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Truck News July 2017

Tennessee International Dealer Turns Heads With Fuel Efficiency Demo Truck

Cumberland's C10 LT Series Tractor was developed in close cooperation with International and a host of aftermarket suppliers.

Photo: Cumberland International 

In the 1960s, when performance was king, it wasn't unusual for dealerships to take stock muscle cars and customize them to create highly desirable street machines that are avidly sought after by collectors today.

Today, a Cumberland, Tennessee, International dealership is using the same concept to provide high-performance trucks to its customers. But the emphasis today isn't on horsepower: It's on fuel economy.

We first featured Cumberland International's C10 project in a June 2016 cover story on breaking the 10-mph barrier. That truck was based on an International ProStar.

The second phase of Cumberland International's C10 truck project is a specially tweaked International LT tractor optimized to consistently deliver fleets 10 mpg in real-world trucking operations. The truck is the brainchild of Matt Smart, fleet sales director, and sales representative Patrick Mendenhall, who wanted to “think outside the box” to show customers that International was “making a great product again” while also demonstrating that a 10-plus-mpg truck is achievable to operate in day-to-day fleet operations.

Instead of waiting for a truck manufacturer's “Super Truck” or “Truck of the Future” to roll around, Mendenhall explained, the folks at Cumberland took the project into their own hands and spent most of 2013 building what the dealership calls the RX-C10, with a downsped Cummins X-15 powertrain, advanced safety systems and aerodynamics.

Mendenhall said he and Smart were designated Cumberland's “Fleet Team” by Cumberland dealer principle Terry Minor and began gathering information from resources and vendors to conceptualize the most aerodynamic truck possible.

“With ever-changing technology, this was no easy task," Mendenhall said. “Thankfully, many vendors were excited to help in any way possible to get this project started.” That said, he declines to specify exactly what improvements the ...Read the rest of this story

TechSpedite Offers Expedited New-Technician Training

New technicians progress based on what they've learned. Photo: Pro-Mech Learning Systems.

One company has developed a program aimed at tackling the technician shortage, with an expedited training program promising to create work-ready technicians.

Pro-Mech Learning Systems, which offers commercial vehicle repair training online and in the classroom, has launched TechSpedite; an accelerated four-week intensive training program designed to educate and place capable technicians faster and less expensively than traditional schools.

The course is taught in a real working shop over the course of a full working day to mirror their future environment, according to the company. Hands-on training is conducted daily on live equipment, and success is measured in terms of what the students actually learn rather than the amount of time they spend. Students progress by demonstrating the competency, knowledge, and skills required to complete each task.

TechSpedite's objective is to produce entry-level technicians that can immediately contribute by performing preventive maintenance inspections, diagnose and repair the most common service issues, and possess the basic soft skills required to be a productive tech. Each graduate is drug tested. The employer receives a detailed analysis of the tech's performance in the class, with a report from Pro-Mech outlining the strengths and weaknesses of each graduate and suggestions for on-boarding the tech into their workforce.

“We are finding a desire from students who want to minimize the cost and time commitment required with a traditional vocational college; and from employers eager to hire technicians with the basic skills to fill their demands,” said Chuck Barresi, CEO of Pro-Mech Learning Systems.

The TechSpedite four-week intensive training program teaches students with very limited skills or brand new entrants into the heavy-duty maintenance field the core skills they need to contribute to maintenance operations on the first day of their employment. Key areas of focus center around shop safety, ...Read the rest of this story

Trucking: A ‘poster child’ or ‘problem child’ for automation?

MONTREAL, QUE. Is the heavy trucking industry the poster child for automation or the problem child? It's a question that moderator Peter Sweatman, a co-founding principal at CAVita, posed to a panel of transportation experts discussing platooning and autonomous trucking here at Michelin's Movin'On Conference on sustainable mobility.

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