is one of the things that I like about it…at the end of a day at the wheel you don’t hear ringing in your ears. It’s good to be in a truck where you can talk and hear what the passenger is saying.”

Even the engine fan, which cuts in frequently when the engine is working hard on our run across the Gentle Annie road, isn’t too loud: “In the Freightliner I used to drive, the fan was so loud you couldn’t hear the engine when the fan was on, and on this road the fan was going most of the time. At the end of the day, it’s so much more refreshing hopping out of a truck like this.”

Ben had an 18-speed Roadranger manual in the Freightliner and this is his first AMT: “It definitely took a while to get used to. You can’t just find a gear yourself, you’ve got to take the gear the auto comes up with.

“It’s quite good on-road and I like it now. It’s smooth, it’s easy – but there are times I put it in manual, offroad especially.” He describes the steering as smooth and accurate.

Ben admits he was a bit apprehensive when he was assigned the Sinotruk: “I was worried at first about what everyone would think, but once I saw it and we set it up I was quite happy with it. I was much happier once I’d taken it for a drive and had seen how it actually went.”

Ben gives his old Freightliner its due when it comes to sheer power: “No truck ever passed me going uphill in the Freightliner.”

The Sinotruk doesn’t come close to matching the Freightliner’s 620hp or its hillclimbing ability, but Ben’s happy

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with the performance of the Chinese truck and its 540 horses.

“It’s an honest 540hp and that’s what you want. On this road it struggles on the massive hill compared with the Freightliner, but it makes up for it on the downhill.

“The retarder and engine brake are very good, and you can go a lot quicker downhill without braking. In the Freightliner and Kenworth, I was lucky to go down those hills at 20km/h, in this I can go at 40.”

And where the North American trucks were running away and needed the use of the foot brakes, the Sinotruk’s Voith hydraulic retarder and exhaust brake keep it at a constant speed.

Our journey sees us heading to Otueae Station, about an hour outside Taihape on the North Island’s central plateau.

We’re running at 45km/h on the big climbs before we come to a 25km/h corner, then an even tighter corner onto a one-way bridge, with a 44t vehicle limit.

“I use manual over the one-way bridge, and manual through the real tight stuff,” says Ben: “It’s just until I have complete confidence in the auto.”

He uses manual for the steep hillclimbs too, holding the truck in the right gear – removing the risk of the AMT’s computer deciding,

inappropriately, that it’s time to upshift: “We don’t want to be stopping and having to start off again.

“I usually also switch to manual going downhill – the auto won’t hold the gear. On these hills I could go down faster, but if I go fast into the blind corners (to get around some of the tightest, the rig has to use more than the left half of the road), I could run into a truck or car.”

So his approach is to “chop and change between (the auto and manual-shifting modes) and use what I think the truck can best handle.”

As we run across the plateau before turning off the sealed highway to drop down to the sheep station, Ben muses: “Sometimes when we come over here in the winter, the snow is one foot deep. But on a nice summer’s day you might see Mt Ruapehu. It’s awesome.”

The truck runs smoothly through a sequence of sweeping corners, with repeated changes of direction. Ben drives the combination as confidently and smoothly as if it was a car.

We reach a ridge, where the station spreads out below us in an impressive panorama: “Everything you can see is all one farm…it’s huge,” says Ben. “We do 95% of this guy’s stock cartage.

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Above: The truck and trailer unit is H-permitted, but a couple of bridges on the Gentle Annie road limit it to 44t all-up on this trip Right: A Voith hydraulic retarder combines with the Sinotruk exhaust brake to provide strong retardation

Sometimes we do three to four loads a week.” Once off the road, Ben threads the truck expertly down the steep, winding gravel access road.

He manoeuvres it expertly into the tight yard and lines it up with the angled loading race and the process of loading 640 lambs, destined for a farm in Havelock North, gets under way.

Once loaded, the rig is “bang-on 44 tonnes,” reports Ben. It’s the maximum weight out of here because of the weight restrictions on two one-way bridges on the Gentle Annie road.

The climb back up to the Gentle Annie is made in manual mode, holding fifth gear, and with the crosslocks and power divider on (which takes out the traction control).”

Maintaining forward momentum is the key to a successful climb: “You just have to keep going all the way up, make sure you don’t cut any corners, and go as wide as you can going into them.

“The road is pretty good at the moment, but sometimes, if

it’s wet, the wheels start spinning and we’ll have no traction.”

To give the drivers the best traction, the alloy wheels are fitted with chunkily-treaded Bridgestone M729 275/70R 22.5 tyres, which Ben says give the best wear and traction balance for both offroad and on-highway work. The steerers, by the way, are fitted with Triangle TR656 275/70R/22.5 tyres.

As we round some tough corners, including what seems like an impossibly-tight hairpin, Ben salutes the Sinotruk: “It’s done well, there hasn’t been any wheelspin at all.”

Sections of the road are very soft, but the Sinotruk makes the climb relentlessly, with no hint of wheelspin, whereas Ben says, “the Freightliner and Kenworth skid all the way up here.

“We might have got up there in sixth, but I didn’t want to risk having to change down,” he adds. That might have meant being forced to stop and then undertake the tricky business of restarting a 44t rig on a steep, slippery hill.

At the summit, he stops and then reverses the truck to take Truck & Driver | 33

Above: The Ben Allen trucks regularly work in the steep country between Hawke’s Bay and Taihape

Left, top & bottom: Ben Whaitiri expertly manoeuvres the unit onto the loading race at Otueae Station. He did have misgivings about getting the Sinotruk...but is now happy with its performance...and its comfort

the weight off to allow the crosslocks to disengage.

Then he hands the laden truck over to NZ Truck & Driver tester Trevor Woolston to haul the load of lambs back over the Gentle Annie and into Hawke’s Bay. He admits to being a little apprehensive about handing over his truck to Woolston for the daunting run back across the hills.

But Woolston revels in the return to his roots – the years when he drove R Model Macks on back-country bulk tipping duties.

He opts to do most of the trip operating the AMT in manual mode, which he reckons is more suitable and secure than relying on the auto….which he thinks still needs further recalibration to cope with our hilly terrain.

He thinks too that the AMT’s shifting is still not quick enough, and that the ’box changes up before it should when the engine is digging deep. So the solution, for now, is to use the manual override.

There are a couple of mis-shifts when Woolston selects a higher gear than he intends at the foot of steep climbs. He quickly gets into the right gear, and the Sinotruk recovers impressively. Woolston lets out a sigh of relief: He won’t have to stop and restart.

Both times, the engine just digs deep and slogs up the incline, gathering speed steadily. It may not be the most powerful or torquey of trucks but it is willing and proves capable.

“It’s grabbing gears pretty well after a mis-shift,” says Woolston, “and is going up in fifth gear, at about 25km/h.”

For the particularly steep and long climb to the summit of the Gentle Annie, he settles on fifth as the go-to gear. The motor is running at 2000 revs, the truck doing 24km/h, eventually slowing a little, to 20k.

“These are long, long climbs. The engine is not massively powerful, and I’m not feeling a lot of torque coming through – but it is doing it.”

Woolston is conscious that on this road it’s important to keep the brakes as cool as possible, so he’s grateful that the transmission retarder and exhaust brake combine well to slow the truck and allow him to comfortably maintain a stable pace.

“We’re doing 40km/h down this reasonably steep hill in seventh, and I’m not having to use the foot brakes. She’s holding back okay, though there’s a small delay in the exhaust brake coming in. It holds back quite well, and it’s not running away on us at all.

“On the road we just drove over, I didn’t have to use my foot brakes that much – I drove it on the exhaust brake and retarder.”

On a flat road, with the truck running at 90km/h and the revs at 1400rpm, Woolston has to keep a close watch on the speedo – because he feels that the Sinotruk wants to run at 100km/h or more, even though it’s carting 44t.

“I’ve got to say that I’m reasonably impressed,” Woolston reckons as he hands the Sinotruk back to Ben: “The truck is a lot better than I thought it would be – and it’s miles ahead of the Sinotruks we’ve driven before.”

Ben Whaitiri’s happy with the way the Sinotruk performs, although he is looking forward to the AMT’s shifting being spedup.

The Chinese truck’s comfort and low in-cab noise are winning attributes: “At the end of the day, there’s nothing like hopping out of a comfortable truck. Your back doesn’t hurt, and you can drive a long day in this truck and it doesn’t feel like it. Drive eight hours in the Freightliner and you know you’ve driven it.” T&D

34 | Truck & Driver

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Trevor Test

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HEN GRAHAM LOWES TOLD ME at the RTF Conference in Hamilton last year that Ben Allen Transport was getting “one of those Chinese trucks” for livestock work, I got very interested.

I wanted to see how the much-talkedabout Sinotruk 540hp would be suited to a really Kiwi trucking challenge.

Months later, after a new Fruehauf fiveaxle trailer and deck has been built and new Delta stock crates fitted, we finally get to meet up with the truck in question as it heads out of Napier, onto one of New Zealand’s most challenging roads – the Gentle Annie. This mountainous route between Hawke’s Bay and Taihape should certainly test this Sinotruk to its limit.

We drive in to Otueae Station to pick up a load of lambs being bought down to a farm near Havelock North for finishing – the load bringing us up to around 44 tonnes.

So it’s a good load and there are some great hills ahead.

It’s fair to say I’ve been critical of some of the Sinotruk product I’ve driven previously, so I’m interested to see what this new model has to offer. It’s one of two prototypes brought into NZ for evaluation, so it’ll be interesting to see what’s different and how the brand is evolving.

I climb into the driver’s seat on the Taihape side of the Gentle Annie hill for the drive east. First-up experience is great with excellent cab entry – three well-spaced steps with good deep, wide steps and grabhandles both sides of the door opening

36 | Truck & Driver

giving good support all the way into the cab. Once in the high-roof sleeper, it’s certainly a European-looking interior.

The driver has a full air suspension seat, very similar in look and feel to an ISRI and certainly very comfortable. There’s excellent adjustment in the seat and steering column to set me up for a comfortable drive.

This model is fitted with a two-pedal 12-speed AMT so there’s no clutch pedal, giving plenty of room to stretch out the left leg.

Both journalist Mike Stock and I are very impressed with the ride and the quietness inside the cab. We can easily maintain a conversation with no need to raise our voices, except maybe when the engine fan kicks in.

There are good air vents throughout the cab, supplying a good flow of cool air for the driver and passenger. Storage is well catered for with two very large above-screen storage cupboards and also an additional storage unit between the seat – as well as a fridge draw under the bunk.

Mirrors are well positioned with flat and convex mirrors mounted in full housings as well as a front offside mirror, which is very handy on stock work, where you’re negotiating tight yards and avoiding posts and other obstacles. Both rear mirrors work well, with the convex one giving good vision down the side.

Almost immediately on the drive we’re into hill country, I’ll be using the AMT in manual mode as I get the feeling that the shift is a bit slow and this hill is not going to be forgiving of any slow shifting. We’re told by Sinotruk GM Allan Bates that it believes it can significantly speed up the shift, making it more suitable for the NZ topography and a technician is already onto it.

We drop over the top on our first descent and I drop the box back to 7th, running at around 40km/h, using both the engine brake and the retarder. We drop down a long steep slope without having to resort to the service brakes. I’m impressed.

On the first major climb we drop a couple of gears quite quickly, then have to take multiple downshifts to 5th gear before it bites in for the climb.

We make the climb in 5th, running at just under 25k. These are steep, long climbs with some good tight corners thrown in to really test a truck’s power – and it handles these well in the right gear….with a bit up my sleeve for the extra-tight corners that drag back the speed as we pull the five-axle trailer around them.

As we hit each of the climbs we have the same quick drop in gears, partly because the shift is a bit slow – thus causing a drop in speed on each downshift.

However, it’s hard to get a true feel for the engine performance as the AMT tends to mask the torque of the motor compared to a manual, where you can let it lug down by holding a gear. I certainly wouldn’t recommend late shifting with this box. But by being early on the shift I find the fully-loaded Sinotruk handles these hills very well.

The engine is rated at 397kw (539hp) at 1900rpm and develops 2500Nm at 10501350rpm so that’s comparable to other similarly-speced engines.

Steering is very good, with a light feel on the wheel but also giving good feedback. It’s easy to position the truck on the road, maintaining

a straight line with no need for constant correcting. In fact, on this very windy road it’s certainly quite relaxing to drive.

There are several bumpy sections of road and some off-camber corners but the ride inside the cab is well insulated, with no noticeable bumps coming up through the cab and no cab roll in the corners. Thus it’s a very good stable ride.

The Fruehauf trailer tracks well and with the load of lambs on board it sits nicely on the road. There are a couple of single-lane bridges with reasonably tight entries and exits but the unit’s easy to line up and the trailer follows through nicely.

As we run back into Omahu and the end of our run I have to admit to being impressed with this truck’s performance. As Graham Lowes says, it’s not a 600hp Kenworth….but at the price it’s a worthwhile compromise and if it delivers reliability and a reasonable cost of operation it is a worthwhile investment.

Time will be the greatest test for this truck and I look forward to hearing what difference the upgrade of the gearshifting will make to the driveability of this truck and its suitability for NZ conditions. T&D

• SPECIFICATIONS • SINOTRUK C7-U 8x4

Engine: Sinotruk MC13.54-50 Capacity: 12.4 litres Maximum power: 397kW (539hp) @ 1900rpm Peak torque: 2500 Nm (1843 lb ft) @ 1050-1350rpm Fuel Capacity: 400 litres Transmission: Sinotruk HW25712XAL 12-speed automated manual Ratios: 1 st – 15.01 2nd – 11.66 3rd – 9.03 4th – 7.14 5th – 5.56 6th – 4.37 7 th – 3.34 8th – 2.66 9th – 2.06 10th – 1.63 11th – 1.27 12th – 1.00 Front axles: Sinotruk HF7, disc-braked Rear axles: Sinotruk MCY 13, disc-braked Auxiliary brake: Sinotruk exhaust brake and Voith VR115CT hydraulic retarder Front suspension: Three-leaf parabolic springs Rear suspension: ECAS eight airbag GVW: 32,000kg GCM: 75,000kg

Truck & Driver | 37

Contact: Trevor: Mob 0274 437 968 Email: trevor@jacksonenterprises.co.nz Paul Hirst Mob 027 4437969 Email: paul@jacksonenterprises.co.nz

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TD28133

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THE DRIVING FORCE OF NEW ZEALAND TRUCKING

Under the Government’s proposal, transport operators will end up subsidising KiwiRail. Photo: KiwiRail DFT’s7186 & 7051,” by GPS 56 – licensed under CC BY 2.0

Mode neutrality goes out the window T

by Ken Shirley Chief Executive

TD28133

Road Transport Forum NZ

HIS GOVERNMENT, AS SOON AS IT WAS elected, promised to be a government of change.

Following a fairly slow first few months, we are now beginning to see what it meant by that – and for the road transport industry there are certainly going to be some challenging times ahead.

Now, don’t for one minute think that I’m anti-change, as I’m not and – and, as a rule, neither should our industry be: The right kind of change can be a very good thing – and for incoming governments, especially after nine years in opposition, it’s perfectly understandable that they want to come in and shake things up a little.

Having political parties enter Government looking to differentiate themselves from their predecessors and leave their own legacy is a healthy part of our democracy and should not be discouraged.

I’m actually of the opinion that the previous National Government, while an extremely competent manager and steward of our economy, was too cautious in its thinking – and not willing to spend its vast political capital on some of the longterm directional changes that New Zealand required.

I’m thinking of things like Resource Management Act reform, streamlining our district health board system and addressing issues around land use and water quality.

