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Changing the Landscape

3rd June 2010, Page 38
3rd June 2010
Page 38
Page 39
Page 38, 3rd June 2010 — Changing the Landscape
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Keywords : Truck, Vehicles

It's a reflection of the times that when truck manufacturers talk about "encouraging signs"; it's usually based on a slow-down in had news.., rather than any imminent arrival of any sort of good news.

It's a point of view and one that 1veco subscribes to when it comes to the construction vehicle market. Indeed. director of brand and communication Nigel Emms believes recent registration figures offer a glimmer of hope within a landscape he acknowledges as bleak: "Construction nose-dived quicker than almost any other sector as the recession hit. and faces even more challenges as we crawl out of recession."

But. although construction and house building have lately been well-and-truly clobbered, Emms reckons there are reasons to be cheerful. "Comparing March 2010's [registrations] with March 2009, 3.5-tonners are now down 'only' by 12%; 7.5-tonners have improved,so they're now down 32%; 18-tonners are now down by just 4%; 6x2s are actually up 21%; 6x4s are up by 11% too, and eight-wheelers are now down only 1%.There's some good, positive news in there and in an industry as hard hit as the construction sector, every green shoot is worth hanging on to."

For those questioning the Italian truck maker's definition of good news, it's worth noting that during the past 18 months the decline in registrations for construction vehicles has been as much as 61% for eight-leggers, 57% for six-wheelers and 41% and 58% for 7.5-tonners and 18-tonners respectively. Given that market collapse it's hardly surprising that truck makers are willing to believe that things can only get better.

Only when the construction vehicle market does return, it will be to a very different operating landscape. Previously clear-cut buying patterns have been tossed out the window. Where once six-wheelers built things up and eight-wheelers knocked them down, and local authorities bought 18-tonners and small jobbing-builders 75-tonners, the tectonic plates within the sector are visibly shifting as Emins explains: "At the lighter end, the 7.5-tonna used to be the mainstay of the local building industry nowadays the trend is towards the 3.5-tonner, and for obvious reasons."

Cheaper and less hassle 'those reasons include the ongoing fall-out from changes to HGV driver licensing in 1997 and the subsequent decline in the number of car-licence holders still entitled to drive a 75-tonner, The advent of speed limiters on 7.5-tonners, together with the need for 0-licences and tachographs also means that "it's clearly cheaper and less hassle for a local building firm to operate at 3.5-tonnes", says Emms.

The 18-tonner tides are going out too. Once the main-stay of municipal fleets and builders merchants, with recent changes in the way bulk materials are handled, the number of construction-related 18-tonners sold has significantly diminished — in 2009 they represented just 5% of all 18-tonners registered. compared with nearly 8% the year before.

Why? Because operators are moving up to six-wheelers. However, even in that sector, things are changing. "Today, the three-axle 6x4 tipper is a very rare beast," asserts Emms, "Most three-axle 6x4s are either mixers or refuse vehicles, and most three-axle rigids are 6x2s. Building materials are now delivered in hulk to construction sites — either bagged or on pallets — and a 6x2 provides added productivity to the operator. Some of them need a crane to load and off-load and a 6x2 allows you do so this without compromising payload or axle-loading weights." The desire to put on weight doesn't stop at three-axles either, for when it comes to tippers: "The majority of construction operators now use eight-wheelers and for very sound operational reasons," says Emms.

Aiming to be more productive

That's all down to one word — productivity.

"Traditionally, an eight-wheeler was either a muckaway or aggregates carrier,he adds. "They thrived in the road building and construction booms of the 1980s and 90s. Today, they're far more multi-purpose. Again, it's back to productivity Most of today's eight wheelers are specified and durable enough to handle any kind of operation — from on/off-site aggregates today to heavy-duty muckaway tomorrow. Today it's not easy to say what a truck is going to be doing in six weeks time, let alone six months or years. So a truck needs to be specified to handle anything. And an eight-wheeler delivers this kind of flexibility.

That desire to put more on the back of a truck is certainly noticeable in the ready-mix concrete sector where the number of eight-wheel mixer chassis operating on UK roads continues to gTow. Yet despite all the 'up-gunning', and noticeable improvements in the condition of building sites' mixer men have so far rejected calls to switch to a 6x2 or 8x2 chassis, remaining wedded to double-drive bogies on their chassis. Considering the potential payload gains, it's hard to see why 6x2s or 8x2s aren't more popular than mixers. •

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