News

Transport for London (TfL) has shortlisted ten contractors for a road maintenance framework that could be worth as much as US$3billion over eight years. The framework is split into four contracts and could cover all London roads from 2013. TfL said the framework would provide cost savings and other efficiencies. The final contracts will be awarded before the end of 2012. The ten contractors are: Amey, Balfour Beatty Living Places, Bam Nuttall-Hyder Consulting, Colas-VolkerHighways-URS Scott Wilson, Co

The Japanese SE Group is working on a new road project in Vietnam. The 25km highway is costing some US$476 million to construct, with some 60% of the funding coming from the JBIC Bank and SE Group providing around 20%. The rest of the funding will be provided by official development assistant capital. This new road will provide a link from the city of Halong in Vietnam's Quang Ninh province to the Hanoi-Haiphong highway project.

Komatsu Europe is keen to develop its customer base in developed markets by using ideas like the diesel particulate filter (DPF) exchange programme. New Komatsu Europe managing director and CEO Keiko Fujiwara explained, “When we introduced the Stage IIIB models a lot of customers were concerned about initial costs and the care required for the DPF. That’s why we decided this exclusively for our Stage IIIB customers.”

Bridgestone has increased the available sizes for some of its popular off-road tyres. The VLTS tyre for articulated dump trucks now comes as an 875/65 R29 to suit top weight machines and additional sizes are also now available for the VSW and the VJT L3 pattern tyre, which are usually used on wheel loaders.

Komatsu used INTERMAT to take the wraps off two new Dash 7 wheeled loaders, badged WA380-7 and WA500-7. With engine emissions being the main driver, the smaller 18-tonne WA380-7 packs 142kW from its EU Stage IIIb engine to deliver improved efficiency and lower fuel consumption. The machine also gets torque converter lock-up with the function operating in 2nd, 3rd and 4th gears, and gives the loader a 40 km/h forward speed.

Cat’s latest E-series excavator is the 16.7tonne 316E. It replaces the 315D and gets a Cat C4.4 Acert engine to meet EU Stage IIIb emissions. It is the first of three smaller E series being launched by Cat this year. Electric boom regeneration is also available on the new model, and combined with the latest engine technology, gives the company a fuel-saving focus. There is a new cab with lower noise levels – typically a 4dB(a) reduction over its D series predecessor – and improved comfort and visibility too

The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has announced a US$1 million grant award to help develop electric vehicle infrastructure on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. The grant recipient, Car Charging Group, will install charging stations at 17 Turnpike service plazas. Level II charging stations, which can charge a car in roughly four hours, and Level III charging stations, which can charge a car in about 20 minutes, will be installed at the service plazas in three phases. The first phase of the

Rubble Master is highlighting the latest compact recycling machine to be equipped with its GO! technology. The RM100GO has been optimised for simple operation to enable even inexperienced operators to run it safely and efficiently

Scanlaser is striving for ‘iconic’ status at INTERMAT. The Hexagon Group dealership for Leica Geosystems (LG) products in Europe is at the show promoting LG’s new icon construction project system. “It’s in four elements,” explained Scanlaser director general Pierre Dubreuil. “There’s iconstruct positioning tools, GPS, and robotic total stations for foremen and surveyors; icontrol, a machine control system for excavators, graders and dozers; iconnect telematics to transfer construction site machine informati

Palfinger Platforms has replaced its TKA series access platform with the P300KS. Mounted on a 7.5 tonne truck chassis, the P300KS has a working height of 30m with a maximum outreach to the side or the back of 20.5m. The cage, which offers 540 degrees of rotation, has a maximum load of 350kg.

A worrying trend has been identified in Italy with regard to road accidents. Data from Osservatorio Asaps-Il Centauro reveals that serious road accidents involving children up to the age of 13 increased by 10% to 541 in 2011, causing 65 fatalities and 625 injuries. Some 69% of the victims were on board the vehicles involved. While 14 of the victims were pedestrian, five were hit while on their bike and one died in a motorbike accident. The highest number of accidents was among children up to the age of five

Terex boss Ron DeFoe has spoken about the company’s expanded global strategy and confirmed his thoughts about the threat represented by Chinese manufacturers. “This year has started well for the Terex organisation and we are confident that our markets are moving into an extended cycle of economic growth right around the globe. As a result we are forecasting a significant growth in sales from US$6.5 billion (2011) to US$8.5 billion,” he said.