Early indications are that this Government is not going to let itself fall into that trap. Certainly, in the area of land transport and the provision of infrastructure, this Government seems determined to create its own legacy. Whereas the previous Government broadly ran a programme that built on progress made by governments before it, Labour, NZ First and the Greens – under the leadership of Transport and Infrastructure Minister Phil Twyford – have opted for a complete change of course.

Where National prioritised the upgrade of important state highways, this Government is focused on behaviour change and trying to get people off the road and onto other forms of transport – namely trains, light rail, walking and cycling.

There is no question that in Auckland, in particular, better public transport must play a part in alleviating traffic congestion. However, the way the Government is going about it indicates that it has very little understanding of the importance of mode neutrality to our economy and the effect that bad policy can have on making the ‘waka go slower.’

The Forum has made its representations pretty clear on these matters and has not held back in our assessment of the negative impact that the Government’s policies will have on road transport and the broader economy.

By now, readers will be pretty familiar with the arguments Truck & Driver | 39

THE DRIVING FORCE OF NEW ZEALAND TRUCKING

Investment in any transport mode should be based on true comparative advantage, with rigorous benefit/ cost analyses Transport and Infrastructure Minister Phil Twyford speaking at last year’s RTF Conference

for and against the Auckland regional fuel tax, so I won’t go into that in too much detail. Needless to say, the Forum is strongly opposed to it: It’s a poorly thought-out, inefficient and regressive policy that contains so many loopholes and work-arounds that its revenue-gathering benefits can only politely be described as overstated.

Unfortunately, it’s also a desperately unfair piece of legislation, because – unlike our industry, which must pass cost increases on – the private motorist can’t do that, so will end up being stung twice. Firstly on the fuel they use and secondly on the products they buy.

Due to the amount of media coverage given to the regional fuel tax, the fact that the Government intends to turn KiwiRail into an approved public organisation for the purposes of accessing road user taxes has fallen below the radar a little bit. This however, is a really big deal and potentially has a far bigger impact on our industry than the fuel tax will.

The gist of the policy is that the Government proposes amending the governing provisions of the National Land Transport Fund (NLTF) beyond the present scope of passenger rail service subsidies by introducing a legislative amendment that would result in an increased dependency of rail on public funding, across the board. This would categorise KiwiRail as an approved public organisation, allowing it to access the NLTF for the purpose of operating in the commercial market alongside alternative transport providers.

Transport providers would therefore end up subsidising their competition. That is a perverse and unfair outcome and is an anathema to road freight operators who operate in a highly competitive commercial environment and compliantly pay road user charges into the NLTF. If it is the Government’s intention to use a higher proportion of the 40 | Truck & Driver

NLTF for urban passenger rail then this proposed change is unnecessary.

Rail-based passenger transport is operated on behalf of Auckland Transport and regional councils, who are already authorised recipients of the NLTF. If, however, it is the Government’s intention to fund KiwiRail capital works and rail freight operations from road user taxes…. then we have serious concerns. Such action would totally contradict the Government’s stated policy of ‘mode neutrality.’

One mode would in essence be cross-subsidising another competing mode – creating serious pricing and investment distortions to the detriment of NZ road transport businesses and the wider economy.

If KiwiRail is to receive funding from the NLTF then surely a ‘rail user charge,’ comparable to the mass/distance road user charge, should be introduced to maintain the integrity of the Fund and a semblance of neutrality.

In the Forum’s view there are two key planks to successful transport policy: 1. Investment in any transport mode should be based on true comparative advantage, with rigorous benefit/cost analyses (including the consideration of externalities).

2. Transparent pricing is of critical importance to all transport modes and cross-subsidisation (such as what the Government is proposing), is the antithesis of transparent pricing and will create distortions across the economy.

No matter how often the Government talks about mode neutrality as an objective, the fact is that it is totally throwing the concept out the window and is willing to sacrifice the efficiency of market competition and true comparative advantage across the transport modes to do it. T&D

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MP for Selwyn Amy Adams (fifth from right), Ashburton Mayor Donna Favel (second from left) and representatives of NZTA, KiwiRail, TrackSAFE NZ and NZ Police pose in front of the life-sized billboard. Photo: Ashburton Courier

Always expect trains!

M

ID-CANTERBURY DRIVERS MIGHT HAVE TO do a double-take to figure out why there’s a locomotive parked off the railway tracks at the Hatfield-Overdale level crossing in Rakaia.

The life-sized locomotive billboard is actually part of the Expect Trains level crossing safety campaign aimed at increasing compliance with stop signs at level crossings and was installed at the crossing site in April.

The campaign, developed and funded jointly by the New Zealand Transport Agency, KiwiRail and TrackSAFE NZ, is based on research findings that drivers in rural areas can sometimes become complacent around railway level crossings.

“People told the researchers they often drive as if they’re on auto-pilot,” says TrackSAFE NZ manager Megan Drayton.

“The research found that people did not expect to see a train every time they drove, and this led to complacency, and a failure to stop and look for trains.

“The billboard, transported by Toll NZ, acts as a visual reminder for drivers to slow down and check for real trains before they cross the railway tracks. It’s aimed at reminding people to expect a train at all times, and to stop at the crossing and look both ways.”

NZTA senior manager for rail safety Brett Aldridge says: “Local drivers often under-estimate how dangerous railway level crossings can be. And, while train movements might be infrequent, these are huge pieces of equipment and they are absolutely unforgiving.

“Complacency can lead to risky behaviour like failing to carefully look for trains before crossing railway tracks. We really want drivers in rural areas like Rakaia to be aware that failing to check carefully for that train could be a fatal oversight. These collisions also have a devastating effect upon train drivers. We’re hoping the life-sized train billboard will alert people to the risk.”

This is the first time the campaign has reached the South Island. The Canterbury region was chosen as it has the highest number of railway level crossings and, in particular, a high number of passively-protected crossings (level crossings protected only by Give Way and Stop signs – no bells or barrier arms).

Just under half (47%) of the 1320 public road railway level crossings on KiwiRail’s national network are protected by Give Way or Stop signs, with the remainder protected by a combination of bells, alarms and barriers.

The Hatfield-Overdale Road level crossing has had two collisions between a train and a vehicle in the last eight years – resulting in two deaths, one person suffering serious injuries and another escaping with minor injuries. There was also one near-collision.

There are approximately 11 planned trains a day (not including specials, work trains, charter services, etc) and approximately 150 vehicles a day that pass through the crossing on this section of the Main South Line.

The billboard has previously been installed in the Wairarapa, Central Hawke’s Bay, Rangitikei and Ruapehu districts in the North Island. T&D Truck & Driver | 43

THE DRIVING FORCE OF NEW ZEALAND TRUCKING

NZ Road Transport Industry Awards 2018 R

OAD TRANSPORT FORUM CHIEF EXECUTIVE Ken Shirley is imploring road transport operators and those who are close to the industry to consider making a nomination for the 2018 New Zealand Road Transport Industry Awards.

“We have had some outstanding winners of the awards over the past few years,” says Shirley.

“However, unless nominations are actually lodged we cannot appropriately acknowledge those individuals and businesses that really deserve it.

“These awards are not in any way elitist or restricted to those in director or management positions, so if you know of someone in your business who goes the extra mile for the organisation and their workmates then step up and nominate them. It could be that they are the driver with an exemplary safety record, or the despatcher who has never called in sick.

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“With this year’s RTF Conference in Dunedin it is an extra incentive and opportunity for Otago and Southland operators to be acknowledged. It would be fantastic to have this year’s awards reflect a bit of the event’s southern flavour,” says Shirley.

Once again, there are five awards on offer, four of which seek to recognise activities and achievements that improve the daily lives of people in the industry and make it a rewarding and safe environment to work in. They are the Industry Innovation Award, Outstanding Contribution to Training Award, Outstanding Contribution to Health and Safety and the overall Supreme Contribution to NZ Road Transport Award.

The other award is the Bridgestone NZ Road Transport Hero Award.

This is an extremely prestigious award that identifies the actions of a member of the road transport industry who, in the course of their normal workday, saves or attempts to save another person from danger.

“Any industry employee is eligible for the award and it would be

THE DRIVING FORCE OF NEW ZEALAND TRUCKING

Road Transport Forum New Zealand was set up as a national body in 1997 to responsibly promote and advance the interests of the road transport industry and its member associations. Members of the Road Transport Forum’s member associations – NRC, NZ Trucking and RTANZ – are automatically affiliated to the Forum.

Road Transport Forum NZ PO Box 1778, Wellington 04 472 3877 forum@rtf.nz www.rtfnz.co.nz Ken Shirley, Chief Executive 04 472 3877 021 570 877 ken@rtf.nz

Opposite page: Last year’s Outstanding Contribution to Training Award was, NZ Express Transport – its reps here receiving the award Above: The last winner of the Bridgestone NZ Road Transport Hero Award in 2015, Mike McGregor, who bravely drove his burning load through the Porirua suburb of Mana – away from houses and businesses

fantastic to receive some strong nominations this year.

The bar is intentionally set quite high, but if some of the anecdotes I hear around the traps are anything to go by, there are plenty of worthy nominees out there.

“Our industry is painfully modest about its achievements at times and I know how bashful so many of our members are but it is important that our outstanding contributors are recognised,” says Shirley.

The awards will be presented at the Road Transport Industry Awards Dinner on Wednesday September 26 in the beautiful Dunedin Town Hall.

Criteria and nomination forms for each of the awards can be found in the events section of the RTF website, while registration for the Conference and Awards Dinner is available at the RTF Conference website (rtfconference. co.nz). T&D

National Road Carriers (NRC) Providing services that assist NZ transport businesses PO Box 12-100, Penrose, Auckland 0800 686 777 09 622 2529 (Fax) enquiries@natroad.co.nz www.natroad.co.nz David Aitken, Chief Executive 09 636 2951 021 771 911 david.aitken@natroad.co.nz Paula Rogers, Executive Officer 09 636 2957 021 771 951 paula.rogers@natroad.co.nz Grant Turner, Executive Officer 09 636 2953 021 771 956 grant.turner@natroad.co.nz NZ Trucking Association (NZTA) Working for owner operators and the industry PO Box 16905, Hornby, Christchurch 8441 0800 338 338 03 349 0135 (Fax) info@nztruckingassn.co.nz www.nztruckingassn.co.nz David Boyce, Chief Executive 03 344 6257 021 754 137 dave.boyce@nztruckingassn.co.nz Carol McGeady, Executive Officer 03 349 8070 021 252 7252 carol.mcgeady@nztruckingassn.co.nz Women in Road Transport (WiRT) Promoting the sector as a preferred career option for women and supporting women in the industry www.rtfnz.co.nz/womeninroadtransport wirtnz@gmail.com

Road Transport Association of NZ (RTANZ) Formed in 2010 from the previous regional structure of the NZRTA National Office, PO Box 7392, Christchurch 8240 0800 367 782 03 366 9853 (Fax) admin@rtanz.co.nz www.rtanz.co.nz Dennis Robertson, Chief Executive 03 366 9854 021 221 3955 drobertson@rtanz.co.nz Area Executives Auckland/North Waikato/Thames Valley Keith McGuire 0800 367 782 (Option 2) 027 445 5785 kmcguire@rtanz.co.nz Southern Waikato/Bay of Plenty/Taupo/ Poverty Bay Dave Cox 0800 367 782 (Option 2) 027 443 6022 dcox@rtanz.co.nz King Country/Taranaki/Wanganui/ Manawatu/Horowhenua to Levin Tom Cloke 0800 367 782 (Option 4) 027 446 4892 tcloke@rtanz.co.nz Hawke’s Bay/Wairarapa/Otaki to Wellington Sandy Walker 0800 367 782 (Option 5) 027 485 6038 swalker@rtanz.co.nz Northern West Coast/Nelson/ Marlborough/North Canterbury John Bond 0800 367 782 (Option 6) 027 444 8136 jbond@rtanz.co.nz Southern West Coast/Christchurch/MidCanterbury/South Canterbury Simon Carson 0800 367 782 (Option 7) 027 556 6099 scarson@rtanz.co.nz Otago/Southland Alan Cooper 0800 367 782 (Option 8) 027 315 5895 acooper@rtanz.co.nz

Truck & Driver | 45

Geoff Morgan, one of three McKay Cartage owner/drivers, returns from a forest delivery in his Kenworth T659. Today the Te Weraroa River at Mangatu is sweet, shallow....but it ain’t always so!

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Wall o

FLEET FOCUS

l of Wood Story Wayne Munro Photos Gerald Shacklock

Truck & Driver | 47

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One of the two company DAFs heads for the Waerenga O Kuri Quarry, about 55kms west of Gisborne, for its first load of the day

I

F KEVIN MCKAY WAS A BULLSHIT ARTIST, HE’D TELL YOU HE knew it from the start.

He’d reckon that his decision to quit his owner/driver contract – carting containers and bulk liquid tankers in the Bay of Plenty – buy a tipper and head for the back-blocks of the East Coast was all carefully planned.

Perfectly timed to put him smack-bang in the middle of things, just as the current East Coast logging boom began. Primed and ready to work – carting metal for forestry and rural roads – just as the harvesting of the Coast’s long-talked-about Wall of Wood ramped up.

But just two days spent with the 43-year-old McKay is time enough to convince you that he’s one of the nicest, most down to earth, honest, strictly-no-bullshit blokes around.

And so he says candidly that, oh no, the life-changing decision he and wife Megan made back in 2006 was just dumb luck.

That they didn’t even know about the so-called Wall of Wood that forestry and logging people had been saying for years was looming up for harvesting on the Coast…

Had no idea that swapping their Mount Maunganui-based Mitsi Shogun tractor unit for a new Mitsi tipper, based about 25 kilometres inland from Tokomaru Bay (the back of beyond, even in East Coast terms), would put them in the perfect spot to service the boom’s roading metal needs.

Here’s Kevin’s take on it: “I think it was just a wee bit of luck – like going up there at the beginning of a sort of forestry boom coming on….”

A few years earlier and they would probably have been one of the many, many casualties of the so-called “Huaguang disaster” – the financial failure in 2003 of the Chinese company that had bought the cutting rights to East Coast Forests for $96million just the previous year.

In Kevin-speak “it all turned to custard and a lot of local people got burned.” In biz terminology Huaguang went into receivership and its assets were sold in 2004 for $47m, leaving unsecured creditors owed more than $49m.

It left a vacuum in the bulk metal cartage business – and luckily for the McKays, it also resulted in “better companies coming on board” to fill the forest ownership void left by Huaguang.

“And, well, we were one of the only ones up there, bar a guy at Tolaga who had an older truck,” says Kevin.

“And what other competition there was, was based in Gisborne – they didn’t want to be based up there. So it was open.

“And once you found your feet – got all your diesel and your tools to become self-sufficient – not many of the others could touch you, because you had everything right there. Everyone else had to travel.

“So that side of it was good. And I didn’t know that (when I arrived).” So it was all down to his impressive foresight and business nous then? “Yeah,” he laughs. “Certainly.”

It’s true that, like so many things in life, the Coast opportunity came down to chance. The career in trucking, on the other hand – that was almost predestined: Kevin McKay’s Dad Errol was a truck driver, who’d started with Taylor Bros in Katikati in the 1970s, went on to run its concrete plant, then operate its Hiab truck.

“So I spent a lot of time with him as a boy. And my three brothers all drove trucks. The diesel bug gets you and that was the end of that.”

Formal education wasn’t for Kevin: At 15, he “walked out of school – I’d had enough. I’d pretty much been told by teachers that I was going nowhere and I was never going to be any good – so I dropped out….and started working.

