"Since I have been here I have been pleased with the MAN's
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reliability" Hugh Jones
GroContinental dates back to the 1930s when the father of the present chairman, Ray Grocott, began transporting livestock for local farmers. Ray joined the company in 1955 and, with his mother, laid the foundations for its development over the intervening years. Today GroContinental, which includes many household names among a wide customer base, can be counted among the UK's major temperature-controlled storage and distribution companies.
The transport operation is based at Higher Heath, Shropshire; Hugh Jones has been dis tribution manager for the past nine months. The company runs 42 artics, of which 40 have an MAN tractive unit at the front end. "We have a couple of Dafs which have been successful and have provided us with a useful comparison with the rest of the fleet," he says. "All of our tractive units are 6x2s as they make it easier to stay within axle limits with fridge trailers.
"We run at 41 tonnes at the moment and are considering the move to 44 tonnes. We already cube out with some loads, so it won't be as much of an advantage as it was moving up from 38 to 41 tonnes.
"The operation involves multi-drop deliveries of frozen and chilled dairy products for the food ingredients market and on the return run we pick up from the manufacturers. We have some curtain-sided trailers which are used to collect and deliver packaging to manufacturing sites on a just-in-time basis.
"The majority of the fleet operates on domestic work and each truck covers about 100,000 miles a year but we have 10 trucks running on the Continent which average 150,000 miles a year."
It was foreign travel that prompted Ray Crocott to try out the MAN—up to 1974 the company operated ERFs, then it tried out an MAN for a Middle East run. It proved to be so
much more reliable and economical that GroContinental bought more on the strength of the experience. "We still have some F90s at just over six years old but currently replace five to six units a year.
"The 22.403s work mainly in the UK and the more powerful 22.463s and newer 26.414s run into the Benelux countries and Germany. The F2000 isn't light, at about 7.5 tonnes, but the weight of fridge trailers has come down in recent years and we manage with a payload of 22 tonnes.
"The company has looked at contract leasing but finds it more beneficial to make outright purchases and provide our own maintenance. We are generally satisfied with the price, but residuals have fallen away in recent years. Our workshops have a very good reputation and we sell most of our trucks on to local operators.
"Since I have been here I have been pleased with the MAN's reliability. It's rare to have one breakdown. I think this is a credit to our workshops and the fact that we have a dedicated driver for each vehicle. Our staff stays with us a long time; some drivers have outlasted several vehicles. "There have been faults, but nothing that keeps on being thrown up. Today most problems are minor and to do with the electrics; up to P-reg the headlamp bulbs were difficult to replace. The base of the seat may need replacing once in a vehicle's life. We had to modify the drop arm to take a grease nipple. Tyre life is not an issue but we fit 385/65s on the front steer axle as they last twice as long as conventional Goodyear steer tyres.
t "From a driver's perspective
both the 403 and 463 have good torque output and the gearboxes are easy to use. The F2000 cab is a good size and has good visibility but it now looks a bit dated compared with later models. The drivers prefer the large cab which has plenty of storage space. It's very quiet but the cab suspension could be stiffer as it tends to roll a bit. Fuel consumption for vehicles running in the UK averages out at 7.5mpg but the Continental fleet does better, returning up to 9.0mpg.
"Our image is very important to us and each vehicle is washed at the end of its shift. We get a few stone chips on the front of the cab, like they all do, but it doesn't suffer from rust."