New Light & Medium Duty News

[Joe771476]

Thanks for that info on the electric buses Twintornados.  Meanwhile I'm a little puzzled.  As Bob R. and I have noticed, observations on the roads/highways here in New England don't reflect sales throughout the rest of the country.  But here in CT, I think I'm seeing more Ram Promasters than Transits!  I havent seen a Sprinter or GM van in months!  The only Sprinter I've seen was on TV transferring Fotis  Dulos from a UConn ambulance to a Life Star helicopter!  The USPS (post office) bought a ton of Promasters and I'm seeing a ton of blue Amazon Promasters as well.  Must be they're dumping them for peanuts and why FCA was charged with paying off the union for lower wages.

[Bob Rosadini]

Just what Ford needed-more competition-the long rumored Mack mediums are here....

Volvo opens manufacturing facility in Virginia for new Mack medium-duty truck line

 

Jason Cannon, Commercial Carrier Journal (CCJ)  /  January 30, 2020

Mack Trucks on Thursday cut the ribbon on a new production facility in Salem, Virginia, that the company will use to build a new medium duty truck lineup.

 

Mack’s Roanoke Valley Operations (RVO) – a 280,000 square foot facility, representing an investment of $13 million in Roanoke County – will employ upwards of 250 people and is charged with birthing Mack’s new MD6 and MD7, Class 6 and Class 7 trucks, respectively.

 

Jonathan Randall, Mack Trucks senior vice president of North American sales and marketing, noted the official unveiling of RVO and the company’s expanded lineup caps a process that started two years ago.

 

Governor Ralph Northam has approved a $700,000 grant from the Commonwealth’s Opportunity Fund for the project. Mack’s investment will be being used for equipment, tooling and building enhancements.

 

“This is a great day for Salem, a great day for Roanoke County and a great day for all of Virginia,” said Brian Ball, Virginia’s secretary of commerce and trade.

 

Unemployment in Virginia sits at 2.6%, a full percent below the national average, and Mack Trucks President Martin Weissburg cited the local pool of potential employees as an attraction to the area, which is also strategically positioned between Mack’s Geeensboro, N.C. headquarters and its Allentown, Pennsylvania truck production site. It’s also less than an hour from sister company Volvo Trucks North America’s New River Valley truck production site.

 

“We’re excited about being part of being part of this community,” Weissburg said.

 

The operation is expected to have annual impact of $364 million across the region.

 

The Mack MD6 & MD7

 

Mack’s new medium duty entries – the Class 6 MD6 and Class 7 MD7 – unlocks new over the road segments for the truck maker.

 

The Mack MD6 has a Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR) of 25,995 pounds, and the MD7 model has a GVWR of 33,000 pounds. Both are exempt from the 12% Federal Excise Tax (FET).

 

Serial production of the trucks is set to begin this summer and the company is already taking orders.

 

The MD lineup becomes the first automotive project in the State of Virginia to go from prototype to production, and targets trucking applications in dry van and refrigerated segments, and stake/flatbed, dump and tank truck vocations.

 

The exterior is stylized similarly to Mack’s on-highway champion, Anthem, but the new MD trucks will be equipped with Cummins 6.7 liter engine and made available in a 4×2 configuration. Mack says both models will feature a sharp wheel cut for urban maneuverability and noted the MD Series cab design features a short, industry-leading, 103-inch bumper-to-back-of-cab (BBC) measurement.

 

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[SoonerLS]

4 hours ago, Joe771476 said:

I'm seeing a ton of blue Amazon Promasters as well.  Must be they're dumping them for peanuts and why FCA was charged with paying off the union for lower wages.

I see a bunch of Amazon vans every day; there's a UPS depot not far from my office, and it looks like Amazon is cohabitating with them--it's not uncommon to see a long stream of Amazon smiles at the stoplight that serves the access road to the depot. I don't recall seeing any ProMasters, but I've seen about equal numbers of Transits and Sprinters in Amazon blue.

 

Of course, if I want to see a bunch of Transits, all I have to do is go out to the shop. We have a boatload of them in our fleet, and this is the low part of our year, so almost all of them were parked in the shop. (They're the lifeblood of the company, so they don't get left outside while they're at home.) Seriously, it looked like the shop guys had been playing Tetris with Transits...

[Gurgeh]

11 hours ago, SoonerLS said:

I see a bunch of Amazon vans every day; there's a UPS depot not far from my office, and it looks like Amazon is cohabitating with them--it's not uncommon to see a long stream of Amazon smiles at the stoplight that serves the access road to the depot. I don't recall seeing any ProMasters, but I've seen about equal numbers of Transits and Sprinters in Amazon blue.

 

Of course, if I want to see a bunch of Transits, all I have to do is go out to the shop. We have a boatload of them in our fleet, and this is the low part of our year, so almost all of them were parked in the shop. (They're the lifeblood of the company, so they don't get left outside while they're at home.) Seriously, it looked like the shop guys had been playing Tetris with Transits...