“My Mum said ‘you can’t leave school until you’ve got a job.’ I found a job and that was the end of that.”

No surprise that the job happened to include driving a little Daihatsu truck – for Katikati Building Supplies. When they bought a bigger truck, an old Dodge, he drove that too – even though, he confesses, “I didn’t have my licence for it when I first started driving it.”

After that, he started driving heavy trucks for Robert Monk Transport – “doing freight and farm deliveries and progressing up through the bigger trucks.”

He and Megan bought their first truck – a 430-horsepower Mitsi – when he was in his late 20s, going to work as an OD for Rex Tucker Transport. He enjoyed the life and the business.

But then Megan’s cousin, Craig Needham called. His Needham Contracting operation was running a bulldozer and a digger, building roads for Ernslaw One on the East Coast....and he’d been offered the opportunity to add a truck and cart his own metal.

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Enter your fleet colour scheme in the PPG Transport Imaging Awards: Just fill out this entry form (or a photocopy of it) and send it into New Zealand Truck & Driver.

Be in with a chance to win in the annual PPG Transport Imaging Awards.

Contact name name & position in company: ________________________________________________________________ Location:

___________________________________________________________________________________________

Phone numbers: __________________________________________________________________________________________

TD16163

Fleet or company name:___________________________________________________________________________________

Please send a selection of photos of one particular truck in your fleet colours. It’s desirable (but not compulsory) to also send shots of other trucks that show off the colours. Make sure your images are supplied as large format files taken on a fine setting on a digital camera. The files must be at least 3MB. All entries become the property of Allied Publications Ltd. All entries property of AlliedIMAGING Publications Send yourbecome entry tothe PPG TRANSPORT A Ltd. S AWARD Send your entry to: PPG TRANSPORT IMAGING AWARDS 1642 or email to waynemunro@xtra.co.nz Allied Publications Ltd PO Box 112062 Penrose Auckland Allied Publications Ltd, PO Box 112062, Penrose, Auckland 1642, or email to waynemunro@xtra.co.nz (Remember do not reduce size of images to transmit by email, send two at a time on separate emails if large files.)

(Do not reduce the size of images to send them by email – send large files one or two at a time in separate emails if necessary).

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T’S A LIVERY THAT KEEPS COMPANY BRANDING TO A bare minimum: No big, bold logo on the roof aerofoil.

Ditto for the stock crates.

And yet in the area that G.K. Skou Transport concentrates on – primarily around the Manawatu, and most particularly around its base in Marton – its trucks are unmistakable.

That’s thanks to their readily-identifiable bold colours – dark green, dramatically cut by bright red and yellow stripes.

Sure, the same colours also used to feature on the big Total Transport fleet just up the island at Taupo, company founder Graeme Skou acknowledges.

In fact, on the 1985 Mack Cruise-Liner classic he restored eight years ago, he actually replicated the Total livery rather than the G.K. Skou Transport colour scheme (with the style of the stripes and heaps of extra pinstriping).

The stripes on the Skou trucks have always been different to the old Total livery – from the time when he started the company, in 1986.

The yellow stripe on top, the red below, ran straight across the front of his trucks below the windscreen, back under the side windows and flicked up the side of the cab behind the windows. In some cases, the stripes even returned forward, above the side windows. And a broad red stripe continued back, on the stock crates.

“Now, with Total not around…there’s nothing really like it eh, which is quite cool.”

Apart from modifications to suit different truck makes and models, the Skou colour scheme has essentially had only one change over the years.

That was in 1994: “There was an old fella Pat Culling – used to have Culling Enterprises, a truck painting business in Palmerston North.

“And he said to me one day, when he went to paint one of the trucks: ‘I’m sick of you with all these colours! Why don’t you just have a straight green, with a couple of stripes through it.’

“What he was getting at was we had a silver bumper, white roof…a bit of white around the windows as well!”

Culling’s tidy-up – getting rid of the silver and the white – worked a treat as far as Graeme’s concerned: “We’ve had it

2 | Truck & Driver

ever since….stuck to that. It just seems to have grown on you eh. I’m very happy with the colour scheme.”

He and current signwriter, Tony Walton’s Custom Art in Feilding, have added pin-striping to the livery in recent years – around the doors and windows and across the front of the trucks: “It lifts them a little bit too eh,” says Graeme approvingly.

He’d almost forgotten another change – the short-term adoption of signwriting and deer’s head graphics on the aerofoil, back in the early 2000s. They disappeared from the livery purely by chance.

Graeme explains: “Ah, to tell you the truth we went to signwrite one and I was in a bit of a hurry – so I decided we weren’t gonna put the scaff up there just for a name up on the foil, so we diced it and I said we’d do it another day.

“We never got around to it – and we’ve never done one since.”

Yes, he acknowledges that other operators see the benefit of heavily featuring their company name and logo on their trucks: “But no – we’re quite happy with just what we’re doing now. It’s quite simple eh.”

The trucks are painted by Total Truck Spray in Palmerston North – the colours now standardised: “Over the years we had that much confusion over different shades, so now it’s Skou Yellow, Skou Red and Skou Green.”

G.K. Skou Transport has nine trucks in its current fleet – six livestock units, including two Volvo FHs that are the latest additions – and three tippers. As well as the Volvos there are six Hinos and one Isuzu.

The livestock units work around the lower North Island, while the bulk trucks mostly stay closer to Marton – doing “a lot of wool, manure, hay, silage….we’re just a real rural carrier really.”

Having good-looking, easily-recognisable trucks is very important, Graeme reckons: “Oh, it’s like your advertising – it’s out there all the time.

“This time of the year we’re so busy we struggle to keep them clean – but that green does seem to hide the dirt a bit.

“That PPG paint – it’s good paint that eh. We’ve got that on our sheep crates – and that’s a fairly harsh environment,

TRANSPORT IMAGING AWARDS

Clockwise, from above: One of the two new Volvos on the fleet, featuring the latest version of the stripes...

Graeme Skou is happy to avoid any bold branding and let the strong colours do the talking...Mack CruiseLiner uses the same colours, but follows the old Total Transport style of stripes...the colour scheme as it’s been since 1994, featuring on a long-gone ERF

with the sheep shit and things like that. And they just don’t discolour anymore – they hold their shine eh!”

The oldest truck in the working fleet (the Mack is only used for classic truck shows and runs) is a 2002 FY Hino sixwheeler: “It still works every day – and that paint! You know, it’s been on there since 2002 and it still looks really good.

“We’ve been meaning to repaint it – but it just doesn’t really need it eh.”

Graeme hints that he’s often not the final arbiter on how his trucks look: His wife, he says, has got her way with the colour scheme for the 1977 Kenworth W924 he’s currently

doing up. That’s going to be silver – not in the G.K. Skou colours.

Truck painter Pat Culling brought the changes in 1994 – and most recently Graeme reckons he was given some livery directions late last year, when the first of the two new Volvos arrived.

The stripes on them curve down on the front edges of the cab, towards the headlights, and Graeme says: “I wasn’t particularly a fan of that – I wanted (the stripes) to go straight across. But Tony (Walton) said ‘don’t be oldfashioned – go this way.’ ” T&D

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“We always got on real well with him and he said to me ‘why don’t you come down and have a look at it.’ So I did.”

And he liked what he saw – enough to give up the security of his OD deal and the comfort of their own home in Mount Maunganui… to live in cold and basic shearers’ quarters (with a bunch of other roading and forestry workers) on the remote Fernside Station.

Kevin reckons that years of roughing it with mates on hunting and fishing expeditions meant “I was sort of used to it. It wasn’t too bad.” Although he does add: “It was an interesting place in the winter.”

He stayed there for around a year, until Megan and their young son Alex followed him down to the Coast, moving into the picturesque but tiny Tokomaru Bay – famous as the birthplace of Prince Tui Teka.

For all the East Coast’s rep as a stronghold of dope-smoking,

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bareback horse-riding Rastas and gangs, the McKays fell in love with the place and its people from the outset: “Once you get to know them they’re a lot better people than those you’d find in the city – more genuine, I think,” says Kevin.

“There’s a lot of good people around. Accept everyone for who they are – you can’t judge a book by its cover.”

For sure, he says, there were some in business who “weren’t totally overly-enthused about seeing a young out of towner coming into the area. It was like ‘what’s he doing here?’

“But that all changed as time went on.” It helped that his approach was non-confrontational: “Fly below the radar…keep your nose to the ground – worry about what you’re doing. Don’t worry about what they’re doing.”

Specifically, what he was getting on with was carting truck and trailer loads of bulk metal from Ruatoria quarries to forest stockpiles around the Fernside area – around a 90km round trip.

Acceptance into the community progressed – ‘specially when

The company’s 2007 Kenworth T904 in hometown Tokomaru Bay. While the East Coast is thriving, largely on the back of the forestry boom, “Toke” – once a busy port – now has elements of a ghost town, with abandoned buildings like this oncegrand NZ Shipping Company office and store a poignant reminder of what once was. the company started to grow. As Kevin says: “Once you started employing guys and they found out you’re not bad….it certainly changed things a lot.”

A year into it, McKay Cartage added another secondhand Mitsi truck and trailer – and after two years the forestry company it was carrying for “was starting to grow….and they decided it’d be better if they gave us our own contract and deal direct.”

Says Kevin: “Within two years of coming here we had three trucks, within four years – about five, six….can’t remember.

“It’s been a truck a year pretty much. It wasn’t something that was really predicted....but, good team of guys, and we’ve had the support of a lot of good people.

“Some of the (forest) managers were good – could see what we were doing and were really supportive. Some of the other companies were persevering with who they had – trying to make it work. And then it didn’t work in the end and we were sort of asked to replace them – and those opportunities kept being given to you.”

The result is that now, just 12 years after Kevin and Megan started on the East Coast, McKay Cartage has a fleet of 17 trucks – all 6x4s (“eight-wheelers don’t suit our terrain,” Kevin explains), 14 company owned and three owner/driver trucks.

Their first Mitsi lasted four and a half years – and did a good enough job to warrant buying the 350hp sister truck that was the fleet’s No. 2.

After a few more Mitsis, Kevin bought a new Hino 700 Series – prompting a series of them. Kevin

explains: “Buying new is really the only way to go. I found with the Jappers that after four years in our environment, they’d done 350,000kms….if you put them on the market you got a really good resale – and then it wasn’t really much more to get another new one. And the secondhand ones were selling within 24hrs.”

But then, he turned away from Hinos: “We started having a few issues with them. They were a little bit light, and we had a few motor problems….”

And so began his association with PACCAR trucks – Kenworths and DAFs. The Kenworths were a natural choice for Kevin: He’d “always” liked them – and, until buying his first Mitsi, “I’d never driven a Japanese truck.

“But always when you’re setting up a business you’ve got to be mindful of what you’re buying – and your repayments.”

The first Kenworths purchased were bought secondhand – like the 1999 T650 that’s now the oldest truck in the fleet.

He’s satisfied that, in terms of whole-of-life costs, Kenworths are, in the main, the way to go. Certainly, he says, “they proved themselves pretty quickly.”

The company fleet currently runs to 11 Kenworths – four T404s, two T409s, a couple of T409SARs, a 2007 T904, one T650 and a solo K104 – and there’s another new KW due next month as well. There are two DAF CF85s and one Hino 700, which he says has been “brilliant.” The O/Ds add two DAFs and a 2017 Kenworth T659 to the operation.

The engines are either PACCAR (in the DAFs) or Cummins (all

Truck & Driver | 51

pre-EGR or Euro 5 SCR engines), except for one Cat. From here on in, Kevin’s currently only considering Cummins-engined Kenworths – the red engines having “been good so far – bloody brilliant!”

For the Coast and the nature of the McKay work, big horsepower is unnecessary, he reckons – 500-520hp is about right…. “don’t need them running at 600hp – not in the terrain we’re working in. You need the torque more than the power – 1850 lb ft. It’s the roughness of the roads…steep, gruelling country.”

The only exception to the Kenworths in the foreseeable future could be “maybe Hino again….for some of the work, where you’re doing six-wheeler stuff. It’s really just horses for courses.” The DAFs, he says, “do have a lot going for them in driver comfort” and have been “reasonably reliable – but with the country being so gruelling, you get one bad apple….and I think we’ve found a few of those.”

While five of the McKay trucks are 2004 models or later, as Kevin says “you do have to put that in perspective down here….trucks only have half the life of what a State Highway 1 truck would have.”

The McKay policy of “putting good gear on the road” has helped secure the growth, he’s sure: “You’re there every day, you’re doing a good job.” The same with fitting central tyre inflation systems across the fleet – to improve traction and tyre wear.

Trying to get by with secondhand gear, he reckons, is something he’s tried….and found out that it doesn’t work! “It’s done a million Ks – and you want it to do another million. It’s not going to happen!

“So, by buying good gear, keeping it for four or five years and flicking it on, you’re staying in touch….and you don’t give any chance for someone (a competitor) to come back at you.

“The growth has been driven by demand….and building a name and being passionate about what you’re doing …. You take a

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contract on and well, if you don’t grow with it, you’ve got to get out of it, don’t you.”

Megan confirms that the business has operated reactively, rather than proactively: “I think some people have a game plan when they go into business…. We’ve never had one – still don’t.

“Kev’s pretty cruisy – and I’m the opposite, so I’ve had to just calm down a bit, because things change from one day to another in this game.

“You don’t get many opportunities, so I think if something comes across your path you have to grab it.

“Kev is an extremely hard worker and I suppose in our own ways we complement each other. We’re lucky we have our set of skills and we bring them together.”

Back in Mt Maunganui she’d run the office for an engineering company, so dealing with the big numbers needed to keep investing in new trucks to meet demand didn’t faze her.

“But for Kevin, figures scared him. Seeing all the zeros after a figure! But figures were second nature to me. Now they’re second nature to him.”

Of course, “it hasn’t been all plain sailing. There have been quite a few sleepless nights, because you have the responsibility of however-many families. It’s the domino effect – the repercussions.

It’s not just yourselves.

“We’ve had good support. We have a good relationship with our accountant, who’s been with us since year dot – watched us grow and grown with us. Our bank and our financiers we have really good communication with.”

They’ve also had good customers – with just one defaulter in 12 years. That was a tough one though – and the after-effects of that

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Truck & Driver | 53

Clockwise, from top right: Kevin McKay is, as wife Megan says, “humble in himself – he’ll do the ‘I left school at 15, thick as pigshit’ scenario”....

Russell Manuel had a spell driving trucks in Australia....Ash Todd at “home”.....Dane (Koro) Mato also did time driving in Aussie – underground!.... fulltime mechanic Leo Karl has taken a load off Kevin in terms of maintenance duties

company’s failure currently sees them out of the work they used to do on public roads.

The company’s working area extends as far north as just beyond Te Araroa, to Matawai in the west and south to Wairoa.

Within that is some uncompromisingly rugged country – with roads to match. There’s a hint of how it is with the road sign we spot on the Tauwhareparae road: The bendy arrow warns of a windy road for the “next 46km.” Bloody hell!

The carts over such roads can be pretty long as well: A truck and trailer load of 100mm metal picked up by one of the company DAFs at the Waerenga O Kuri Quarry, about 55kms west of Gisborne, is destined for a forest stockpile a two-hour drive away – up the coast to Tolaga Bay and then an hour inland.

Adds Kevin: “You might only cover 80-90kms in two hours. It’s not quick country.”

And then, on top of that, there’s the state of the roads. The ones we see in a couple of days with McKay Cartage are, in places, just bloody awful: One council road that I think for many kilometres is gravel, actually is (or used to be) fully sealed…..its tarmac now largely broken up for kilometre after kilometre.

