Subject:
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Re: a question for those with lots of technic
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.technic
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Date:
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Wed, 7 Mar 2001 13:13:07 GMT
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Viewed:
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1198 times
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In lugnet.technic, Jennifer Clark writes:
> Gaurav Thakur wrote:
>
> > IYeah, they actually don't look too bad if several of them are used (as done
> > in Dennis Bosman's mobile crane). The ones placed in the rear can also be
> > stacked in front of each other pretty easily to make the model look a bit
> > more realistioc (real trucks seem to have multiple tires placed on top of
> > one another in the rear).
>
> I've no idea what the situation is in the US, but in the UK there seems
> to be a move away from the double wheel arrangement on trucks. The
> majority of trailers
> nowadays, for example, have three axles, each of which has only single tyres,
> albeit slighter wider than normal. I believe the law here states that driven
> wheels must be double when bearing a heavy load, but other than that there is no
> explicit requirement. This leads to a fairly common arrangement on 6x2 tractors,
> where only one of the rear axles (the driven one) has double wheels. The
> non-driven rear axle is often steered and can be retracted for travel with a
> light or empty load.
The US has a HUGE fleet which makes it hard to spot trends sometimes. The
vast majority of over the road trucks continue to be 18 wheelers (tractor
with 1 steer axle, 2 tires, and two drive axles, 4 tires each, trailer with
two axles, 4 tires each). However I have noticed a slight increase in the
number of single tired axles on trailers. Very slight, so far. A single axle
instead of two is more common. We've always had a lot of variation (trailers
with smaller wheels for highcube low weight lading, trailers with extra
axles, steel centipedes with 8 axles all of which can be independently
raised to "walk around" corners, etc) so it's hard to tell.
In construction trucking (dumps (tippers), concrete pumper trucks, cement
mixers, building supply trucks) the trend is toward much larger (and lower
pressure) single tires on the rear axles. But these are mostly straight
trucks rather than semis (artics). And I think the trend there is driven
more by increased sensitivity to soft ground and the damage that dualies
cause than anything else.
However dual steer axles are very rare overall. Much rarer than in the UK,
they are used only in very special situations (cranes and the like) where
there is no way to balance the load without using them. Usually the vehicle
itself was imported from Europe, although I have seen one Mack that had
them. Once.
I think part of the reason for dual wheel popularity is the vast number of
truck stops we have that are equipped to service them (at 700 bucks a tire
to replace one tire!!!) making change (of the equipment) a long and
expensive proposition.
Laws about what is the max allowed vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction,
most states set their own weight and axle/wheel limits. But the tire and
wheel sizes seem pretty standard across the US.
Disclaimer, I don't work in this biz, this is based on my (could be flawed)
observation only as I travel around the nation...
++Lar
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: a question for those with lots of technic
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| (...) Great answer Larry, you must have a mind like mine that accumulates all this sort of stuff for later citing. My head is full of it, which is pretty sad in a way but useful if one makes Technic models :-) (...) This sounds interesting - are (...) (24 years ago, 7-Mar-01, to lugnet.technic)
| | | Re: a question for those with lots of technic
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| (...) Yeah...I'm in the US too and mostly see the usual 18 wheelers. I have seen quite a few trash trucks though which seem to have 3 drive axles in the back, each housing 4 wheels (making total number of wheels 14). The interesting thing is that (...) (24 years ago, 8-Mar-01, to lugnet.technic)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: a question for those with lots of technic
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| (...) I've no idea what the situation is in the US, but in the UK there seems to be a move away from the double wheel arrangement on trucks. The majority of trailers nowadays, for example, have three axles, each of which has only single tyres, (...) (24 years ago, 7-Mar-01, to lugnet.technic)
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