Delegates to the inaugural ComVec commercial vehicle engineering conference in Brisbane used the gathering to challenge regulators to keep up with the pace of technological change in road transport.
Organised by the Commercial Vehicle Industry Association of Queensland (CVIAQ), the conference was "unashamedly" not about the freight task, says CVIAQ CEO Brett Wright
By Gary Worrall | June 8, 2012
Delegates to the inaugural ComVec commercial vehicle engineering conference in Brisbane used the gathering to challenge regulators to keep up with the pace of technological change in road transport.
Organised by the Commercial Vehicle Industry Association of Queensland (CVIAQ), the conference was “unashamedly” not about the freight task, says CVIAQ CEO Brett Wright
Instead, it focused entirely on the engineering challenges facing designers.
Wright says despite recent cuts in Federal funding for vehicle innovation, the transport industry is still expected to provide safer, cleaner and more efficient vehicles for the freight task.
With the presenters including Queensland Transport and Main Roads (TMR) General Manager of the Road System Management Division Bruce Ollason and National Heavy Vehicle Regulator (NHVR) Deputy Project Director Angus Draheim, delegates had an opportunity to point out the challenges facing vehicle designers.
Ollason says while Performance Based Standards (PBS) vehicles offer “massive potential” to deliver improvements in freight handling, the challenge for road managers is the number of ageing bridges that limit individual vehicle masses.
Citing Queensland’s road network, Ollason says there are many bridges that could never be upgraded, a point later supported by fellow departmental officer Mark Mitchell, who says many of the bridges are already at the upper limit of their weight capacities.
These comments were supported by PBS certifier Ken Cowell, who warned designers to beware of pitfalls surrounding PBS vehicles, including the assumption that the road network can support a specific application.
Cowell says guaranteed road access, especially bridges, are one of the biggest stumbling blocks to getting new PBS vehicles approved.
Forum moderator Neil Findlay says the need for “better” or expanded road access for existing vehicles could deliver benefits not just in the freight task but also for designers looking to eke out incremental gains from current designs.
For an expanded coverage of the 2012 ComVec conference, see the July edition of ATN Magazine.