 

100,000 of them will eventually be Rivian "Prime" vans.

[jpd80]

8 hours ago, Gurgeh said:

 

100,000 of them will eventually be Rivian "Prime" vans.

The catch is that Amazon won't own them, all will be sold to subcontract delivery businesses. It sounds a lot like how Uber sets up its drivers with vehicles that are

A suitable an apps to co-ordinate deliveries. 

 

Bezos won't touch the delivery side of the business because

He knows it's a lot of work for little return, best left to small

businesses.

Edited February 1, 2020 by jpd80

[SoonerLS]

6 minutes ago, jpd80 said:

The catch is that Amazon won't own them, all will be sold to subcontract delivery businesses. It sounds a lot like how Uber sets up its drivers with vehicles that are

A suitable an apps to co-ordinate deliveries. 

 

Bezos won't touch the delivery side of the business because

He knows it's a lot of work for little return, best left to small

businesses.

It’s sort of how Uber wants things to work—the Uber drivers bring their own cars, and Uber tries to classify them (the drivers) as contractors. 
 

In Amazon‘s case, they’re trying to get their employees to start their own delivery service companies which would then contract back to Amazon (among others) for delivery services. The main differences are that Amazon is helping them get set up in business, whereas Uber is making them bring their own vehicles to the party; and Amazon is also trying to functionally use them as contractors, not just trying to designate employees as contractors. 

[Bob Rosadini]

8 minutes ago, SoonerLS said:

It’s sort of how Uber wants things to work—the Uber drivers bring their own cars, and Uber tries to classify them (the drivers) as contractors. 
 

In Amazon‘s case, they’re trying to get their employees to start their own delivery service companies which would then contract back to Amazon (among others) for delivery services. The main differences are that Amazon is helping them get set up in business, whereas Uber is making them bring their own vehicles to the party; and Amazon is also trying to functionally use them as contractors, not just trying to designate employees as contractors. 

IMO, "indentured servants"!  Amazon will set the rate for the vehicle lease. Unlike company drivers, the supervision will be minimal.  Want to spend a lot of time in having coffee?  then don't complain about how much money you make- "its a 8.5 hour day- you took 9.9 hours?-that's your problem,".  And I would assume as they have an investment in the truck, Amazon will have standards.  The routes will probably be dispatched by some sort of automated system that will sequence the loading and say..." Here you go- XX stops, and yy total miles for the day.  Projected hours...Z.ZZ"   Miss the standards too often and you are out of a job.

 

By the way, ever see an overweight UPS driver?.  An example of a company that has tough performance standards for its package car drivers and enforces them.

[jpd80]

Doug Heffernan of King of Queens?

 

[jpd80]

1 hour ago, SoonerLS said:

It’s sort of how Uber wants things to work—the Uber drivers bring their own cars, and Uber tries to classify them (the drivers) as contractors. 
 

In Amazon‘s case, they’re trying to get their employees to start their own delivery service companies which would then contract back to Amazon (among others) for delivery services. The main differences are that Amazon is helping them get set up in business, whereas Uber is making them bring their own vehicles to the party; and Amazon is also trying to functionally use them as contractors, not just trying to designate employees as contractors. 

Uber actually has policies to allow drivers to access new vehicles to lease, the bottom line is that they want service providers

classified as contractors but to do that, they must be free to service other clients and that's the key to Uber allowing drivers

to work for other companies, exclusivity may make sole operators  technically employees which defeats the whole plan.

For Amazon, all they have to demonstrate is some separation that makes their drivers a separate business entity,

I think that's easy to show in commercial freight.

Edited February 2, 2020 by jpd80

[SoonerLS]

2 hours ago, Bob Rosadini said:

IMO, "indentured servants"!  Amazon will set the rate for the vehicle lease. Unlike company drivers, the supervision will be minimal.  Want to spend a lot of time in having coffee?  then don't complain about how much money you make- "its a 8.5 hour day- you took 9.9 hours?-that's your problem,".  And I would assume as they have an investment in the truck, Amazon will have standards.  The routes will probably be dispatched by some sort of automated system that will sequence the loading and say..." Here you go- XX stops, and yy total miles for the day.  Projected hours...Z.ZZ"   Miss the standards too often and you are out of a job.

That sounds like the gig for any self-employed person. If you don’t make your client happy, they won’t keep paying you. As FedEx and UPS are discovering. 

[Joe771476]

If Mack wants to go into 6 & 7, then let's have Ford go into class 8!  Let the games begin!

[twintornados]

On 1/31/2020 at 8:59 PM, Bob Rosadini said:

.

 

 

Hmmm, let me see where I saw that styling before...

[Bob Rosadini]

TT...No this is where you saw it...

 

 

 

 

 

3 hours ago, twintornados said:

 

Hmmm, let me see where I saw that styling before...

