[aaggoswami]

A few images from my earlier trip on highway.
Spotted these trucks around 80 kms. from Vadodara towards Ahmedabad.

[Ashley2]

Normally I travel home in NH 47 and used to skip sangakiri in bye pass.But this time when I was returning I wanted to go inside the town to witness how so much trucks are sold in "Trucking City". There are body building workshops in every corner and each of them are jam packed building truck bodies.
Typical Tamilnadu style truck cabs are always different from the rest of India.They never use much of Cowl/FES from the manufacturer and they craft/sculpt their own style.
As I was passing through the city- the city itself was almost like a junk yard with so much cabs/FSMs/Frames been thrown off. I have also seen brand new FES of AL been removed and scrapped and they were building their own style of cab with angles/flats - welded together.
Apart from this there was a huge TVS Ashokleyland outlet - not sure they have any dealerships for cars - almost a size of sales yard.





Unusually there was a Govt.Bus standing in the service center.

[Ashley2]

This is a 30.25 with a AL FES.
The FES is properly jeweled into the truck though the first sight will tell you its 2214 unless you look at front axle hub covers.

[Ashley2]

Originally Posted by julupani

1. 25 Tata LPT 3118c chassis moving towards Chennai on NH5. This model is becoming more and more common by the day.
2. 11 Tata LPS 4018 Tip-trailors. All belonged to ARSS Infrastructure, and were numbered. The highest I saw was 108. A bit surprised to see tip trailors getting used for road construction work.

The scenes you have seen must be a convoy moving towards RSO's and no matter they are numbered one by one.

[julupani]

@Ashley

The 3118c chassis were definitely moving towards the RSOs from where they would move to the actual dealers where they will be delivered.

The tip-trailors, like I said, belonged to ARSS Infra and they were marked pretty prominently with the company name. They were also carrying a load, so they were in use and not moving to any RSOs or any other such place.

Also, Tata does not have any numbering system on the trucks despatched to regional depots. As far as I know they still use the same old bar-coded VIN to get the job done.

[D33-PAC]

Ashley2 what is a FES and FSM?

Why are Tamil Nadu cabins built so differently ? I thought fleet owners like to keep it minimalist to save costs but won't rebuilding everything make things more expensive?

[Ashley2]

Originally Posted by D33-PAC

Ashley2 what is a FES and FSM?

FES - Front End Structure more commonly called as Cowl.
FSM - Frame Side Members ( Two FSMs join together to form a Frame assy)

Originally Posted by D33-PAC

Why are Tamil Nadu cabins built so differently ? I thought fleet owners like to keep it minimalist to save costs but won't rebuilding everything make things more expensive?

Yes, they are very peculiar in design and body building!
They almost scrap the OE FES and build their own style.
They are very cost effective during repair but why to spend initially is a question mark?

[Ashley2]

@D33-PAC : Refer my earlier post 114 in
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/commer...ml#post1744048

[D33-PAC]

Originally Posted by Ashley2

FES - Front End Structure more commonly called as Cowl.
FSM - Frame Side Members ( Two FSMs join together to form a Frame assy)


Yes, they are very peculiar in design and body building!
They almost scrap the OE FES and build their own style.
They are very cost effective during repair but why to spend initially is a question mark?

That doesn't really make sense considering fleet owners like to save $$$. I recently spoke to a truck driver(from AP) to gain some insight and he told me ALL sells less because spare parts are hard to find(just making the point below understandable)
It's hard to understand why TN builders would build their cabins like that, for N.P. vehicles from TN , finding spares for the cabin exteriors(panels, etc) would be quite difficult. So I really don't see how the TN building style might have any financial sense to it.

I think the most the most frequently damaged spot on these vehicles is the cowl. It would require custom manufacturing for an TN vehicle outside TN to replace the cowl panels.

Is it possible there might be some performance gains? TN vehicles seem to have wider grills allowing greater airflow into the radiator.

[BaCkSeAtDrIVeR]

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/shifti...ml#post2330891

Dunno why that was posted in the jokes thread. To be fair, I find it funny.

And reminds me of how the crew used to do it on fishing boats. A rope would be wound over the power take off, and pulled, causing the power take off to turn the crank. Sometimes, this may fail - especially in older engines, and another boat would be required to pull the rope.

And once, have seen a loaded truck being pushed by another one - because manual pushing to start would have been impossible. They gingerly brought the rear ends together - the way the hero and heroine does it in song and dance sequences.

[AlphaKilo]

found this website when googled for TATA 3516 C. This website still shows some exotics/piece of junk from tata like Sierra(my favourite), Sumo 4x4, Safari (Gen 1) and Tata mobile. Its like going back to old school days.

Sterling Motors - Dealers of TELCO vehicles in India.

But when one needs info on the commercial vehicles, I guess we can look in here, as they have given almost complete info on individual models. This is even better than the Tatas website itself where we a see Eicher 10.16

[julupani]

@AlphaKilo

The website is useful only in one way. To get info about Tata's model range from abou 8-10years ago. The LCV and ICV range showed there still exists, except for the LPT1009, but I beleive with many changes in the specs. Among the M&HCV range, none except the 1613 variants, are in the market any more.

Not to mention, the many many new models that are not showed there.

I would still think it better to look at the present Tata Motors website, which is atleast only 3-4years out of date. And all the products on the Tata website are still on sale at least. You may also refer to Tata CV Global website for some other models.

I think Tata is in the process of improving all its CV websites. It started with the Construck site, then the main website and now recently the Buses website. So I think you can hope that the CV truck website will be up in the next few months.

Also, as an additional info the Tata LPS 3516 is also no longer in production.

[D33-PAC]

Saw a LPT 2516 TC today with a regular hauling body. for the first time! I wonder why these barely sell?

[Ashley2]

what are the engine options in Tata CV range right now - both BSIII and BS IV

[julupani]

@D33PAC

What do you mean regular hauling body? The LPT2516 is not a tipper, its a standard haulage model only.