Table of contents for Issue 352 in Owner Driver

Heavy Vehicle Industry Australia (HVIA) is calling for members of the transport industry to sign the current e-petition to make Australian standards more readily available for heavy vehicle operators. The e-petition is currently open on the Australian Parliament House petition register and calls for Australian standards to be made for free or at a reasonable cost for anyone in the industry requiring them to perform their duties. HVIA chief executive Todd Hacking says access to all Australian standards should be free as he pushes for these standards to be made available to the heavy vehicle industry. “It is our members who have volunteered their time to develop the industry benchmarks, yet as soon as that is done, Standards Australia is putting them behind a paywall,” Hacking says. “The Australian heavy…

Travelling about the countryside, meeting and interviewing truck enthusiasts, is certainly one of the perks of this transport media game. Like minded, genuine men and women who share a passion for trucks and road transport in general quite often become mates through shared interests. David Armstrong was one of those blokes. Sadly, while the Easter long weekend was being enjoyed by many, David passed away suddenly on Sunday, April 17. I met David in August last year at his home in Cootamundra to compile a feature for the October 2021 issue of OwnerDriver magazine. David and his Katoomba blue R-200 International, which he restored with his son Craig (who passed away in 2015), were regulars at truck shows and classic truck road run events, and will be sorely missed by…

Three months doesn’t make a year but if the results of the first quarter of 2022 are anything to go by, this will be a year that sets an entirely new bar for some Australian truck suppliers. Despite the impacts of a pandemic and political grandstanding on a grand scale, the demand for trucks has never been so consistently strong, culminating in an exceptional first quarter result. In fact, the best first quarter result on record. As Truck Industry Council chief executive, Tony McMullan, commented: “The first three months of 2022 have brought record new truck sales in Australia. “As we have seen since the beginning of 2022, the leader of this growth has been at the heavy end of the market, with both heavy and medium-duty sectors showing strong…

It was with a wet set of clothes as I tried to wash the truck, ready to head out the Trangie Truck and Tractor Show on Saturday, April 9. But the more I washed, the more it rained, so I gave in and thought at least I will still be there. Setting out from Dubbo, it rained all the way to Trangie and into the first hour of the truck show. But luckily, around 9am, the rain lifted with only a few sprinkles, continuing after the ceremony and awards at the showgrounds around 3pm. The organisers had said the show would go on and they stood their ground. They were rewarded with a reported 200 vehicles that entered across all categories – trucks, cars, bikes and tractors. It was well…

You know what I love about our industry? The dichotomy. Now that’s a pretty fancy word. I even had to look it up to understand but it’s fun and appropriate. As I understand it, dichotomy means a division between contrasting things or parts. How does it relate to our industry? Well, that’s easier to explain. We are an industry that thrives on new and modern technology while also being an industry that thrives on old and reliable technology. The fancy new high-tech gear does the job that the old more simplified gear also accomplishes. In today’s story it’s the latter part we are going to focus on, with another twist. We will be focusing on the old classic gear, but with a young modern driver behind the wheel. Oh, so…

“There were a few extra hoops to jump through.” Sitting at Louisville’s Muhammad Ali International Airport (renamed in 2019) I had a couple of hours to kill before beginning the three-leg, 21-hour, 16,000km trip home. I feel exhausted but energised. It had been two years since I last attempted to get over to the Mid-America Trucking Show (MATS) and this year’s event also happened to be its 50th show. Bonus! Yes, there were a few extra hoops to jump through to get here and get home and, yes, the flight time was a little longer than previous as the international flights are not as abundant. But I made it and I filled up more memory cards than my previous trip. I also managed to meet more passionate truckies, tried fried…

Popular Australian country singer Nev Nicholls, whose repertoire included many songs of the trucking lifestyle, passed away on April 16 at age 91 after spending the last years of his life in a nursing home. Nicholls had always been a prolific writer and besides recording vast numbers of his own songs he also covered songs, but was known significantly for his connection to trucking music. Nicholls was born in the New South Wales town of Millthorpe, spending his formative years in the farming community of Tallwood. He started playing guitar at age 11. In 1957, he took part in his first country tour, The Reg Lindsay Show, on the NSW north coast. In 1968, he began a 10-year stint at the Texas Tavern in Sydney’s King Cross, the audience including…

