Mucking in!
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by Brian Weatherley • As fleet engineers head towards Telford next week, plant contractors and construction equipment transporters will be travelling to Site Equipment Demonstration '96 at Milton Keynes. organised by Commercial Motor's sister magazine Contract Journal.
This year SED has been expanded to include more exhibits for tipper and mixer operators. al has a stand there and will bring you a three-page report next week: there's certainly no shortage of innovations to interest hauliers.
For example, Seddon Atkinson will have its lightweight Strato 26.240C mixer chassis on show in the colours of RMC and fitted with the compa ny's own design of mixer. With an 8.3-litre Cummins engine and steel-sprung back bogie in place of the standard rubber suspension, the Strato tips the scales at 6,655kg.
If you're more interested in eight-wheelers, Seddon's Iveco group stablemate Iveco Ford will have a EuroTrakker on display sporting a Kee) Withey tipping body and Maywood onboard weighing equipment. Eight-wheelers will also feature on the MAN stand—the new F2000 8x4 range, made up on dedicated on-road/off-road inodels. will get an airing at Fen Farm too.
Leyland Daf's popular 85 Series will be represented in the shape of the most-powerful 11.6-litre-engined 85.360 with an all-steel Thompson body.
The latest Hino multi-wheelers have aroused a lot of interest; not least since they delivered impressive fuel economy figures round CM's tipper test route. At SED, Valley Trucks of Hoddesdon will have a 300hp FY1 1:KA 8x4 with a Thompson Muckmaster body finished in the colours of S&J Tippers and Plant.
On the Cat engine stand you'll also find a Foden 3000 tipper powered by the latest 3176B yellow diesel. After a long break, the Cat is back under the Kite mark and the 10litre Euro-2 3176 straight six will soon be joined by the 14litre 3406E engine in Foden's 4000 Series.
Both Mercedes and Cummins will have engine displays--Mercedes will also be showing its Unimog 130.
Low-loader operators looking for new kit will find plenty to choose from at SED.
Next week King will unveil a number of products designed to counter the attack from Continental specialist trailer makers. Its MTSE range of single-spine extenders (launched at SED last year) now includes a 590mm low-deck version (compared with the standard model's 870inm). The new trailer will compete against the latest lowdecker from Broshuis, launched at the RAT Show earlier this year (CM 15-21 February).
The low-height extendible stretches from 13.6-21.2m and has a 25-tonne payload with a 35-tonne gross trailer weight.
King has further refined its MTSE46/3 single-spine extender with the addition of wheel wells on the platform which specifically allow a Terex dump truck to be carried into continental Europe within the 4m Continental height limit. Payloads up to 35 are offered on three-axle models with 48 tonnes on four.
Following in the footsteps of King's lightweight stepframes, the workhorse GTS46/3 tri-axle stepframe now has a low (160mm) neck height, bringing the overall load height down by 100mm and reducing the step height of the top deck. Further improvements have been made to the automatic unfolding rear loading ramps: they've been made safer to operate, while the adoption of Posilok top deck access ramps reduces the risk of the ramps being forced sideways when the top deck is being loaded.
UK arch-rival Andover Trailers will also be at SET) with its Superlow stepframe (class winner in the 1994 CM Trailer of the Year competition), along with examples of its lowprofile plant bodies fitted to FRF and Volvo rigids and a 24-tonne drawbar trailer for carrying road planers. AT is the UK agent for the Goldhofer power steer and extendible trailers and will he displaying a triaxle drop-well low-loader.
If you're talking Special Types trailers Nooteboom's name is bound to crop up. It will have its latest 60-tonne powersteered low-loader on show, The Easy Beaver stepfrarne, fitted with Nooteboom's CE-approved ramps, is said to be "extremely competitively priced, despite the use of high quality components".
Lincolnshire-based specialist trailer maker Ken Wootton will be in the main showground exhibiting trailers from its range that are popular with municipals, utilities and construction buyers.
SED will be at Fen Farm, Waredon, Milton Keynes, Bucks on 74-16 May. The site will be signposted J74, Ml. Entry free.