One corner on a hill on the Tauwhareparae road has a hole in it that even in East Coast terms is spectacularly bad. It’s about two metres long, maybe 1m wide….and at least 10 centimetres deep.

We watch loaded logtruck suspensions slump into it as the trucks power up the hill and through the right-hander.

You think to yourself, sure the logtrucks are causing damage – but surely the RUCs the operators are paying should be going back into roads like these. And it’s not as if this Wall of Wood suddenly just arrived on the scene – unexpected and unannounced!

We meet McKay O/D Geoff Morgan on his way out from dropping a load in the Mangatu Forest, north of the tiny settlement at Whatatutu, due west of Tolaga Bay. In this area, he reckons, are “some of the worst roads around.”

There are steep gradients and stretches of really rough road that might last 20kms or more: “A lot of out of town drivers wouldn’t even drive in here – but this is where we all learnt to drive.”

Oh…and there’s also the river crossings: We negotiate a wide riverbed in his Kenworth T659, with just a shallow flow running gently over the concrete-based ford. It’s not always so benign, says Geoff: He’s seen it with fast-flowing water bank to bank – maybe 200m wide.

He reckons he’d still go through here with water “up to your fuel tank”….but no higher: “I’ve seen trucks stuck in here – been stuck in here myself before it was concreted. The longer you sit there the water digs you in deeper as it runs around your tyres.”

Scarily, during his logtruck-driving past he once had a fullyloaded logging trailer “start floating on me – right up the back of Wairangi. We had 11 river crossings up there….all fed by the Raukumara Ranges. When it started raining we had to f***ing get the f*** out of there!”

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Top: Joe Keelan, at the wheel of a two-year-old T409, heads out of the Paraoa Forest, Tolaga Bay, to get another load of road metal Above, left to right: Drivers Joey Keelan, Matt (Big Matt) Richards and Hori Riwai

Kevin points out one road where logtrucks have to negotiate seven river crossings in each direction to access log loads: “One truck ripped an axle out in a hole in a river crossing. There’ve been trucks stuck in rivers up here…for days.”

There’s also the hazards of increasingly heavy forestry-related traffic on these roads – McKay Ruatoria-based driver Joe Keelan having recently been involved in a collision with a ute which, Kevin says, “was flying down a hill and hit the brakes….going miles too fast. There was enough room for the ute to go on the inside of him but the driver panicked, locked up sideways and went straight into the front of him.” The driver was lucky – he got out of it.

Kevin reckons that Coast drivers regularly experience near-misses in similar circumstances: “It’s part of their day. It shouldn’t be, but I’m afraid it is.”

Coping with the brutal nature of the working environment means being very, very proactive in not only buying the right trucks and trailers for the conditions, but also religiously staying on top of their servicing.

Says Kevin: “The changes in the environment from summer to winter – the impact it has on the gear, the tyres…. The maintenance never stops – you’ve got to be chipping away at it. Every truck, every day. As the trucks are rolling in, you’re walking around looking at things.”

Initially, Kevin says, it was a problem “coming to understand it – finding the tyres, for instance, that worked for these conditions.

“We were just killing tyres – killing everything! We’ve got a whole

bunch of spare tyres up the Coast mounted on rims and we went through a stage where in a day you could change seven or eight tyres…on seven or eight trucks! So you know, $500 a day – it just wasn’t working.”

His trucks have always had Michelins on the steerers, but he only settled on K72 Power Retreads for the drivers five or six years ago… and Kiwi tyres for the trailers a little more recently.

All the Kenworths and DAFs are on PACCAR’s Airglide rear suspension because it’s effective…and still relatively simple: “There’s not much to it….we don’t get problems with it.”

Mind you the preventive maintenance that’s long been scheduled for all of the trucks has a serious focus on the suspension. Says Kevin: “It’s massive – shackle pins, bushes, springs, shocks, air-ride valves. You get to know…and we do them preventively. Some state highway trucks probably never get any of them changed.”

The maintenance programme is strict – and anything noticed, even in passing, is immediately scheduled for attention in the workshop. On roads so bad it’d be dumb not to, Kevin says: “To get a service provider up to Tokomaru Bay you’re looking at $700 or $800 – just to get them there.”

Other measures include keeping one truck and trailer unit essentially as a spare – to fill in for gear being serviced.

The trailers, most of them built by Transport & General, are specced with the environment in mind. There is, for instance, a twoaxle pull trailer…because on the “real steep terrain you struggle to pull a full trailer.”

Truck & Driver | 57

Top: The company’s admin team (from left) – Iwi Harrison, Georgina Lloyd, Candice Gate and Megan McKay

Above: Kevin’s “home” when he first shifted to the Coast – chilly shearers’ quarters on Fernside Station Right: Kevin and Megan’s boys, Alex (left) and James, around 2010, with the company’s third or fourth tipper

For bigger rock, a couple of the trailers have Hardox hardened steel bodies and there are two tipulator semi-trailers – primarily used for carting over-size rocks for sea walls and the like. Bottomdumper trailers are occasionally hired, for spreading metal on council roads if the camber makes tipping too risky.

Talking about all of this prompts a shrug from Kevin: “People… say ‘oh he’s doing well, he’s doing this’ – they don’t see any of these hidden factors. It’s the same with any business. It’s very easy to judge, but it’s not till you actually get in it that you learn how it works – what’s what, and what’s not. And what you have to put up with.”

For six or seven years now, the business has had two bases – one on a rural property just outside Gisborne, with a two-bay workshop and offices behind the family home. There’s also a leased yard, plus workshop facilities, at Tokomaru Bay – the main base for the operation.

Until about 18 months ago, Kevin and a “floating” driver shared most of the maintenance and servicing duties – while Kevin was still 58 | Truck & Driver

driving regularly as well as running the daily operation.

At that point he reluctantly decided to step back from all but occasional fill-in driving work – focusing instead on the management of the fleet. Even so he was still taking the major responsibility for getting the trucks to a Gisborne truckwash on weekends. Because there’s only tankwater in the settlements up the Coast, they even organise to regularly get the northern-based trucks down to Gisborne for a scrub-up.

The problem with him driving is that “you could be out of phone coverage for an hour to two hours. You don’t want to have someone waiting that long for you to return a call.” Phones are the main form of communication, backed up by R/Ts. Kevin’s responsibilities for keeping on top of the truck maintenance eased dramatically a year back, with the arrival of McKay Cartage’s first fulltime mechanic, Leo Karl.

The Cummins-trained Karl moved to Gisborne from Tauranga for the job – and the more relaxed lifestyle. The place, he says, is “paradise.”

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There’s still one 700 Series Hino on the fleet – the last of a run of them. Kevin says this one has been “brilliant.” Here Matt (Little Matty) McLeely is heading out of Hokoroa Rd, Tolaga Bay

The work is different: “Biggest thing that I’ve noticed is if you see something starting to go here, you’ve got to get onto it straight away because by the time you see it next it’s rooted.

“With the majority of on-highway stuff you can watch it progressively – you know, like bushes: ‘Yep, it’s starting to get some wear, next time we’ll do it.’

“Here, if you see that it’s got some wear, she’s f****d. You’ve got to do it.”

None of it’s surprising “when you see the corrugations. And they have to keep pumping along to keep pace with everything else.

They can’t put it in first gear and dawdle around the place.

“So you’re hard on anything like suspension bushes, steering joints, tyres – anything like that cops an absolute f***ing pasting.”

Engine ancillaries are generally not an issue, he adds: “Nah, well everything’s pretty well bulletproof now – Cummins has been making engines for off-highway for years and years and years.”

Leo does whatever’s required – up to and including engine rebuilds or (in the case of the K104) installing a new Cummins crate motor and a refurbed Roadranger.

Kevin’s rationale is that “it’s a Kenworth, and it’s still clean and tidy truck – and you’re staying away from all that electronic stuff. So it doesn’t matter if they are 20 years old or brand new, if you look after them and maintain them right, well they will just keep going.”

A major reason for his love of Kenworths is, he explains: “They’re robust, everything’s bolted together, parts are pretty easy to get for them. If you crack a crossmember, it’s unbolt and re-bolt.”

Typically Kevin spends his weeks at Tokomaru Bay, while Megan and their two boys – 12-year-old Alex and James, 10 – stay in Gisborne.

Until about two years ago, Megan did all of the company’s admin work….in the middle of the night, after the boys had gone to bed: “That’s how it rolled….I could be up till 2-3am doing bookwork…and juggling two kids.” Not surprisingly, she adds, “it got too big….”

So now she shares the admin duties with admin manager Iwi

Harrison, assistant Georgina Lloyd and health and safety manager Candice Gate.

H&S, says Kevin, is “something you’ve got to keep working on all the time – it’s not just putting a health and safety policy in place and then forgetting about it!

“We’re always thinking of different things….looking at things differently and how we could improve on this or that. I was told quite a while ago to take 10 steps back and take a look from the outside in.”

The lack of an effective H&S policy – “you know, having all the boxes ticked for your customers” – has, he reckons, “been the downfall of some of the competition.”

The company runs EROAD’s onboard monitoring and electronic RUC management system in all of the trucks, using it to see where they are at any time, to reclaim offroad RUCs and to manage billing: “The girls in the office use it to check each load off to make sure it’s gone to the right destination – because sometimes things can get changed en route, because someone else needs metal urgently.”

McKay Cartage contracts Gisborne’s McInnes Driver Training to attend H&S meetings, do in-cab driver refresher training and tutor new recruits. Says Kevin: “The first thing they do is they go for a drug test, then they go for a medical, then they normally come out and get inducted into the company…and then they go with John McInnes.”

He’ll work with them for “however long it needs. If it’s a new guy starting who’s got experience, John might only do one load with them….other times it could be two to three days. It’s whatever it takes for those guys to be comfortable and familiar with their trucks…”

Kevin reckons he never actually imagined he’d be the owner of a 13-truck fleet: “Not really – it was just always one of those passions I had, being brought up in a trucking family.”

“Yeah Megs sort of watches things pretty closely. If she wasn’t comfortable with it she wouldn’t let it happen. It’s not just a oneTruck & Driver | 61

Main picture: Kenworth T659 on a delivery at Pouawa

Inset left: Even on the sunny East Coast, it can get chilly. This is Mount Hikurangi Right: The McKays’ first truck, before they moved to the Coast

sided relationship….me just going out and doing whatever I want to do and then taking it back to her and her fixing it up.”

Given the reasonably rapid growth of the McKay Cartage fleet it seems like Kevin and Megan must have grabbed every chance they’ve been given – but he says that’s not actually so: “Awhh, I’ve got an opportunity in front of me at the moment to diversify. But our motto has always been to ‘stick to ya knitting...do something and do it well.’ The grass is not always greener, so I will be refusing this opportunity.”

Sure, he adds, such a diversification “really wouldn’t be too hard.

But I just think we’ve got enough on our plate with what we’ve got.

We don’t need to put any other stress on. You’ve only got a certain labour pool in the area too.”

The company’s drivers have been sourced mostly from around the Coast – some of them “guys who’ve driven logging trucks for years and had enough of that kind of work. We have a lot more flexibility hours-wise: We have keys to quarry gates and….depending on resource consents, you can rock up at any hour. So if you want to start at two in the morning and work till two in the afternoon, you can do that.

“Or if you don’t want to start till seven….and work to seven at night, you can do that as well.”

Many of them are Coasters who’ve been away – then come home for family and lifestyle…and have been pleasantly surprised to find good jobs. Like Kenworth driver Russell Manuel – born in Te Puia Springs, now living on the coast at Rangitokia. He spent about 15 years away, in Wellington and Aussie, where he started driving trucks, doing linehaul all over the country.

He’s happy to be back home – and without having to go logtruck driving: “I’d never do logging – that’s a swear word!”

Ruatoria resident Matt Richards joined the McKays about 18 months ago – following his Dad Warren’s footsteps in becoming a truckdriver. He likes the fact he can park his truck outside his house, start work when he likes and, “the biggest pleasure – the variety of places we go.” Well, that AND the fact that “it’s too fast for me in the big smoke.”

62 | Truck & Driver

Dane (Koro) Mato is another Coaster who’s gone away and come back…and is happy. Included in his five years away he did about 16 months driving 6x6 offroad dumptrucks underground in an Australian mine.

Now living at Waipiro Bay, he reckons he’s probably back to stay: “I’m used to what I’m doing here now. It’s a family-friendly business – we all get on with one another.”

Hino driver Matt McLeely, from Tokomaru Bay (or “Paradise,” as he calls it), spent some time in Auckland driving a tanker supporting aerial spraying: “Yeah it was good fun – but couldn’t handle the Auckland way of living.”

Hori Riwai is the McKays’ longest-serving driver – has been with them for 10 years. He comes from Te Puia Springs and has driven loggers, tippers for the local council…and big mining roadtrains in West Australia.

His father Harvey was a truck driver and Hori’s hoping one of his eight kids will follow in their footsteps. McKays, he says unprompted, is “the best outfit that I’ve worked for. He’s tops.”

One of the drivers, Ash Todd is now 72 – “works harder than a 20-year-old,” Kevin reckons appreciatively.

Ash and wife Mary live in Ruatoria – not actually in their home, but beside it! They prefer living in the ex-ARA Mercedes-Benz Auckland bus that Ash converted into a motor home. They’ve lived in it for the past 17 or 18 years.

The Southland-born Ash has been driving for about 55 years, doing stints in Oz and down south before returning to the Coast and joining the McKays.

He reckons he and Mary like to go on hikois – “we get lost a fair bit. When we get sick of the neighbours we just close the door, open the gate and just go.

Working for McKays suits him just fine: “Kev rings me up every now and again to see if I’m still alive. He’s alright – I don’t see much of him.”

He’s even happy driving the Kenworth T404 that’s the oldtimer in the fleet: “Kev knows I don’t like modern, fancy stuff.”

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Above: Dusty, rough roads are par for the course for the McKay trucks. Here Matt Richards negotiates Hokoroa Rd, inland from Tolaga Bay, in the company T904

Left: The fleet about eight years ago. All of these trucks have since been replaced

by driver shortages and he reckons that the pay rates are pretty much par for the course – but “it does help that they’re paid from door to door – they all take their trucks home or they take a work ute home. So no costs associated with coming and going. Their uniforms and boots are supplied. And the cost of living up the Coast is reasonably cheap.”

More importantly, he and Megan believe, their drivers work a five-day week: Given the tough terrain, the bad roads, he reckons that seems enough: “I think it’s really important that they get quality time off, with the family.

“Without your team and that even balance, you don’t have a business, so it’s not all about production and push, push, push!

You’ve got to have a balance for everyone.”

He says he also lets his staff know that “if they have any problems…you’re there to talk to them. They’re not just a number….someone that you thrash to the bitter end, and you don’t really care about.

“Because you do care. Because without them, where’s your business? I find if you focus on the smaller things – giving them some good gear and keeping it maintained, they’re happy…”

Ask Megan where she sees the company heading and she reckons: “Umm, so this is what I was talking about – we don’t have a plan. It’s very hard: We can grow it….but as everyone knows it’s getting the right people in the seat.

“We don’t have a high staff turnover and if we have had to employ someone we don’t just look at their driving abilities – we look at how they’re going to fit with our team. We are like a little family – we have to get on, because the boys have to help each

other.

“We’re so lucky – we’ve got a really good team. Sometimes we think we’re a bit soft, but we treat them the way we want to be treated. We just don’t have a business without them.”

