CCJ

November 2015

Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal

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30 commercial carrier journal | november 2015 • Peterbilt and Kenworth both announced plans to join the other major North American truck OEMs in sitting out the 2016 Mid-America Truck- ing Show in Louisville, Ky. Daimler Trucks North America, Navistar, Mack Trucks and Volvo Trucks North America all previously announced they would skip MATS in 2016. • Mack Trucks was granted a recall exemption by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administra - tion concerning nearly 2,000 model-year 2014- 16 Mack LEU incomplete vehicles manufactured between July 22, 2013, and April 20, 2015. Mack determined the brake actuation and release times slightly exceed federal requirements by milliseconds. NHTSA determined the noncom - pliance was inconsequential to vehicle safety. • Paccar filed a petition with NHTSA to request a recall exemption for an issue with the turn signal indicators on certain medium-duty models that flash twice as fast as the turn signals themselves. About 197 model-year 2015-16 Kenworth K270 and K370 trucks and model-year 2015-16 Peterbilt 220 trucks manu - factured between Nov. 10, 2014, and March 18, 2015, are affected. • Peterbilt rolled out its new Red Oval program (www.peterbiltredoval.com) to provide custom - ers with exclusive certified preowned trucks from throughout its dealer network and Paccar Financial Used Truck Centers. The trucks come with a Red Oval Assurance warranty, a 150-point inspection, a customer loyalty program and preferred financing through Paccar Financial. • Volvo Trucks North America will introduce Volvo Certified Uptime Centers within its dealer network in 2016 after piloting the concept at 13 test dealerships. The certified centers will adopt standardized processes and have dedicated uptime bays where trucks requiring a repair time of four hours or less are serviced immedi - ately. The centers will use Remote Diagnostics, Volvo's telematics-based proactive diagnostics and repair planning system. • International's ProStar tractor soon will be available with Allison's TC10 fully automatic transmission coupled with the Cummins ISX15 engine. Orders begin in December, with expect - ed delivery dates of early 2016. • Kenworth's 76-inch midroof sleeper for its T680 and T880 models is now in production. The sleeper was designed for bulk tank, flatbed and other operators who prefer a lower roof and offers a 100-pound weight savings and less aerodynamic drag. • Kenworth announced that Allison's 4700 rug - ged duty series 7-speed automatic transmission – with optional second "deep reverse" – can INBrief Yokohama begins commercial tire production in Mississippi A t a ceremony last month, corpo- rate executives from Yokohama Tire Corp. and state and local officials celebrated the official opening of the Yokohama Tire Manufacturing Mississippi plant in West Point, Miss. The 1-million-square-foot facility now manufactures commercial truck and bus tires for OEM, fleet and dealer customers in the North American market. When production ramp-up of phase 1 of the plant is complete by 2018, YTMM will manufacture 3,000 tires per day – about 1 million annually. Yokoha- ma said it has the potential to quadruple capacity with an additional three phases as tire demand rises. "It is no longer sufficient to source tires from existing manufacturing plants around the world," said Hi- komitsu Noji, president and repre- sentative director of The Yokohama Rubber Co. "Supply will have to come from where our customers are and be able to provide specific products that the North American market demands." While YTMM has the technological manufacturing capabilities to produce almost any tire in Yokohama's product lineup, the plant will focus on supply- ing core commercial tire products and sizes, including steer, drive and trailer tires from 17.5- to 24.5-inch rim sizes. YTMM will be able to service both the OEM and replacement markets, in- cluding its GTY Tire Co. joint venture with Continental Tires the Americas. "Class 8 trucks in service are expected to go from 3.5 million to 4 million in the next 10 years," said Rick Philips, vice president of sales for Yokohama Tire Corp. "All these trucks mean more tires on the ground. The fact that we will be producing tires locally will mean our speed to market will improve greatly. Our lead time will go from a few months sourcing tires offshore to a few days sourcing here in Mississippi." West Point was selected after a year- long search in 2012 that included site locations in 3,000 U.S. counties. "This was the right time to build a new plant, and Mississippi was absolutely the right place to build it," said Taka- haru Fushimi, chief executive officer of Yokohama Corp. of North America and Yokohama Tire Corp. – Jeff Crissey Hikomitsu Noji, president and representative director of The Yokohama Rubber Co., discusses the company's growth strategy for the North American commercial tire market. Mack celebrates new axle production line M ack Trucks inaugurated its new axle line at its facility in Hagerstown, Md., where the company assembles its powertrain components. The new line is part of a $30 million investment that brings assembly of all Mack heavy- duty drive axles and machining of its carrier housings to the plant. The investment also was used for In addition to adding drive axle oper- ations to its Hagerstown plant, Mack's investment also was used to upgrade its engine assembly process.

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