Truck Tyres
The Aufine Group says it “enjoyed a very active and successful” CITExpo show this year, with a great deal of interest from visitors. Speaking with Tyres & Accessories at the Shanghai show, company general manager David Sun says that although he’d observed signs of the current global economic situation amongst people he’d met during the exhibition, the Aufine team nevertheless met new contacts and held meetings that offer a good chance for new business relationships.
Stapleton’s became the tyre distribution industry’s first to launch an online ordering system more than a decade ago. More recently the company upgraded this and now the recently revamped ProfitLink2 reportedly remains a leader in the field, putting the leading distributor’s nationwide 1,200,000 units of tyre stocks at its retail customers’ fingertips. The latest development relates to the tyre labelling legislation that will take effect shortly after this article is published in print at the back end of October.
Don’t you just hate it when you’re driving down the road and people start shooting at you? Apart from the noise and inconvenience involved, a stray bullet can really wreak havoc on your tyres. Fortunately, one Hangzhou, China-based tyre maker has the answer for those who want to avoid weapons-related punctures.
At this week’s IAA Commercial Vehicles show in Germany, Goodyear is launching its first ever dedicated European-market coach tyres, the Goodyear Marathon Coach and Goodyear Ultra Grip Coach winter drive tyre. Both tyres are available in 295/80R22.5 and 315/80R22.5, with all products to be available on the market by the end of October.
Within Europe, Bridgestone is progressively replacing its R297 steer and M729 drive tyres with the newly-developed R-STEER 001 and R-DRIVE 001 regional application truck tyres. Commenting on the pair’s launch, which coincides with the IAA Commercial Vehicles show in Germany, Bridgestone says the new tyres are “designed for robustness in versatile usage, providing high-level performance and a long lifecycle in a wide range of operating conditions.”
Visitors to Michelin’s stand at the IAA Commercial Vehicles show in Germany, which opens to the public today, will be greeted by a whole new range of tyres from the French manufacturer. The world premier of the X Line Energy range is being held at the show; Michelin says the launch of the new range comes at a “special time” as it coincides with the introduction of the European tyre labelling programme.
Dutch industrial, off-the-road and commercial tyre manufacturer, Magna Tyres Group, has launched a renewed website at www.magnatyres.com. Employing the business’s new corporate imagery, the Magna Tyres website provides online visitors with a visual presentation of its whole product line, including off-the-road tyres, industrial tyres and truck tyres.
Goodyear has launched an information campaign about winter road safety aimed at commercial vehicle owners and fleets. The manufacturer says it has identified a common misconception, with many commercial vehicle operators assuming that winter tyres are only suitable for snow and ice. Of course, readers of Tyrepress.com will be well aware that winter tyres are developed not only for extreme weather conditions; they also perform better than other tyres at temperatures below 7°C, because of optimised designs and softer, high-silica compounds that don’t harden like regular driving compounds.
Beijing based Best Choice International Trade Co., Ltd. launched the Mazzini radial truck tyre brand in August. Labelling tests have already taken place and the 315/80 R22.5 MZ266 product is said to be rated C in fuel efficiency and D in wet grip.
Kirkby Tyres’ philosophy of stocking large quantities of high quality on and off-road highway tyres and wheels to cover every possible application for both OE and replacement markets has reportedly earned the company increased business. The exclusive importer of Double Coin tyres, Kirkby reports that it has sold over a million tyres to the replacement market to date.
Established in 2002 and with the backing of the highly-regarded Mesnac Company Limited, Sailun reports that it is gaining a “fast-growing reputation” for its radial truck tyre range. According to the company, its development has been fuelled by quality standards enhanced by the research, design and technical testing facilities occupied by over 300 technical Sailun engineers and staff in the National Economic and Technological Development Zone in Qingdao.
While no-one in the tyre industry claims to have bypassed the combined effects of the credit crunch, euro-crisis and the consequent recession(s), it is fair to say that these economic phenomena have had particularly marked effects on the commercial vehicle tyre market. First of all, as a direct result of customer demand scaling back, truck makers cut down on vehicle production, with the tyre manufacturers responsible for supplying these OEMs forced to follow suit. As fleets responded to falling demand for their services and extended the life of their tyres as far as possible (as well laying up trailers and cannibalising tyres whenever they could), what began as a demand shock in the OE side of the business developed into a replacement slump as well.
With European tyre labelling set to become mandatory on truck tyres in a matter of weeks, Tyres & Accessories published some 20 pages of in-depth coverage on what this all means for the market in last month’s August edition. Nevertheless we barely scratched the surface and one has to admit that the majority of tyre labelling reporting leans towards the passenger car side of things.
Production at Michelin’s Ballymena plant has passed the 30 million mark; management and staff at the factory marked this milestone on 30 August. The milestone also coincided with the start of production of a new size in the X MultiWay 3D range.
The Warrior brand is set to do battle with in the Chinese market, and perhaps will be pitted against premium brands. On 28 August the joint venture operation run by Double Coin Holdings, parent company Shanghai Huayi (Group) and Michelin unveiled its new passenger car range. Double Coin Group (Anhui) Warrior Tires began manufacturing Warrior branded tyres at its Wuwei, Anhui province factory in March and the new facility is expected to have a six million tyre a year capacity by the end of 2012. Output capacity should reach 15 million a year by 2015.
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