So how will the future McKay Cartage look? Well Kevin clearly hopes that the two boys will be involved. For sure, with Alex it’s a case of like father, like son: Now 12, he’s “keen to get into it.

He doesn’t like school, but he is legally bound to stay till he’s 16.

So he’s really only got another three and a bit years and then I’ve said to him ‘if transport is your passion, try and do a mechanical apprenticeship or something like that.’

“That’s always a good trade…something good to know if you are going to go on to driving and owning trucks.” Already, Kevin adds, Alex “puts his overalls on and jumps under a truck with a grease gun…”

Does Kevin want McKay Cartage to get bigger? “Nah, not really!

If I have to I will, but otherwise I’m happy where we are really.

Yeah, it all depends on customers’ needs and wants. What they want dictates what you have to do.”

Megan sums up the Kevin McKay approach: “He always has a plan, always tries to think outside the square to try and do something better. He is humble in himself – he’ll do the ‘I left school at 15, thick as pigshit’ scenario – and I turn around and say to him ‘well, you didn’t do too badly.’ He has done REALLY well!

“I used to worry like ‘what if, what if….’ Now Kevin’s rubbed off on me: ‘Don’t worry about what if! Worry about it when and if it happens. THEN you come up with the plan.’ ” T&D Truck & Driver | 65

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F

ORGET TOKYO DISNEYLAND. YOU CAN KEEP YOUR katsus and stick your sake. And you know what you can do with your yakitori!

When it comes to things to see, eat, drink or do in Japan, I have a new favourite. It’s called Kitsuregawa.

It’s a place…and it rocks. It’s like an adventure playground for truckies – with trucks you can drive, rough roads with potholes and washboard and judder bars, steep hills to drive up and down, a skid pad…even a section of paving covered with slippery tiles, to replicate driving on ice. Nice.

And, best of all, there’s a 3.6-kilometre-long high-speed oval track, with steeply-banked curves each end. So

steep, in fact, that you can drive a truck around them at 140km/h….with your hands off the steering wheel!

How do I know this to be true? Because our driver, while taking us for an introductory tour of the place in a coach, does exactly that – allows the banking to take care of the turning. Actually, he may not have been doing 140k – probably more like 150!

Look, Tokyo is a trip in itself – exciting, exotic, surprising….different from home in so many ways.

Different…but charming.

But what’s not to like about a place that’s got ice-cold Sapporos, Asahis etc in vending machines on streets, train platforms and every floor of your pub. That’s got noodle

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Truck & Driver | 67

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The exterior is restyled (the extra Japanese chromework is unlikely to be a Kiwi option!), but the true Euro nature of the new truck stays hidden

E

bars and sushi bars and sashimi bars…and, well, just bar bars.

Where the people are friendly and polite – even though there’s over nine million of ‘em! Where you wander two blocks back from a six-lane inner-city street, jammed with cars and humanity in the morning rush-hour…and find quiet, tree-lined suburban lanes of small houses and apartments, a temple with a beautifully-manicured garden, guys in suits heading off to work, Mums taking the kids to school, old ladies sweeping leaves. Ah, such normality…in the heart of abnormality.

On the other hand, for a real WTF! experience, walk against the tsunami-like tide of commuters during rushhour at Shinagawa Station – a major portal in a Tokyo rail network that copes with 40 million journeys a day!

And pop up out of the subway system at Shibuya Crossing – a giant intersection in the city’s heart, where every pedestrian crossing light goes green simultaneously…resulting, so it’s said, in as many as 2500 people crossing at the same time! I don’t count ‘em, but that looks about right.

And then there’s the shinkansen – yep, the bullet trains. The good thing about Kitsuregawa is we take a shinkansen to get there – about 150kms northeast of the metropolis.

Actually, riding in a shinkansen at 275km/h (on other lines the trains do up to 320k) is quite an unexciting, serene experience – even as you quickly leave the highrises and teeming millions behind, and race through towns and rice paddy-fields.

The best bit of the shinkansen experience is actually standing on a platform in a small station as a bullet train flies through. The noise, the spray and the rush of wind is like having a jet fly by.

So, to beat all of this takes some doing. But Kitsuregawa does it. Easily.

Sadly, I have to report that this is no transport operator/ truckie-specific tourist attraction – for those with a heavyduty heart, a big-rig bent. It’s Mitsubishi FUSO Truck & Bus Corporation’s test track, or proving ground – closed to all but a select few.

Happily for me (at least for today)….I’m one them! Of course, it’s not all about having fun – there is a serious purpose behind my being here. I’m in Japan at the invitation (and cost) of FUSO New Zealand, which has brought a group of Kiwi trucking media, dealers, senior execs and a couple of key customers here to see firsthand the Japanese make’s Next Big Thing.

That is, the new FUSO heavy-duty flagship, to be released in NZ in about a year’s time. It’s a serious counterpoint to the lower-budget Enduro range introduced last year.

In fact, when it comes to Japanese trucks, these new FUSOS are as top-end as they come – with European everything: Euro engine, transmission, feel, driver-friendly features and, most notably, highest-level Euro safety.

Funnily enough (though probably it’s not that funny to FUSO NZ boss Kurtis Andrews – our tour leader), one of the trucks awaiting us beside Kitsuregawa’s highspeed track actually has a Mercedes-Benz steering wheel!

Truck & Driver | 69

Top, both pictures: Urged on by the Kiwi tour group, the Japanese proving ground driver ups the speed as he demonstrates the Active Brake Assist 4.

He’s mortified when it nudges the crash-test dummy car....but we’re still impressed Right: Senior FUSO exec Ilan Elad uses FUSO NZ as an example to other distributors of how to succeed with the product

Bizarre…but, nevertheless, accurately reflecting this truck’s heritage.

The engine, after all, is the double overhead camshaft Merc OM 470 10.7-litre – AKA the Detroit DD11 from Daimler Trucks’ global heavy-duty engine platform. It achieves the Euro 6 emissions standard with a mix of both SCR (selective catalytic reduction) and EGR (exhaust gas recirculation).

Although smaller and 100 kilograms lighter than the OM 457 12-litre in its predecessor (and NZ’s current HD), it produces the same peak power and torque, with much better fuel efficiency, FUSO says.

Thus it delivers a maximum 460 horsepower/338kW (at 1600rpm) and 1622 lb ft/2200Nm of peak torque (at 1200 revs). Top power is available pretty much from 1500 to around 1750rpm and the torque is at or near its max from 1000 to 1500.

The technology in the new engine – introduced in Europe by Merc just two years ago – is up to the minute, compared to the current donk: In place of a unit pump there’s Daimler’s X-Pulse amplified commonrail fuel system delivering higher injection pressure, and there’s an asymmetric turbocharger rather than the old wastegate turbo. And instead of the old exhaust brake there’s a Jacobs engine brake, which produces 325kW/441hp.

The DD11/OM 470 actually comes in five power ratings, starting at 326hp/240kW. The 520hp/382kW DD13 (or OM 471) engine will also be offered in NZ and Australia with the new-generation premium truck. Not when it’s first launched…and so far without FUSO Japan confirming an exact date. However Kurtis Andrews is confident it will be sometime next year.

There’s no manual transmission option with the new model – instead it uses Merc’s G330-12 or G230-12 OD AMTs, with FUSO Shiftpilot software that includes thirdgeneration eco-roll and soft-cruise for fuel efficiency at 70 | Truck & Driver

cruising speeds and a rock-free mode for extricating the truck from low-traction offroad situations. The driver can select standard, economy or power modes, or select manual mode and call up the shifts manually.

FUSO NZ’s Ian Porter points out the AMT is “exactly the same transmission as that in an Actros Euro 6. Currently, on our Euro 5 HD, we’re two generations back from this product. So, with this…we come right up to the latest transmission.”

FUSO says that a mix of new technologies in the engine, its lighter weight and the efficiency of the AMT contribute to cutting fuel consumption “by up to 15% compared to the previous model.”

In Japan the trucks come with advanced telematics, introduced in two phases – the first offering basic fleet management services, the second adding real time vehicle location and information, trip history and geo fencing, truck and driver fuel use analysis, driver scorecard and critical event notification, plus fleet performance evaluation, driver rankings and coaching.

But the most remarkable attribute of the new model – sold in Japan as a Super Great, somewhat incongruously called Black Panther within FUSO Japan but as yet unnamed for the NZ market – is its impressive array of safety features.

They include Brake Assist 4, which will automatically brake the truck to a halt to avoid a rear-end collision (or at least reduce its severity).....with no need for any input from the driver.

Then there’s the groundbreaking Proximity Control Assist and adaptive cruise control system: Sure, there are plenty of similar systems around – using radar to maintain a set distance between the truck and the vehicle ahead. But this FUSO offering goes one better than the rest (as far as I’m aware anyway), in that will bring the truck to a stop… and will then restart automatically when the vehicle ahead

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Top left: The shinkansen is best experienced from outside

Top right: Tokyo – city of contrasts. This is a couple of minutes’ walk from one of the busiest railway stations in the world

Above left: The steep banking at the test track is designed to have a truck turn without any steering or tyre stresses...but we’re not allowed on the top two lanes!

Above right: Driving at the Kitsuregawa proving ground is easily my most favourite Japanese experience

moves off.

As Ian Porter says: “Perfect for Auckland traffic!”

There’s also a lane departure warning system and side-guard and lane-changing assistance systems that monitor blind-spots and trigger audio and visual alerts if the driver begins to turn left while there’s someone or something in the blind spot.

There’s even Active Attention Assist – which uses an infrared camera to monitor a driver’s face and eyes for signs of inattention or tiredness…and sounds an alert if it detects any. Finally there are XtraVision LED headlights to complete the safety package.

Driver-friendly features inside the new 2.5-metre wide cab include push-button starting, extra noise deadening, a new digital dash display, fingertip steering wheel controls, a new ISRI driver’s seat and three-step entry, aided by long grabhandles.

Andrews doesn’t muck around when it comes to summing-up what this new model will bring to the Kiwi market: Even though UD Trucks is also tapping into its global family with safety features and Euro refinements, Andrews reckons unequivocally that the new FUSO “IS the most advanced – the best quality – Japanese truck ever built.”

So we can judge that for ourselves, there are two HDs to drive on the rain-soaked high-speed track. A 6x4 tractor unit has the range-topping 460hp/338kW version of the 10.7 litre, and has a heavy-duty tri-axle semitrailer behind it. The 6x4 tipper, at just 20t all-up, has a 394hp/290kW version of the same engine. FUSO NZ is still deciding whether it will bring in anything other than

the 460hp rating in the DD11, plus the 520hp DD13.

Kurtis Andrews has stressed to our hosts that the trucks have to be loaded for our test track drive…..but probably he didn’t actually mean going so far as the 60 tonnes that the tractor unit and semi are at!

Still, the DD11 handles it with ease. It accelerates easily, shifts easily (either left to do it itself automatically, or called-up manually), and brakes effectively. The six-lane track includes a wavy surface on one lane on a straight and a bumpy stretch on another.

Both are handled with aplomb by the trucks – up to the 80km/h speed limit.

Getting in and out is easy, getting comfy in the ISRI seat….ditto. The view from the seat is good – with only a skinny A-pillar to get in the way. And settling-in behind the wheel is no problem. It’s a pleasure to drive.

Sadly, we’re not allowed to try the steepest part of the banking at 140k! In fact, we’re not allowed on the top two lanes at all.

Nor are we allowed, a little later, to drive the truck at a plastic crash-test dummy car…and have the Active Brake Assist 4 detect it and instantly, and automatically, slam on the brakes.

One of the proving ground’s fulltime test drivers demos it though – and it is damn impressive: No smoking tyres, nothing spectacular – just a sudden stop, from 50km/h…ending up a couple of centimetres from the “car.”

We ARE impressed, but the Kiwis want more realism – ie more speed. “Go faster,” we request for his second run – this time with TR Group MD Andrew Carpenter Truck & Driver | 73

9:19 am

FUSO NZ boss Kurtis Andrews asked for the test trucks to be loaded....but he didn’t expect them to put 60 tonnes on the semi behind the tractor unit! sitting in the passenger seat.

The driver complies. It looks like he’s doing 60 at least, maybe even 70k when it autonomously goes into emergency braking mode. It…just touches the crash-test dummy. Nudges it away. The driver looks mortified. His colleagues, watching on, shake their heads. Clearly the Kiwi way is not how it’s meant to be done.

But hey, it is no less impressive: The system’s reaction time is clearly faster than a human’s and in real life, even if it doesn’t avoid a collision, it will seriously reduce its severity.

In a few years, Andrews suggests “people just will not want to buy a truck without it. You look down to do something, look up and a someone’s stopped in front of you….”

We’re not permitted to drive the trucks on the gravel and rough road sections of the proving ground either – nor on the tiled section that simulates icy road. Ah well, that’s probably for the best!

Happily, we are allowed to drive the trucks up and down a short but steep hill – starting from a halt at the foot of the hill and stopping on the 8% and 10% gradients to experience firsthand the capabilities of the 10.7-litre and the AMT (well, that and the hill-hold system). Unsurprisingly, at 60t the tractor unit protests a bit, with an initial shudder, and then resumes the climb.

The AMT quickly upshifts to fourth gear at 14km/h, 1700 revs and makes it stick. I think I say “wow” at least once.

For the descent, with the three-stage Jake brake on its maximum setting, we start down in 8th at 23km/h and 74 | Truck & Driver

it quickly downshifts into 7th at 1700rpm and holds our speed at around 26k.

All of this amounts to a brief, but very impressive, encounter.

The Japanese market obviously likes it too – FUSO having sold 1900 Super Greats in the first six months of sales…and now holding another 6000 orders.

Given that it usually sells around 10,000 heavy-duty trucks a year, “this bodes well for us,” says Super Great product manager Rajanand Rao. Ilan Elad, Daimler Trucks Asia’s director of international sales operations for Oceania, reckons that the new truck is “a huge game-changer” – a key element in FUSO’s turnaround plans and its aim to position itself “one step above our competitors.”

It is, he adds, the first example of FUSO taking full advantage of being part of the Daimler Group: “We can bring in a lot of technologies from the US, from Europe – adjusting it to the Japanese market. And our competitors are not there.

“FUSO used to be the leader in heavy duty trucks....

Over the years, due to our competitors’ focus in that segment and the fact we didn’t invest as much in the platform, we lost our position….”

Fuso has, he says frankly, been through “numerous challenges over the past years: “We held our own for a period of time, but as a brand, unfortunately in several areas we felt we became a ‘me-too’ product (an also-ran, a copier of others) rather than leading.”

A few years ago, says Elad, the company and the Group decided “to really up our game,” and so FUSO

has been investing heavily in a future intended to see it return to No. 1 status among the Japanese makes.

It’s invested in the new HD model, in launching the all-electric eCanter and an entire E-FUSO range and in “the back office – the processes, the finance, the decisionmaking, the R&D. All of that was put in place and it takes time to change the corporate view, the corporate culture.”

It’s also investing in new facilities (including a coming $US9million redevelopment of its Shin-Kawasaki head office). And on its telematics – including predictive maintenance to prevent breakdowns.

It’s all necessary, he explains, considering that “some of the facilities haven’t been touched for 40 years.”

Even though the truck is built around proven technology from elsewhere in the Daimler Group, the Super Great was subjected to a huge amount of testing over three years, according to the company’s head of testing Asia, Hironobu Ando.

This included a new approach, he explains: “Normally we test the product in the worst conditions – the steepest slope, highest temperature, the lowest temperature….

“But the reality is that failure is not always happening in the worst conditions – it’s happening in normal conditions.

“So we did the usual testing, but also we admit that we’re not capable to test all the quality in the testing facility, so therefore we decided to drive – just drive. Long distance, long time.

