O . Because of the new Construction and
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Use Regulations I am wondering whether it would be more profitable to exchange my "heavy" four-wheeler for a sixwheeler but have doubts as to whether the additional expenditure of around £7..000 or so could be really justified. What are your views?
AAs a general observation the larger the
vehicle operated the lower the cost per ton would be. Thus a four-wheel rigid vehicle with a carrying capacity of 9 tons when averaging 1,000 miles a week would cost 17.55d. a mile to operate, i.e. 1.95d. per ton mile. The corresponding figure for a six-wheeler with a carrying capacity of 12 tons would be 20.59d. a mile, i.e. 1.71d. per ton mile.
Basically the lower ton mile figure for the larger vehicle stem mainly from the fact that the driver's wage constitutes such a large proportion of the total cost. But the additional payment made to the driver when his vehicle, as in this case, comes in the next higher wage category only marginally affects the total cost.
As with any general statement there are the inevitable qualifications. The ton mileage figures above obviously depend on the vehicles concerned being fully loaded. If, however, there was some underloading of the larger vehicle then the hoped-for improvement in cost per ton mile might not be achieved. Fora short interim period, nevertheless, it might be possible to tolerate some slight underloading and still equal the ton mileage figure of the smaller vehicle before ultimately getting sufficient traffic to load fully and thereby achieve maximum benefit.
There would also be the obvious qualification that any benefit from using larger vehicles would depend on favourable operational conditions including sufficient access to terminal points.