Mental fitness foundation, Gotcha4Life, and Isuzu Australia Limited (IAL) are giving the public a rare chance to win a fully equipped and unique Isuzu NNR Servicepack Crew with canopy body and a raft of built-in accessories valued at over $152,000, and all for a fantastic cause. During late April, the one-of-a-kind, custom truck build recently undertook the Mateship Miles roadshow with Gotcha4Life, travelling from Victoria to New South Wales via Shepparton, Wagga Wagga, Canberra, Nowra and Wollongong. The Mateship Miles saw Gotcha4Life founder Gus Worland visit regional towns that have been affected by fires, floods and COVID-19 over the last few years. The aim of the roadshow was to kick-start conversations about the importance of building mental fitness, meaningful mateship and social and emotional connection in communities, while utilising the…

The National Road Transport Association (NatRoad) has welcomed the $80 million pledge by the Federal Labor Party for new truck road stops but says more needs to be done by all levels of government to alleviate driver fatigue. NatRoad CEO Warren Clark says his organisation agrees with the industry view that existing funding programs for rest areas are “woefully insufficient”. “The Heavy Vehicle Safety and Productivity Program (HVSPP) is one of the Australian government’s main programs for funding rest areas and an industry analysis shows it is running at an annual spend of about only $5.5 million,” Clark says. “The whole national network needs to be thoroughly audited. “You can’t have a world class road freight system unless you have strategically placed, world class rest areas.” Clark says any commitment…

Karlie Shire has been appointed as Scania’s driver trainer for Western Australia, Northern Territory and South Australia, as well as the company’s mining and resources division. An experienced heavy combination driver based in Perth, Shire is said to have been a keen Scania enthusiast throughout her driving career. Having first appeared on Scania’s radar with her strong performance in the final of the 2016 Driver Competition, most recently Karlie has been driving a Scania G 500 prime mover combination for VISY. “I am very excited to take on this new role. For a while now I have been chatting to fellow Scania drivers at truck stops about their trucks and introducing many of them to features they did not know were hiding on the dash, especially with regard to monitoring…

Heart of Australia has announced a major funding commitment of $17.2 million from the Federal Government to guarantee its mobile medical clinics will continue to service regional and rural Queenslanders for the next four years. The Heart of Australia fleet now numbers five trucks hauling custom-designed mobile clinics. Paccar Australia kicked things off in the early years, donating two Kenworth K200 prime movers. Black Truck Sales stepped up in with an Isuzu F Series FSD260 before Paccar added two DAF prime movers. The latest – Heart 5 – a DAF XF 530, was launched in February this year. Founder and cardiologist Dr Rolf Gomes says he is thrilled Heart of Australia’s five mobile clinics will continue to provide improved access to specialist medical services for Queenslanders living in remote and…

“I wanted it back because it was my first truck.” Bluey Gordon leans back on a desk chair, his demountable office building in the yard sitting adjacent to a varied assortment of Mack trucks. He’s up for a chat and has a multitude of stories to tell, some of which can’t be repeated in these pages. It’s been a long haul for the 76-year-old. Born and raised in the Darling Downs city of Toowoomba, it’s a place he’s always called home, apart from a 12-month compulsory military assignment to Vietnam in the years 1967 to ’68. But more about that later. Bluey tells of trying his hand at a number of vocations, including truck driving, pulling beers, selling baked goods and, finally, running his own fleet of Mack trucks with…

Every now and then, something special comes along. It doesn’t matter what it is. It can be anything. For whatever reason or reasons, it just comes together in a way which makes it, well, special. A cut above. A bit better. A good thing. Ahead of the pack. Something that doesn’t just do one or two things well, but does most things better than most. Even so, there’s a danger in calling something ‘special’ because so much depends on individual opinion. After all, one person’s delight is quite easily another person’s derision and, let’s face it, when it comes to trucks, opinions can be poles apart. However, after a few days in Scania’s R770 flagship, it would almost certainly be a severely jaundiced and irrevocably riveted view that failed to…