“This is a very stupid way. But we drove this vehicle five million kilometres, in total. We have 50 vehicles, something like that…

“And in this drive test, we found 500 failures. It’s a significant number – and if we didn’t do this, these 500 failures would be

released to the market…”

So, “stupid” as the testing regime seemed to Ando’s scientific mind, he ended up happy – sorting out 500 potential problems, rather than discovering them at the rate of one per week.

“And now I’m very confident. Unfortunately, you cannot feel that in your test drive – but I somehow want to convince you that I am very convinced of its quality.”

Even on top of all of that, Ilan Elad makes clear that this new model is not sufficient in itself to tip the balance – to restore FUSO’s No. 1 status in Japan: “No, we are not where we want to be….but I think we are on the right path. The next three years will define where we come in.”

Having tough competition is, he adds, “good for us, because they set the standards high – they have good platforms at Isuzu and Hino.

“But one thing is very important….Daimler Trucks is the big elephant in the room! We are the biggest player by far – 470,000 trucks last year (globally), over 500,000 hopefully this year. We have the war chest to go and invest.”

Already, he adds, FUSO is competing head to head with Isuzu and Hino in the light-duty segment of the Japanese market. Next year it will launch a new medium-duty model as well.

“Then we need to up our game in the maintenance and support to the customers. And at the end it’s all about the package…

“Because in the end the customer buys on experience: We were No. 1, we had quality issues, we had attitude issues…we had a lot of things that brought us back.

“And now we need to get this whole organisation to put the customer first – give the customers the product they want.”

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Free Phone – 0800 023 811 Truck & Driver | 75

Top left: Another new Super Great gets close to the end of the Shin Kawasaki production line Top right: Kurtis Andrews says straightout that the new HD truck is “the most advanced...Japanese truck ever built” Far left: In Japan the truck is sold as the Super Great, is as yet unnamed for NZ. Maybe it’ll end up being a new Shogun?

To regain the top spot, “a lot of things need to be ticked and it can’t be just a onetime…you need to slowly, slowly grow and grow and grow.

“It’s a lot about rebuilding trust. Because the brand is good – I think it’s a very strong brand. We’ve done a lot over the years to ruin it.”

Turning that around, he says, “is a mindset. And while we’re working on it, we’re not there yet.”

It’s interesting that this new model finds the mother company rebuilding – striving to become No. 1 make again in its home market...just as FUSO is doing in NZ. It’s a coincidence that, of course, hasn’t gone unnoticed by either party. In fact, says Elad: “In NZ we’re much closer because I think Keith and Kurtis Andrews have changed the way they think – they’ve become more aggressive.

“They’re real truckers, working very well with our dealers. So I think we have a better chance.”

He pays Kurtis Andrews a serious compliment for his attitude: “I’m trying to take Kurtis and show him and clone him in other places.”

He reckons he uses the example of how Andrews and FUSO NZ are doing, “everywhere” – pointing out that “we didn’t lower the prices, we didn’t give them any new product that we don’t have anywhere else – it’s the ingenuity of ‘where are the weaknesses,’ and ‘where can we grow.’ And how you make the customer experience better. Because without that no-one’s going to buy it.

“We have good dealers around the world. But it’s that confidence that they need to feel…”

76 | Truck & Driver

The NZ market, he reckons, has an importance beyond its size: “I think it’s fascinating. I mean, it’s a small market, but the professionalism and the level of the fleets.... You see like the TR Group here (MD Carpenter and GM Brendan King are part of our tour group) – the way they understand the trucks. It’s not a market to be taken lightly.”

There’s a market sophistication that’s obvious, he adds, “from the questions the customers ask. And you see when they buy, the decisionmaking is not just on price – it’s on quality, the longevity, the TCO.” Kurtis Andrews is excited about the new truck – particularly about its arsenal of safety features and its Euro qualities. With three trucks now in NZ for evaluation and customer testing, FUSO NZ has to carefully weigh up the cost of the safety package: “If we tick all of the boxes, it obviously moves the price – and we have to keep it competitive. But we do believe the market is shifting to a highly safety-conscious mindset.”

It sounds like he’s leaning towards launching the truck in NZ in mid-2019 (in 8x4 and 6x4 variants) with most, if not all, of the safety package as standard – seeing the truck as a trendsetter in terms of its safety features, Euro standards of quality and its Euro drivetrain.

And he confirms it: “I’m pretty confident that this is right for the future. You can either be first, or you can hold off as long as possible.

“When you talk about a car now, stability control is standard – and is mandated. So trucks have got to catch up – and quick.

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“I think it’s an opportunity for us to move up in the world, and actually show off the premium side of FUSO…” And when the DD13-engined model gets here, he’s confident that it “will rival the DAFs of this world, because it’ll have the same horsepower, it’ll have the latest-generation transmission….but it’ll have all the safety features, where DAF won’t.”

The new truck will also give NZ FUSO buyers an unprecedented choice, because the Euro 6-engined truck will sell alongside the current Euro 5 HD range (which can continue to be offered in NZ until the as-yet-unscheduled mandated change to Euro 6)…and the newly-launched Enduro lineup.

“You start with our current truck, which is obviously very good value…but you’re talking about a truck that doesn’t have any of these safety systems other than ABS and an airbag. That will still have a place in our market – people will still want a cheaper truck.

“But we’re going to have the best of both worlds – because the truck sitting beside it…we believe it should have everything. There will be a cost for that – but in terms of value it will be on a par. You’ll get more….for more money.

“It’ll suit another market. People who might want a European truck – want the safety systems – may not have to go to a European truck and to that kind of money.”

The task of reclaiming a greater market share in NZ – and working towards challenging Isuzu as No. 1 – is made easier, Andrews confirms, by the fact that “we’ve now

got the factory which is very, very focused – and they’re making products that are not just me-too products, they’re actually leaders.

“Look, if you’ve got slack distributors around the world not challenging the factories, they’ll just keep doing what they’ve always done – and keep getting the results they’ve always got.

“We’ve certainly been suffering with that, albeit while we’re still the No. 2 brand in NZ… Still, you let other brands just get away from you and other opportunities slip through your fingers.

“For example, 500hp: We’ve wanted that for years – and I’ve certainly made it my mission to not let that one go. And when it slips through our fingers I pick up the phone, yell and scream and say ‘no way!’ That truck, in my eyes – 500hp for a Japanese truck – is where it’s at…. the sweet spot. But with 2500Nm of torque. That’s the underlying thing.

“Because others have 500hp, but they don’t have the torque to back it up – so we’re very excited about the new truck.”

As for past problems with the old AMT in NZ – that, says Andrews, “was mostly around the software. The hardware was very, very reliable.”

The problems, he adds, were “countered by a change in the ECU and mapping software. Now (with the new truck) we’ve got the completely new Daimler CAN-Bus mapping and completely different architecture.

“And during our testing of the three trucks we’ve got (in NZ) it’s a priority to make sure we get that right.” T&D Truck & Driver | 79

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• B-Trains • Skeletals • Flatdecks • Refrigerated • Curtainsiders by by MaxiTRANS MaxiTRANS

TRUCK SHOP

The cameras can be monitored live, with up to eight channels recording

Keeping an eye on things

F

LEET MANAGEMENT TECHNOLOGY SUPPLIER Coretex has launched its second-generation onboard video cameras – offering operators the means to improve safety and manage insurance costs.

Its two, four or eight-camera setups are offered as standalone systems or as part of an integrated Coretex package.

Either way, says the company, the cameras can simplify incident resolution, cut accident rates, protect reputation and save insurance costs.

Cameras can be live streamed or triggered by either the driver or by G-force events.

Says the company: “Have you heard the one about the horse that ran into a fence? Here at Coretex we most certainly have – a customer told us.

It had been accused of startling a horse with one of its vehicles; the horse ran into a fence and injured itself.

“Did the Coretex camera on the vehicle have footage that would disprove the claim?”

With its latest camera system, says Coretex, the answer would quite possibly be yes – with the system allowing a look back at recorded video for a specific time (provided it hasn’t already been overwritten).

The feed from the Coretex cameras is correlated with GPS, G-force and other onboard sensors via its Coretex 360 fleet management software

It’s a wind-up A

SIMPLE STRAP-WINDING SYSTEM RECKONED to tidy up lockers, save time and reduce strap wear is now being sold in New Zealand.

South Island-based Transport Repairs has launched the Wally Winder strap winding device, which it reckons is simply set up by way of a universal bracket that attaches to any standard tie-down bar.

It allows a 12-metre strap to be neatly wound in less than 12 seconds, it says.

Transport Repairs says that the device is the brainchild of a couple of Australian farmers who were tired of winding straps by hand.

programme – offering incident analysis and investigation.

It supports up to eight channels of video, viewed directly from 360. It also offers three hardware configuration options – starting with a two-channel setup with a windscreen mounted, road-facing camera with optional driver monitoring.

A four-channel recorder, designed for under-dash mounting, supports a range of standalone cameras – typically road-facing, driver-facing and left/ right side monitoring.

An eight-channel recorder, says Coretex, “captures everything going on, in and around the vehicle.”

All cameras feature real-time upload of video events, optional audio and a panic button.

Operators can remotely log in to the system “and get a live view from any camera. That means you can see what the driver is seeing, from wherever you are.”

To minimise the amount of data needing to be reviewed – while still offering detailed information when required – the system sends still images rather than full video, allowing the operator to evaluate information from within 360 before requesting a full video.

The cameras will continuously record up to 68 hours of video before overwriting, with optional live streaming. T&D

The Wally Winder allows a 12m strap to be neatly wound in less than 12 seconds It says that the $100 (plus GST) Wally Winder “saves a lot of time and mess…they went flying off the shelves in Aussie, so we’re keen to test the waters in the NZ market.” T&D Truck & Driver | 81

e u the degree tilt of the trailer

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iTAP

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KNORR-BREMSE’S iTAP – Intelligent trailer access point INTELLIGENT TRAILER ACCESS

Knorr-Bremse iTap enables control of a wide functions to POINTrange - USES Aof SMARTPHONE OR TABLET ‘APP’ as an easy way be controlled from your smartphone or tablet. of controlling a wide range of trailer functions as well as clearly displaying information.

Customer benefits Handy and Safe • Control functions from the cab and Compatibility

The App communicates by WLAN with the iTAP ECU on the trailer, which clear from any danger zones passes the control commands via the CAN Bus to the brake and suspension control.

• WLAN connection – No problem with electronic control compatibility between truck and trailer B R A K E A N D C H A S S I S CO N T R O L • Control of the trailer functions from every truck in the fleet Simple Interface

CONTROL FUNCTIONS

Information and control functions

• Intuitive handling, easy and transparent structure Control functions

CONTROL FUNCTIONS iLvl Makes child’s play of controlling the air suspension

iLvl

RLF

iLvi suspension layer function made easy Operation of air suspension made easy Operation of air

Easy activation and setting of road

LIFT AXLE Comfortable control of the lift axle functions

WiFi INFORMATION camera FUNCTIONS feed Easy access to continuous Control functions (when installed) TPMS Tyre pressure and temperature monitoriLvl ing made easy Makes child’s play of controlling the air suspension Moreover a whole range of additional functions such as the Traction and LIFT AXLE Manoeuvring Help can be controlled.

Comfortable control of the lift axle functions

RLF Load Angle Easy activation andDisplays setting function bogie load of road layer Displays trailer tilt angle Lift axle Easy control of lift axle functions

TPMS Tyre pressure and temperature monitoring made easy

TPMS Easy monitoring of tyre pressure

COMMERCIAL VEHICLE SYSTEMS

Tilt Angle Shows you the degree of lateral tilt of the trailer

INFORMATION FUNCTIONS

Lift axle

Weight

Information and Displays the aggregate Load axle functions weight on the trailer control functions axles Displays bogie load (for some applications) Control functions Easy control of lift

15

Tilt RLF Angle Shows you the degree Easy iLvl activation and setting of lateral tiltlaying of thefunction trailer of the road Makes child’s play of controlling the air suspension Weight Displays the aggregate LIFT AXLE weight on the trailer Comfortable control of axles the lift axle functions

Angle Displays trailer tilt angle

Various information Displays error memory in code form only supply Various information voltage and odometer RLFpressure, Displays error memory, supply Easy activation and setting TPMS of the road laying function Tyre pressure and temperature monitoring made easy

pressure, voltage and odometer

TPMS Easy monitoring of tyre pressure (when installed)

Moreover a whole range of additional functions such as the Traction and Manoeuvring Help can be controlled.

Moreover a whole range of additional functions such as the Traction and Manoeuvring Help can be controlled.

Suppor up to 2ts camera s!

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23/04/18 9:15 PM

FEATURE

Combi-CB multi-directional forklifts on the assembly line in one small part of the huge state-of-the-art factory

Story Trevor Woolston

W

E COME ACROSS THEM IN FREEZING WORKS, Fonterra plants and transport depots all over New Zealand. In fact, there are 65 of them in service here – and more on the way.

We’re talking about Combilift Straddle Carriers. These three-wheeled container lifters have made a name for themselves all over the world since their launch.

Now, on its 20th anniversary, Combilift has invited guests from all over the world to visit its brand-new factory in Monaghan, Republic of Ireland – just below the Northern Ireland border.

Monaghan is a small town with a population of just over 8000, but it’s the location of Combilift’s new state-of-the art production facility. Monaghan has always been Combilift’s base, but this new facility has been fully developed from green fields into its brand-new headquarters.

Sitting on a 100-acre site, leaving plenty of room for future growth, the brand-new 46,500-square-metre purposebuilt building is the largest manufacturing operation under a single roof in the Republic of Ireland.

What is remarkable is that the new facility was built at a cost of 50 million Euros – and it was privately funded, without any bank borrowing. It makes Combilift a very strong and independent company.

Incorporating the latest manufacturing processes, with a focus on sustainability, the new factory will enable Combilift to double its output in a single shift across all production lines.

Also incorporated into the plant are features such as 23% of the roof area covered in skylights, allowing workers to work in natural daylight supplemented by 1100 LED lights and individual PIR sensors, Truck & Driver | 83

Solar panels supply 185 kW of energy with a 1 MW biomass plant fuelled by recycled wood (pallets etc) to heat the spray booths and assembly area. Also, 110,000 litres of rainwater are harvested for jet washing and bathroom facilities.

Combilift is a privately-owned company established by managing director Martin McVicar and technical director Robert Moffett in 1998. The Moffett name is familiar to many in NZ, from Robert’s previous company, which designed and built the Moffett Mounty truck-mounted forklifts that arrived in NZ back in the 1990s. Moffett Mounty was purchased by the Cargotech Corporation, owners of the Hiab brand.

Moffatt and McVicar developed the world’s first multidirectional, all-wheel-drive, internal combustion enginepowered forklift in 1998 and in its first year of operation produced 18 units – 17 of which were exported. The company has more than doubled in size in the last five years and now has 40,000 units operating in 85 countries.

With the GFC of 2007/2008 Combilift diversified its product range by developing innovative space-saving warehouse and heavy load-handling products – the Aisle Master articulated lift truck and the Straddle Carrier. Today they are the backbone of the Combilift range of lift trucks.

When going through the factory what becomes apparent is the diversity of product. While there are base product ranges, there’s also an extensive range of options so no two units going down the production line will necessarily be the same.

Martin McVicar attributes the company’s impressive growth and its status as an acknowledged world leader in the material handling sector to mass customisation: “Combilift has set a benchmark for the mass production of customised innovative products.

“Mass customisation is the new frontier for both the customer and the manufacturer, as customers are increasingly expecting products to be tailored to their requirements.