 

 

 

[Bob Rosadini]

Further to this new Mack and from an old guys perspective.  I remember when the Louisville was introduced.  Ford spent a lot of money advertising-including Saturday TV spots during football games.  Among its key selling points...." high cab seating position, improved lines of forward visibility "etc.  What did International do?  For the class 6/7 markets they started showing  pictures of their Loadstars claiming among other things....."unlike the competition, your drivers won't get tired out climbing up and down all day to get into that  high cab".   They also made a point of saying that with its high cab and big doors, the "competition" would suffer/cause damage when parked next to other trucks at tight loading docks or words  to that effect.

And talk about advertising, there was a  TV ad spot with two guys sitting in a diner and they look out and say..."look its a glass truck!"  They go out and its a new Louisville and the cab door is transparent so they could look through it into the cab.  Mind you this ad is airing on network TV during a football game.

Can you imagine Ford spending that kind of ad dollars today on anything other than 150 or an SUV?

 

Joe 76..or OlWiz You guys are probably only other guy here who might have a vague memory of any of this?

[Joe771476]

Gee Bob, if my memory serves me, the L-series came out in the early 70's I believe and the CB radio craze was starting in the mid-70's and I was looking for girls!!! I was in my early to mid 20's!   I didn't watch much football or any TV, but I did watch some!  Don't remember the ads, but I always had a wish for a Ford TV ad during a sports game where Ford would brag about how they were the No. 1 police cruiser and show some in action, and then ambulance chassis, and then largest supplier of COMMERCIAL fire chassis and have a C-series and F-series come barreling down the center of the screen with siren and hair horns!  Tag line would be something like,  "No other mfr. is relied upon more for emergency response than Ford!"  Oh it would have been great!  "You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one!"  On a side note, Hino has sold 8 Class 8 units YTD as of Nov 2019.  It's going to be interesting how that number climbs.

[7Mary3]

The new Mack looks pretty good, but powertrain-wise it's just another ISB/Allison medium duty like the M2 and Durastar/MV.  In my area Freightliner and Navistar have plenty of dealers, while Mack and Volvo dealers are nearly non-existent.  I expect the Mack medium duty to do poorly in Southern California.  That is a shame, it looks like a competitive truck.

 

That having been said, I am not of the opinion the F-650 really needs an ISB/Allison powertrain.  I don't think the ISB is any better at all than the 6.7L Powerstroke in output, reliability, or fuel economy.  The 6R-140 TorqShift is the equivalent of the 2000 series Allison.  The only thing an ISB/Allison powertrain would do for the F-650 is make it more expensive.  The 750 is a different story though.  If Ford were serious about class 7, they should offer the Cummins ISL/Allison 3000 in it which would also open the door for an F-850 tandem axle.  Yes, it would raise the price but class 7 is more expensive anyway with the excise tax and I think Ford could still maintain their cost advantage over other makes.  

 

The 7.3L gas should be a big improvement over the 6.8L but I don't expect it to result in a great sales increase. 

 

I really wonder about the future of the 650 and 750 with the changes coming to Avon Lake.          

[Joe771476]

What changes are coming to Avon Lake 7M3?

[7Mary3]

10 minutes ago, Joe771476 said:

What changes are coming to Avon Lake 7M3?

 

2023 Avon Lake is suppose to start building BEV's.  No word if truck production will continue there after that. 

[SoonerLS]

3 hours ago, 7Mary3 said:

 

2023 Avon Lake is suppose to start building BEV's.  No word if truck production will continue there after that. 

I don’t think  they have enough capacity to fold the OHAP SuperDuty production back into KTP, so I don’t see how they could stop truck production there. They’d have to move Expedition and Navigator somewhere else to even think about that. 

[jpd80]

35 minutes ago, SoonerLS said:

I don’t think  they have enough capacity to fold the OHAP SuperDuty production back into KTP, so I don’t see how they could stop truck production there. They’d have to move Expedition and Navigator somewhere else to even think about that. 

They have also increased production at KTP For Super Duty and the big SUVs

[Bob Rosadini]

Seeking Alpha post this morning says Ford has increased  OAP new employee count from 1500 to 1800 and says product announcement will be made "in very near future".  I'm hoping that will be at the Work Truck Show in a couple of weeks.  Once again Ford has the most company reps registered and one of the  biggest display  areas booked at that event.  

Interesting that Mack is setting up  new class 6 and 7 trucks in a leased facility of some 200,000 sq. ft and announcing an investment of $13 million.

We have been told the OAP plant with a $900 million investment will be cranking out electrics of some sort- hopefully it won't mean the end of 650-750 to  make room for Hackett's desire  to electrify everything.

[bzcat]

I think OAP will end up being home of Ford's electric Amazon van.

[jpd80]

3 hours ago, bzcat said:

I think OAP will end up being home of Ford's electric Amazon van.

Or would Rivian just build them at its own van plant in Illinois.......

[ausrutherford]

2 hours ago, jpd80 said:

Or would Rivian just build them at its own van plant in Illinois.......

 

Look at the product in the right upper corner:

[jpd80]

OK, I thought Ohio was where the two mid-sized crossover BEVs would be built

Are we now looking at multiple vehicles from the same plant?