As part of an ongoing operational review following its transition to standalone manufacturer and distributor of ‘on-highway’ assets, Iveco Group has announced that it will assume full responsibility for Iveco vehicle sales in New Zealand via its Auckland facility. The decision is said to be based on the company’s desire to form even closer relationships with its New Zealand customer base, with a view to better servicing its needs. Iveco says its Auckland site already accounts for the majority of vehicle sales in New Zealand, meaning most buyers will be unaffected by the move. The operational change will mean that three existing dealerships will cease sales of Iveco vehicles in six months’ time. Iveco Group says it has invited the affected dealerships to remain part of the network in service…

Volvo Trucks in North America has won an order for 110 Volvo VNR Electric trucks from the global logistics company Maersk. The deal adds to a previous order of 16 vehicles of the same model and marks the single largest commercial order to date for Volvo’s electric trucks. The order was placed by Performance Team, part of the Maersk Group, and adds up to mean a total of 126 such electric trucks will be in service for Performance Team. The first electric trucks are scheduled to be in operation this quarter, with all 126 trucks are scheduled for deployment by the first quarter of 2023. “Volvo Trucks is excited to continue collaborating with Maersk on its fleet sustainability goals and to play a key role in the organisation’s continued scaled…

The Australian Trucking Association (ATA) says it wants the federal government to reset the nation’s approach to road safety and productivity. While launching the ATA’s 2022 election policy charter, ATA chair David Smith says he wants more emphasis to be placed on road safety. “The number of crashes involving trucks is falling, thanks to the work of the industry and governments,” Smith says. “But it won’t be acceptable until there are zero deaths and zero injuries on our roads.” The ATA is calling for an improvement in road safety, and have listed a target they want to see reached in the coming years. “Our target is for a 25 per cent reduction per year in crashes involving trucks, once the measures we propose get started,” Smith says. Under the ATA…

“At 5am on Sunday morning there were trucks already rolling in.” If you are on top of your truck shows and charity convoys you would know the Sydney Convoy for Kids is regularly run in the latter part of the year. Therefore, seeing an article like this in the May issue of OwnerDriver magazine would normally mean either I am really slow at submitting it or I’m a fortune-telling wizard pre-empting the event. Sure, my editor will willingly attest I am a little slow getting my stories in. I live by the Douglas Adams quote: “I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.” But I’m not seven months slow, nor am I some kind of clairvoyant Hogwarts-type character as I look terrible in a…

Vast ability and good looks generally don’t go hand in hand. Often it’s a case of choosing either aesthetics or ability but with Scott Shaw’s silver and blue 2005 Kenworth C500 he has the best of both worlds – good looks and massive amounts of kick-arse capability, kind of like Chuck Norris if he had plastic surgery. But a neat segue from a martial arts legend who is as tough as the proverbial coffin nail to the trucking incarnation of that same robustness has to be stretched today because we have not one, but two, Kenworth C500s. Double Chuck anyone? On the prowess front Scott has no one to thank but the Kenworth gods for imbuing his Charlie with all the strength to go anywhere, do anything and drag back…

Heavy Vehicle Industry Australia (HVIA) has advised that a consultation Regulation Impact Statement (RIS) examining the case for introducing a new mandatory standard for the installation of reversing technologies to new vehicles has been released. Reversing technologies (i.e. rear-view cameras and ultrasonic sensors) increase the driver’s awareness or vision of vulnerable road users behind a vehicle, reducing the number of reversing collisions with pedestrians that result in severe or fatal injuries. The consultation RIS considers two options to address crashes from reversing collisions. The RIS suggests that a new ADR, aligned with United Nations Regulation No. 158, for mandatory fitment of reversing technologies, will save 12 lives and avoid 340 serious and 152 minor injuries over 35 years. It also shows the highest benefit-cost ratio of 1.47 – 2.14, 2.58…

In news from Stuttgart, Germany, Daimler Truck and its employees from all over the world are sending a multitude of strong signs of solidarity with the people of Ukraine in which it says is a difficult time of war. As an immediate measure, the executive board of Daimler Truck approved a monetary donation of one million euros to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). In addition, the manufacturer is providing trucks and buses as well as touring coaches for aid deliveries free of charge, as well as donations in kind and personnel support for targeted support campaigns. Currently, employees can donate and the company says it will match the amount collected at the end. Daimler has been providing trucks and buses as well as touring coaches for aid deliveries free…