84 | Truck & Driver

“We listen to and take feedback on board from our customers and dealers to identify solutions that best match their individual specific needs.”

Currently the company employs 550 staff in the new facility and an additional 200 are employed by subcontractor companies within a 40-kilometre radius, so it makes Combilift a very important player in this small regional area.

Around 10% of its staff live in Northern Ireland and the current Brexit negotiations are being watched closely as issues of crossing the border are resolved.

An additional 130 staff are employed internationally, many in sales and distribution roles in its many overseas markets.

Currently Combilift has annual revenues of 230 million Euros and it invests back 7% into research and development.

Looking forward, Combilift expects the market for electric lift trucks to increase significantly, but still believes there will be a strong demand for IC-engined units.

Much of its current focus is on developing warehousing products that reduce space requirements by reducing aisle sizes. The Aisle Master range is developed as a ride-on and a walk-behind product and its patented swivelling tiller arm allows not only the ability to work in tighter spaces, but also provides better visibility for the operator and increased safety.

We’re shown walk-behind units being operated by Cummins that are lifting and moving some of the larger Cummins engines in its factory – allowing it to do away with larger, traditional-type forklifts and allowing for major space saving.

In Combilift’s design offices the company offers a free service where it does new warehouse layout plans, with reduced aisle widths, to demonstrate the storage space gains achievable with the Aisle Master range.

With the ever-increasing cost of land and buildings, these increases in storage space make the capital return on these

Opposite page: A Combilift Straddle Carrier being shown off Above: Almost a quarter of the roof area in the new factory is devoted to skylights, providing natural light inside the 46,500-metre structure. It’s the Irish republic’s largest manufacturing operation under one roof

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Above: The Aisle Master lift truck range is designed to work in narrower aisles and tighter spaces – allowing for major space saving Right: Publisher Trevor Woolston at the Combilift factory with one of the Straddle Carriers

new technologies very attractive. We’re shown an example where a redesign of a warehouse layout produced an extra 25% of storage space.

During our visit to the factory we see first-hand the diversity of the Straddle Carrier product, which has been driven by customer demand. In NZ we see it traditionally used for container handling, but it’s also used for a vast range of other applications and Combilift designs and adapts the Straddle Carrier for any heavy product that customers may require.

We see units for handling concrete prefab panels, bridge 86 | Truck & Driver

beams, tanks and long-length steel. Rated at 20-100 tonnes, the Straddle Carrier is gaining popularity for its versatility.

Due to its lightweight design it has a lighter footprint than many other heavy lift options, making it popular in yards – where it creates less pavement damage and delivers better manoeuvrability.

With this new manufacturing facility Combilift expects to double production in the next five years, so we can expect to see more of its products making their way into the NZ market. T&D

Caltex Invercargill Oil Shop

K & L Distributors BOP Ltd

Auckland Oil Shop

John Keast Manager Caltex Invercargill Oil Shop is a locally owned and operated company and is proud to be the Caltex Distributor for Southland and South Otago, from south of the Clutha River to Stewart Island.

We pride ourselves in being able to offer and supply the best product backed by the best service in the industry. Along with our oil shop network Caltex Lubricants are available in many areas.

Just give John a call, who has over 35 years experience in the automotive industry, to discuss your requirements.

Caltex Invercargill Oil Shop 20 Spey Street Invercargill 03 218 2124 0800 2 BUY OIL 0800 2 289 645 Southland Batteries 49 Bond Street Invercargill 03 218 8300

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Kumeu’s Craig Walker Building Removals has put this spectacular International LoneStar tractor unit to work nationwide. Luke Joyce drives the 6x4, which has a 615 horsepower Cummins ISX engine, an 18-speed Roadranger manual gearbox and Meritor 46,000 lb diffs. It was set up by TRT.

Record run resumes T

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H E N EW Z E A L A N D N EW T R U C K market returned to its record-breaking form in April – rebounding after its months-long streak of new monthly alltime bests came to an end in March.

The bounce-back saw 372 trucks with a GVM of 4.5 tonnes or more registered in April, according to official NZ Transport Agency data.

That was a 7.2% improvement on the 347 previous best April, from last year. It also carried the year-to-date total at the end of the first four months to another new alltime best – the 1557 total 6.3% up on last year’s 1465.

The trailer market was at even better levels, with the 146 registered in April setting the new benchmark, 11% and 15 registrations ahead of the previous alltime best April – back in 2004.

It was 22 trailers and 17% ahead of April 2017 and the 530 YTD total at the end of April was 26% up on last year and 12% better than the old record, 2015’s 474.

In the overall 4.5t to maximum GVM market, Isuzu was again the No. 1 for the month, with 74 registrations – taking its YTD total to 332.

However, says industry analyst Robin Yates, whose Marketing Hand consultancy prepares this registration report for NZ Truck & Driver, the market leader has actually lost ground in the past year, in terms of both market share and volume.

At the end of April last year, it had registered 342 for a market share of 23.3%. This year it’s down 10 units on that, with a 21.3% share.

Similarly, second-placed Fuso slipped too – even a little further, in fact: Its 248 YTD saw it with a 15.9% share this year so far… compared to its 278 and 19% share at the same point last year.

Two other major players also slipped back this year – Volvo falling from fourth (with 130 regos and an 8.9% share), down to fifth, with 101 and 6.5%.

The winners include third-placed Hino – its 223 sales and 14.3% share a good improvement on last year’s 188 and 12.8%.

Truck & Driver | 89

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23,001kg-max GVM

Jamie and Kelly Ellison, from Ellison Cartage in Carterton, have bought their first new Kenworth K200. The 2.3 flat roof sleeper cab 6x4 has a 600hp Cummins X15 engine, an 18-speed Roadranger manual transmission and RT46-160 rear axles on Airglide 460 suspension.

Extras include stainless steel panels and scoops, LED lights, dual air intakes and a fridge. It has a Transport Trailers alloy tipping body and matching fiveaxle trailer

2018

4501kg-max GVM 2018 Brand ISUZU FUSO HINO DAF VOLVO KENWORTH IVECO MERCEDES-BENZ UD SCANIA MACK MAN FREIGHTLINER FOTON FIAT INTERNATIONAL RAM WESTERN STAR SINOTRUK HYUNDAI OTHER Total

Vol 332 248 223 106 101 96 79 79 72 48 34 29 22 18 15 11 11 11 10 9 3 1557

% 21.3 15.9 14.3 6.8 6.5 6.2 5.1 5.1 4.6 3.1 2.2 1.9 1.4 1.2 1.0 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.6 0.6 0.2 100.0

April Vol 74 45 54 18 30 28 24 17 17 16 13 7 4 4 4 2 3 3 6 1 2 372

% 19.9 12.1 14.5 4.8 8.1 7.5 6.5 4.6 4.6 4.3 3.5 1.9 1.1 1.1 1.1 0.5 0.8 0.8 1.6 0.3 0.5 100.0

3501-4500kg GVM 2018 Brand FIAT MERCEDES-BENZ TOYOTA FORD VOLKSWAGEN RENAULT IVECO LDV CHEVROLET PEUGEOT Total

Vol 105 24 8 7 5 3 1 1 1 1 156

% 67.3 15.4 5.1 4.5 3.2 1.9 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 100.0

April Vol 27 6 0 3 0 1 0 0 1 1 39

% 69.2 15.4 0.0 7.7 0.0 2.6 0.0 0.0 2.6 2.6 100.0

4501-7500kg GVM 2018 Brand FUSO ISUZU MERCEDES-BENZ HINO IVECO FIAT FOTON RAM HYUNDAI JAC Total 90 | Truck & Driver

Vol 110 72 44 41 30 15 11 11 6 2 342

% 32.2 21.1 12.9 12.0 8.8 4.4 3.2 3.2 1.8 0.6 100.0

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April Vol 28 15 8 9 8 4 2 3 0 1 78

% 35.9 19.2 10.3 11.5 10.3 5.1 2.6 3.8 0.0 1.3 100.0

The trailer market was at even better levels 7501-15,000kg GVM 2018 ISUZU HINO FUSO UD IVECO FOTON HYUNDAI MAN DAF MERCEDES-BENZ OTHER Total

121 66 62 22 9 7 3 3 2 2 1 298

40.6 22.1 20.8 7.4 3.0 2.3 1.0 1.0 0.7 0.7 0.3 100.0

April 31 16 6 6 3 2 1 0 0 0 1 66

47.0 24.2 9.1 9.1 4.5 3.0 1.5 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.5 100.0

15,001-20,500kg GVM 2018 Brand HINO UD FUSO ISUZU IVECO MERCEDES-BENZ SCANIA DAF MAN Total

Vol 26 17 16 10 10 5 4 1 1 90

% 28.9 18.9 17.8 11.1 11.1 5.6 4.4 1.1 1.1 100.0

April Vol 4 3 2 4 0 2 1 0 0 16

% 25.0 18.8 12.5 25.0 0.0 12.5 6.3 0.0 0.0 100.0

20,501-23,000kg GVM 2018 Brand HINO UD MERCEDES-BENZ ISUZU Total

Vol 10 3 1 1 15

% 66.7 20.0 6.7 6.7 100.0

April Vol 2 0 1 0 3

% 66.7 0.0 33.3 0.0 100.0

Brand ISUZU DAF VOLVO KENWORTH HINO FUSO SCANIA MACK UD MERCEDES-BENZ IVECO MAN FREIGHTLINER INTERNATIONAL WESTERN STAR SINOTRUK Total

Vol 132 103 101 96 80 60 44 34 30 27 26 25 22 11 11 10 812

% 16.3 12.7 12.4 11.8 9.9 7.4 5.4 4.2 3.7 3.3 3.2 3.1 2.7 1.4 1.4 1.2 100.0

April Vol 28 18 30 28 23 9 15 13 8 6 9 7 4 2 3 6 209

% 13.4 8.6 14.4 13.4 11.0 4.3 7.2 6.2 3.8 2.9 4.3 3.3 1.9 1.0 1.44 2.87 100.0

Trailers 2018 Brand Vol PATCHELL 59 MTE 51 FRUEHAUF 50 ROADMASTER 44 DOMETT 37 TMC 33 MAXICUBE 29 TRANSPORT TRAILERS 23 JACKSON 16 TRANSFLEET 16 FAIRFAX 13 TES 10 CHIEFTAIN 9 EVANS 9 KRAFT 8 CWS 7 HAMMAR 6 MAKARANUI 6 MILLS-TUI 6 TRINITY 6 MTT 5 ADAMS & CURRIE 4 HTS 4 FREIGHTER 4 MORBARK 3 NICKEL 3 CECO 2 COWAN 2 DOUGLAS 2 GLASGOW 2 KOROMIKO 2 MANAC 2 MD 2 FELDBINDER 2 TEO 2 TIDD 2 WHITE 2 EDWARDS 1 GUY NORRIS 1 LUSK 1 MARSHALL 1 MORGAN 1 PENNY 1 1 PTE SEC 1 TANKER 1 WARREN 1 OTHER 37 Total 530

% 11.1 9.6 9.4 8.3 7.0 6.2 5.5 4.3 3.0 3.0 2.5 1.9 1.7 1.7 1.5 1.3 1.1 1.1 1.1 1.1 0.9 0.8 0.8 0.8 0.6 0.6 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 7.0 100.0

April Vol 16 17 16 16 12 6 7 7 4 4 3 3 0 3 2 3 2 0 1 0 4 1 1 4 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 2 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8 146

% 11.0 11.6 11.0 11.0 8.2 4.1 4.8 4.8 2.7 2.7 2.1 2.1 0.0 2.1 1.4 2.1 1.4 0.0 0.7 0.0 2.7 0.7 0.7 2.7 0.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.7 0.7 0.0 0.0 1.4 0.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 5.5 100.0

Contact 0800 THE BULL John Blackburn 027 839 7477 john.b@roadmaster.co.nz Dick Parker 027 490 9677 dick@roadmaster.co.nz Craig Beissel 027 242 0814 craig@roadmaster.co.nz

Colin Patchell 027 241 1701 colin@roadmaster.co.nz Mark Walley 027 703 9278 markw@roadmaster.co.nz

Sales, Manufacturing, Repairs.

Rotorua 07 349 0000 Auckland 09 279 4250

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DAF, fourth YTD, did even better – up from last year’s 63 sales for a 4.3% share, to 106 and a 6.8% share this year. Sixthplaced Kenworth (96/28), with 6.2% of the market so far in 2018, was up from 4.8% and 70 sales.

IVECO improved to seventh-equal (from ninth), with 79 registrations and a 5.1% share, compared to 57 sales and 3.9% last year. Sharing seventh place was Mercedes-Benz – improved from 66 to 79 sales, with a 5.1% share.

UD (72/17) was ninth YTD at the end of April and Scania (48/16) was 10th.

There were no surprises in the crossover 3.5-4.5t GVM segment, with Fiat (105/27) continuing to open up a dominant lead on Mercedes-Benz (24/6), Toyota (8/0), Ford (7/3) and Volkswagen (5/0).

In the 4.5-7.5t GVM class, FUSO (110/28) consolidated its lead, ahead of Isuzu (72/15), Mercedes-Benz (44/8), Hino (41/9), Iveco (30/8) and Fiat (15/4).

In the 7.5-15t GVM category Isuzu (121/31) led Hino (66/16), which displaced FUSO (62/6) for second place. UD (22/6) held fourth, followed by IVECO (9/3) and Foton (7/2).

In the 15-20.5t GVM division, Hino (26/4) retained the lead, ahead of UD (17/3), which edged ahead of FUSO (16/2) for third. IVECO (10/0) was joined by Isuzu (10/4) for fourth-equal.

Mercedes-Benz (5/2) retained sixth, while Scania (4/1) dropped

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to seventh.

In the tiny 20.5-23t segment, Mercedes-Benz became the fourth brand to register a truck, while Hino (10/2) went further ahead of second-placed UD (3/0).

In the premium 23t to maximum GVM division, Isuzu was pipped for the month by Volvo (with 30 registrations) and matched by Kenworth (28)…but remained the clear No. 1 for the year (132/28).

DAF narrowly (103/18) held onto second, ahead of Volvo (101/30), Kenworth (96/28) and Hino (80/23).

FUSO (60/9) was sixth, ahead of Scania (44/15), Mack (34/13), UD (30/8) and Mercedes-Benz (27/6). IVECO (26/9) improved two places to 11th, ahead of MAN (25/7) and Freightliner (22/4).

In the trailer market, Patchell (59/16) continued to hold a break on the rest – although MTE (51/17) edged it to be best for the month. That followed the trend for the year so far – with a different No. 1 each month: In January, Patchell led, in February Domett and Roadmaster shared the honours and in March it was Fruehauf ’s turn.

Fruehauf (50/16) dropped to third, ahead of Roadmaster (44/16) and Domett (37/12), which swapped places with TMC (33/6). MaxiCUBE (29/7), Transport Trailers (23/8), Jackson and Transfleet (16/4 apiece) retained their places in the top 10. T&D

Foodstuffs contractor Will Gundy has put this Kenworth K200 2.8 Kingcab 6x4 on the road out of his Palmerston North base. It has a 600hp Cummins X15, an 18-speed Roadranger manual and RT46-160 diffs on Airglide suspension. Extras include offset front rims, a fridge, tv, LED lights, dual air intakes, a drop visor, painted fuel tanks, stainless panels and LED lights.

