National Road Planing (NRP), a subsidiary of Tarmac Ltd, has taken delivery of five new drawbars from Andover Trailers to support the operation of its latest cold milling machines throughout the UK.
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The order comprises two high-specification centre-balance drawbar trailers with beavertails (model CBDBCL 25), designed specifically to carry smaller cold milling machines weighing up to 17 tonnes. This pair is joined by three lighter tri-axle drawbars (model CBDBCLLT 25), custom-built by Andover Trailers to transport Wirtgen’s new, heavier generation of planer. Two of these trailers will operate with W100Fs, and one with the even larger W120F.
These heavy Wirtgen planers are difficult to transport on a traditional drawbar trailer due to their increased weight (1.6 and 1.0 tonnes respectively) with the W120F coming in at 20 tonnes, but Andover Trailers has developed pioneering designs using a careful blend of different steels to combine an ultra-low unladen weight with a model offering utmost strength.
The five trailers purchased by NRP will operate nationally, travelling between destinations ranging from Devon to Edinburgh, and are tough enough to handle long journeys functioning at their maximum gross trailer weight.
Jamie Town, Operations Director for NRP, commented: “We’ve worked with Andover Trailers many times before, and the company has always provided us with a quality product that is robust, reliable and doesn’t let us down.
“Andover Trailers gets involved from the outset, working closely with the equipment manufacturer to ensure the trailer is perfect for the intended application. All we ever need to do is tell the Andover team what machine we want to carry and they tell us exactly what we need.”
The two centre-balance drawbar trailers are 7.4m long and feature SAF axles, with an optional lifting front axle with auto lower control. The specification also includes hydraulic steady legs coupled to the operation of the 1.2m wide hydraulic power toe ramps, together with Andover’s custom slide-out safety lights.
The three tri-axle drawbars are 10.1m long and use regular SAF axles, with manual swing-down steady legs and 1m wide off-side and 600mm near-side hydraulic power ramps, designed to keep weight to a minimum.
All five of the trailers are fitted with SAF air suspension with raise/lower control, 2 line EEC / EBS braking system with auto slack adjusters and feature an adjustable conveyor support. Like the rest of the fleet, they operate in conjunction with a mix of MAN and Scania tippers.[/private]
