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Leyland: fighting fit Ind ready for action
Page 13
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by Toby Clark
ith 30 many British manufacrers closing factories it's easy feel depressed about the UK uck industry. So it's worth eelrating Leyland Trucks, which is quietly become a genuine iccess. From a low ebb in the Irly nineties after the colpse of the Leyland Daf organinon. Leyland Trucks has :come an example of best anufacturing practice.
Now the firm is planning one its boldest moves yet: designg and building a brand new Inge of trucks for the UK Tried forces—without a firm ter. Leyland (under the accar banner with its stableates Foden and Daf) is one of ve groups bidding for the giant ombat Support Vehicles eavy deal, which is worth up to 2bn. It's using in-house experse in computer-aided design id simulation to cut the cost id time involved in the first :ages of development.
loge prize
ccording to managing director tuart Heys: "Everything we roduce here, including the oden product, is a brand-new iodel. It was the right time to ave a look at the military ange." But there would be no reject if it were not for the uge prize on offer: "I don't now anybody who speculavely develops military vehiles," Heys admits.
He points to the past history f the company's military vehiles (the firm built 3,000 tanks tiring the Second World War) nd cairns: "We really do underLand the requirements of miliary customers."
Chief Engineer Keith Howard dds: "The project teams work at their best when they have a project to focus on." He reckons the firm learnt valuable lessons from the development of the Oaf LF range in terms of "components, project management and design technology".
If the military contract goes ahead it will use technology and components from Daf and Foden, and will adopt a modular approach. "We want to come up with a family of vehicles...in the way we have done with the Oafs," he reports. The firm is not committed to using a Oaf base vehicle, but he promises: "We will use as much knowledge and componentry from our existing ranges as we can." These are likely to include Paccar engines and ZF and Allison gearboxes; other possible features are ZF's automated cliff-locks and a central tyreinflation system.
Growing concerns include operational safety, ergonomics and "stealth" features such as angled side lockers, and bumpers and shuttered radiator guards to reduce the truck's radar and infrared "signature". Conventional emissions are an issue too: with a potential 10year production life the vehicles will have to comply with Euro-4 and even Euro-5.
But the biggest change is one that will strike a chord with any haulier, Whereas the armed forces used to be most concerned with initial procurement cost, now, says Heys, they look at whole-life costs: "I really don't see dealing with the MoD as different from dealing with any other aware commercial customer."