92 | Truck & Driver

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It’s the first new Kenworth bought by Palmerston North’s Ray and Fiona Reid – and boy, did they make it a standout starter! Their Legend T900 has a 600hp Cummins X15 engine, an 18-speed Roadranger manual gearbox, and RT46-160 diffs on Airglide suspension. It has dual fuel tanks, seven-inch exhausts, leather seats, a chrome steering wheel and the Legend package of heritage features, plus a stainless visor and panels and LED lights on the fuel tanks and below the grille. It has a Transport Trailers alloy body and matching four-axle trailer. Ray reckons it can stay in the shed if it’s raining.

Morrinsville’s Zeeland Logistics has put this Kenworth T610 on the road carting containers. Les Gordon drives the 8x4 tractor unit, which was set up

by Southpac Trucks, with Chris Stanley accessories and detailing, plus imaging

by Truck Signs.

Carterton’s Bill Hammond Transport has put its second Kenworth K200 bulk tipper on the road. Mark (Pompom) Thomas works all around the lower North Island in the 2.3 sleeper cab 6x4 and its five-axle trailer, which gives the combination a 46t rating. Extras include a fridge, Alcoa Dura Bright alloys, super singles on the front, dual fuel tanks, exhausts and intakes, a stainless drop visor and stainless panels, plus LEDs. Truck & Driver | 93

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The Twofirst newnew identical DAF FAT Swinglift CF85container bulk tipper sideloader has joined trailers the Kris Slater Cartage fleet have in been Huntly. purchased Southpac

by TR Trucks Group, and Chris for deployment Stanley didwith the setup the on the truck, TDL which Group,has working a Transfleet behind alloy DAF body CF85 and a8x4 matching tractortrailer. units. Fleet Image carried The HC4020-35IC-4 out the colour coding, trailerswhile haveTruck Yanmar Signs 68hp took power care of units the graphics. and run on BPW axles and suspension. They tare at 9940kg.

Two new identical Swinglift container sideloader trailers have been purchased by TR Group, for deployment with the TDL Group, working behind DAF CF85 8x4 tractor units.

The HC4020-35IC-4 trailers have Yanmar 68hp power units and run on BPW axles and suspension. They tare at 9940kg.

94 | Truck & Driver

EG28202

Papamoa’s Mike and Mary Lynch have put this new Kenworth K200 logger to work in their Coastal Log Haulage operation, under contract to Aztec. It has Kraft gear on the truck and trailer, a Bigfoot central tyre inflation system and Willy Malcolm accessories and fittings.

Caulfield Signs did the imaging.

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HOW TO SELL A TRUCK

IN 6 HOURS

1

VISITORS TO NZ TRUCK & DRIVER FACEBOOK TO VIEW THE TRUCK 4,417

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VISITORS TO EQUIPMENT GUIDE WEBSITE TO VIEW THE TRUCK 2,440

3

DIRECT ENQUIRYS SENT VIA EMAIL FROM WEBSITE 6

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LISTING OF THE DAY: 2015 Kenwoth K200 Aerodyne

I have been selling new and used trucks for the last 30 years and for the last 10 years I have been advertising in the Equipment Guide magazine, we have found this to be excellent. Not only do we advertise in the magazine we also use the Equipment Guide website and NZ Truck & Driver facebook page which we have found to be outstanding. Last week the Equipment Guide Team listed a high end truck and trailer unit for us, it was listed mid afternoon and sold 6 hours later. The ability to get the trucks out to market in such a short time frame has increased our monthly sales. In my time as a truck dealer we have never sold anything within 6 hours. I highly recommend Equipment Guide. Advertising with these guys gets to the trucking, logging, construction & contractor markets within minutes not days David Parsons, Managing Director, All Road Ltd

CONTACT US TODAY

EG28202

Auckland, Northland, BOP, Waikato, Central North Island

Don Leith

Mob: 027 233 0090 Email: don@trucker.co.nz

www.

Auckland, Lower North Island, South Island

Hayden Woolston

Mob: 027 448 8768 Email: hayden@trucker.co.nz

.co.nz

Recently

Registered

Taupo’s Green Transport has added three new custombuilt Kenworth T659s to its logging fleet. Quinton Makene, Stephen Hill and Robert Koopu drive the 8x4s, which have Patchell logging gear and matching five-axle trailers, plus Willy Malcolm accessories and Caulfield Signs graphics and imaging.

www.trt.co.nz

Mount Maunganui Mainfreight contractor Hewlett Transport has put this new DAF CF85 to work, carting containers with a sideloader trailer. The 6x4 tractor unit has a 510hp MX engine, an AS Tronic AMT with Intarder, and Meritor rear axles on Airglide suspension. It has Alcoa Dura Bright alloys, Chris Stanley stainless steel extras and imaging work done by Marty’s Signs.

Extensive customisation by Australia’s Klos Custom Trucks and pinstriping and graphics done by Truck Signs’ Cliff Mannington was ordered-up by Graham Redington for Northchill’s Kenworth T900 Legend. It has a 1.6m modular sleeper, a 600hp Cummins X15, an 18-speed Roadranger, Meritor RT46-160 diffs and super-singles on the steerers, plus Alcoa Dura Bright alloys. It has a 97t GCM rating.

96 | Truck & Driver

CLUTCH Assembly

Easy Pedal Clutch Assembly and Clutch Install Kits to suit American, Japanese and European Applications

160KG

Clutch Assembly to suit American Applications

Exchange

DRIVEHEAD We will exchange your old drivehead for new.

We have large stocks available for a quick turnaround.

Save time and cost - talk with our team today!

20-145; Ratios 3.42, 3.58, 3.73, 4.11, 4.33, 4.56 Forward Rear RPL20-145, Rear Rear

RRL20-145

Genuine

PARTS

Original Equipment Backed

by Manufacturer Warranty

CALL US TODAY Hamilton 07 849 4839

to talk with our parts team!

Auckland 09 262 0683

www.trt.co.nz

CLASSIFIED TRUCK & DRIVER

WAITARA

ROTORUA

23 Mayne St, Waitara Craig Midgley (Manager) 06 754 7145 027 560 4345 craig@brokerspnp.co.nz

40-42 Geddes Rd, Rotorua Rick Osborne (Manager) 07 346 2089 027 277 2653 rick@brokerspnp.co.nz

Kurt Broker (Director) 027 699 9612 – kurt@brokerspnp.co.nz

Two locations across Central North Island – www.brokerspnp.co.nz

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At Brokers Panel & Paint we are specialists in commercial vehicle repairs and painting.

We are experienced at all types of automotive painting, sandblasting and panel beating.

We can repair anything: Trucks, diggers, coaches, motorhomes, trailers and everything in between.

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Call us today to see what we can do for you and your fleet!

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Manufacturers & Distributors of:

TD26073

• Roof Air Deflectors and Side Skirts • Fibreglass Sunvisors • Windscreen Stoneguards • Weathershields • Headlight Covers • Bonnet Bug Guards • Tipper Skirts

98 | Truck & Driver

Available from your local truck dealership or: Te Apunga Place, Mt Wellington, Auckland. P.O. Box 62182.

Phone (09) 276-9086. Fax (09) 276-2909. www.visordistributors.co.nz

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Isringhausen leads the way in the application of modern technology to driver’s seating.

ISRI has a full range of driver’s seats to suit every application.

Isringhausen have a

ISRI 6860/875 NTS PRO

ISRI 6860/870 NTS

ISRI 6800/337

Automatic Self Levelling NTS Air Suspension Seat Integrated Folding Head Restraint, Integrated 3-Point Seat Belt & Isolator

Automatic Self Levelling NTS Air Suspension Seat Integrated Head Restraint Integrated 3-Point Seat Belt

Automatic Self Levelling Air Suspension Seat Integrated 3-Point Seat Belt Head Restraint Included

range of accessories to at. compliment every ISRI seat.

This includes optional armrests, head restraints, seat belts, swivel plates and isolators.

Note: Seat fabric may vary from what is shown.

Armrests and head restraints are optional accessories.

Additional information on the full range of ISRI seats is available from the exclusive

ISRI 6500/517

ISRI 6000-517

Automatic Self Levelling NTS Air Suspension Seat IPS Pneumatic Lumbar Support

Automatic Self Levelling Air Suspension Seat Pneumatic Lumbar Support

Mechanical Suspension Seat Adjustable Weight Mechanism Manual Lumbar Support

Note: Headrest & Armrests Not Incl

Note: Trimmed in Black Fabric

Note: Trimmed in Black Fabric TD24929

New Zealand Agent

ISRI 6860/880 NTS

Geemac Trading (NZ) Limited.

Phone (09) 630 1856 or Fax (09) 630 1855 email: sales@geemac.co.nz www.geemac.co.nz / www.isringhausen.co.nz

CLASSIFIED TRUCK & DRIVER

I NDEPENDENT T RUCK S PRAY

the auto accessory specialists

434 Church Street East, Penrose, Auckland

Manufacturers & Distributors of: Truck Accessories:

Ute, Car & 4x4:

• Top Air Deflectors • Sunvisors • Stoneguards • Headlight covers • Door Weathershields • Bonnet Guards

See us at Fieldays Site H25

• SteelTop Canopies • Tonneau Covers • Nudge Bars • Side Steps • Headlight Covers • Bonnet Guards • Bed-Liners • Tailgate Assist - Prolift

MER

$290

Paddy - m: 021 335 739 e: paddy.its@gmail.com

• Trailer painting • Custom Painting

• Fleet spec painting • Sand blasting

TOLL APPROVED APPLICATORS

*TRUCK *CAR *4X4 Airplex Industries Ltd

TD28193

TD27301

• Cab and chassis painting

21 Sa l eya rds R oa d, Ota hu hu , Au c k l a nd Phone + 6 4 9 27 6 9 8 26 Toll Free: NZ 08 00AIR P LEX Fax +64 9 276 9836 Email: i nf o@ a i rp l ex . c o. nz

www.airplex.co.nz

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Panelbeating, Spraypainting, Chassis Straightening, Engineering, Sandblasting and 2 Truck Spray Booths, Body Building, Wheel Alignment

RED/ 4 MT

$66.5

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100 | Truck & Driver

(0800 257 687)

Phone Rick: 06-357 4100 Mobile: 0274 905 788

435 Tremaine Avenue. P.O. Box 4438, Palmerston North • Email: rick@alrotruck.co.nz EG28152

TD28181

0800 ALRO TRUCK

TRANSPORT, DIESEL & MARINE

THE RIGHT PARTS…THE RIGHT PRICES…RIGHT HERE! MERITOR KING PIN KITS

$290.00+GST PER AXLE SET R201309

BLACK RUBBER MUD FLAPS 24” WIDE

24” LONG 30” LONG 36” LONG

SPICER CLUTCHES $P.O.A.

$20.00EA+GST $22.50EA+GST $25.00EA+GST

BONUS IE TDM BEAN ER WITH SPIC CLUTCH S PURCHASE

MERITOR

MERITOR /ALLIANCE BRAKE SHOE KIT

NEW DRIVE HEADS AND GENUINE PARTS AVAILABLE

4707QP

Q PLUS BRAKE SHOE KIT WITH HARDWARE $85.00+GST EACH

EATON 6109, 8209, 8309

FACTORY REMAN TRANSMISSIONS AND PARTS AVAILABLE

VARIOUS MODELS P.O.A.

AIR SUZI COILS

JAPANESE TORQUE ROD BUSHES $25.00 EA+GST

RED/BLUE PAIR 4 MTRS EXTENDED

UNIVERSAL SEAT HEATER KITS

DUAL ZONE, 12 VOLT, 22” X 11” $250.00+GST EACH

$66.50+GST

CHECK OUT OUR WEBSITE WWW.TDM.CO.NZ

Ph: 0800 501 133 EG28152

Specials valid while stocks last.

8 Prescott Street, Penrose, Auckland Fax: 09 525 6161

Email: ray@tdm.co.nz

CLASSIFIED TRUCK & DRIVER

MANUFACTURERS OF QUALITY ALUMINIUM ANCILLARY EQUIPMENT, SERVICING THE TRANSPORT, MARINE AND AGRICULTURE INDUSTRIES FOR OVER 40 YEARS

Auckland

Calling ALL Drivers...

Want to have your Class 4 licence paid for?

Keen for a change in your career?

After a better work-life balance?

TD27933

Give us a call today!

0800 200 018

WE SPECIALISE IN MANUFACTURING TO SUIT YOUR OPERATIONAL REQUIREMENTS. 53 Bridge Street, Bulls Ph 06 322 1575 • Fax 06 322 1351 email info@roadrunnerltd.co.nz

PROUDLY

www.roadrunnerltd.co.nz

OWNED AND

NEW ZEALAND

OPERATED

HOP ON BOARD!

Specialists In Heavy Motor Commercial Motor Vehicles, Carriers Liability, Public Liability Insurance

LG23615

0800 55 54 53 info@stal.co.nz

102 | Truck & Driver

www.sweeneytownsend.co.nz

ONLY

June 2018

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All good with the Wall of Wood BIG TEST Repaying the faith | FLEET FOCUS All good with the Wall of Wood | FEATURE FUSO fights for first

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Terms and conditions: Subscription rates and a free copy of Equipment Guide are for NZ orders only and only for NZ Truck and Driver and NZ Logger subscriptions. Rates include GST and postage. For overseas prices please enquire.

LOUIE AND HIS HARD CASE BUGGERS Well known forester and hunter Lance Duncan retired from the forestry industry then sat down and wrote a book. It’s the tale of his life and is full of yarns from many years of working in forestry and hunting and those people he met along the way.

Its full of humour, our proof reader was in stitches when she worked on this manuscript. It hasn’t been sterilised it’s written as Lance tells it and anybody who knows him will know you will get it straight.

If you are easily offended then it’s probably not for you.

Get your copy now, for a great read and some real entertaining yarns.

First n editio

Post PO Box 112062 Penrose, Auckland 1642

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Email accounts@trucker.co.nz

ORDER FORM: LOUIE AND HIS HARD CASE BUGGERS $50 INCL GST & POSTAGE (NZ PRICE) *OVERSEAS PURCHASES-POSTAGE PRICING WILL DIFFER, PLEASE CONTACT US FOR MORE INFORMATION

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AP27602

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NO MORE MESSY TOOL BOX AND FRUSTRATION

100

$

+ GST

> No more messy tool box and frustration > Universal bracket attached to any standard tie bar > Unique one piece design for strength and durability > Save time, wind a 12m Strap in under 12 seconds > Highly visable safety yellow powder-coated > Minimise wear on straps > Make your excess strap tidy and legal > Wrings water out of wet straps

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ORDER WALLYâ„¢ WINDER: 03 208 1618

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TRUCK AND TRAILER PARTS FOR ALL MAKES AND MODELS

MAN POWER TGX 26.640 MORE PULLING POWER. MORE STOPPING POWER.

The most powerful MAN truck ever available in New Zealand, the TGX 26.640, is now here.

At 640PS (471kW) and 3000Nm (2213 ft.lb) it has more pulling power than ever.

And with up to 900kW combined brake output1 it has more stopping power than ever.

The TGX 26.640 also meets current Euro 6C regulations and is one of the cleanest and most efficient MAN trucks.

Plus you can get it with the latest leading edge technology and safety features, all making for a very powerful argument.

Adaptive Cruise Control Land Guard System BrakeMatic EBS Electronic Stability Program Dynamic Stability Program Roll Over Protection Emergency Brake Assist Antijackknife Brake Emergency Brake Signal Turbo EVBec engine brake EfficientRoll

www.man.co.nz North Island: Penske Commercial Vehicles 0800 728 695 South Island: Heavy Trucks 03 376 4305

1

Maximum combined output of optional TurboEVBec and retarder.

Some listed features are optional equipment.