Brighter times are here, say UK truck bosses

Senior representatives of the heavy vehicle manufacturers attending the CV Show (and behind the razzmatazz there were some significant stay-aways) were generally confident about the future of the UK truck market, now Euro 6 is accepted and the wider economy is recovering.

Ray Ashworth, managing director of UK market leader DAF, pointed out that on DAF’s last attendance at the show in 2013, GDP had been growing by just 1.7 per cent, almost eight per cent of the working population was unemployed and inflation was running at 2.7 per cent. Things had improved: now GDP growth was 2.8 per cent, unemployment 5.7 and inflation almost zero.

After the upheaval of Euro 6 there was little in the way of legislative distortion on the horizon, and DAF was showcasing improvements in safety, the driver’s environment, fuel economy and back-up.

Another development was the CF Silent: DAF was now in negotiation with Transport for London to see if such low-noise vehicles could make ‘out of hours’ deliveries in the capital.

There was no major legislation planned before 2022, when new designs allowing longer lengths in the interests of safety and aerodynamics would be allowed –aside from the introduction of automatic lane departure warning (LDW) and advanced emergency braking systems (AEBS) this November.

Neither would pose a problem for DAF: it already had these systems in production and available as factory-fit extras.

Iveco UK’s product director Martin Flach also highlighted the AEBS as a possible stumbling block for the market’s recovery, but said he had seen no sign of people trying to order early to beat a possible price penalty of around £2,000.

“Frankly, although we didn’t register as many new trucks in the first quarter as we might have liked, we have a strong order book and it may well be too late for some to beat the deadline anyway,” he said.

More significant, he argued, was Iveco’s Hi-SCR and passive particulate trap Euro 6 solution, which is to be found on all models from the EuroCargo 7.5 tonner to the most powerful Stralis tractor.

“This technology will come good for us once people realise the implications of having to regenerate, clean and replace active filters,” he asserted.

“Unlike those trucks using EGR at Euro 6, ours have clean intake air, meaning the emissions control system will go to 600,000 km without attention.

“We don’t burn diesel to clean dirty filter elements in service: our filter can be brought up to temperature simply by half-closing the exhaust brake flap to heat the exhaust gases to 300°C – half the temperature required by the other manufacturers.

“This makes our vehicles particularly attractive to operators running in urban conditions.

“The one drawback of our system is that AdBlue consumption is higher than average at 5-8 per cent of diesel burn, but other costs are reduced sufficiently for this not to be a real factor.”

Mr Flach was looking forward to the introduction of a facelifted EuroCargo with a revised driveline later in the year, but admitted that the increasing weight of legislative equipment that was required was making conventional 7.5-tonners less and less attractive to buyers.

“That’s where we can step in with the 7.2-tonne GVW Daily, which can beat 7.5-tonne trucks on payload,” he asserted.

At the other end of the weight scale, Mr Flach acknowledged that three-axle tractor units were going to dominate the market for the rest of the year.

“We’re looking for five per cent of the tractor market this year, and our longer-term ambition is to get to 10 per cent and beat Renault Trucks,” he said.

“We are currently doing a competitive 12-month deal to enable people to evaluate the truck without feeling they are taking a big risk. The campaign is going through the dealer network and is targeting fleets with 10-30 vehicles.

“We’d like to be stronger in tippers,” Flach admits. “The Trakker is not a bad product but it’s difficult to get people to try it… they think it’s heavy when it’s not.

“We’ve not been big in the sector since the days of the Maguris.

“I’d like to see people think less in terms of the off-road ability of a tipper and more in terms of on-road performance and payload. Most batching plants and building sites now have made-up roads… how much weight could you save with an 8×2 chassis?”

Iveco remains interested in advancing gas as a fuel, but Flach admits that falling diesel pieces and a comparatively small number of refuelling installations has slowed demand down.

“We can now offer pure gas fuel at Euro 6 as an option on Daily and Stralis. It’s a proven technology and the big selling point is that it’s significantly better than even Euro 6 diesel on particulates and slightly better on NOx, as well as being quieter, but the fall in diesel prices has made it a more difficult ‘sell’.”

Over at Mercedes-Benz, customer services director Sam Whittaker was delighted with the marque’s performance and looking forward to more of the same: “We took 25 per cent of the tractor market in the first quarter of the year, and last year our 2545 was the best-selling tuck in the UK…we took 10 per cent of the market with that alone.

“Our emphasis is on ‘Trucks you can trust. People you can trust,” and zero tolerance of downtime. On top of that there’s the Fuel Challenge where we put our demonstrators into fleets with the challenge that we will beat the best-performing truck on the fleet…even if it’s an older model Mercedes-Benz.”

Whittaker is pleased to be able to offer customers two distinct products at 7.5 tonnes: the Japanese-designed Fuso and the Mercedes Atego.

“Fuso got a 15 per cent share of the 7.5-tonne market last year, and if you add on the Atego we got to 22 per cent,” he said.

“The key thing is that different people buy different trucks for different operations, and some cube out before they weigh out, so the Atego is more attractive to them.

“One positive that our operators in London report to us is that the Atego’s particulate trap is only regenerating every three weeks or so…some other trucks have to regenerate every three days.”

At Isuzu Trucks, marketing director Keith Child was celebrating second-place in the 7.5 tonne sector behind DAF last year, and the introduction of a full range of Euro 6 vehicles from 3.5 to 12 tonnes gross weight.

“We’ve got a new cab front with a ‘smiley face’ and internal changes including a new driver’s seat suitable for weights of up to 130 kg, red seat belts to help ensure compliance and a new steering wheel with a bigger air bag for enhanced safety.”

Looking forward to the rest of the year, DAF MD Ray Ashworth concluded that a total of around 40,000 new trucks over six tonnes gross weight would be registered this year. He reported that new order intake was up 165 per cent on the same period last year, and said he expected DAF to hold over 28 per cent of the market by year-end.