By switching to Isuzu 13.5 tonne rigids, national agricultural supplies company Carr’s Billington Agriculture Ltd is automatically benefitting from an extra 1.5 tonne payload per truck, in comparison to the incumbent 12 tonne trucks that they currently operate, thereby providing the company with much greater distribution efficiencies, without any disadvantages from moving up the GVW scale.
Carr’s Billington Agriculture has recently taken delivery of two new Isuzu F135.240 curtain sided rigids that are joining the company’s 174-strong HGV and LCV distribution fleet, with the vehicles working out of depots at Skipton in Yorkshire and Brecon in mid Wales.
These latest additional trucks are the first two new Isuzus to join the Carr’s Billington Agriculture fleet and follow-on from two Isuzu 7.5 tonne dropside rigids and three Isuzu 7.5 tonne curtainsided rigids that the company bought second hand a few years ago.
As David Wardle from Carr’s Billington Agriculture Ltd explains, “The Isuzus we operate are really reliable and have provided us with excellent service, so when we were looking to introduce some higher GVW trucks into our fleet, we decided to switch to Isuzu for these first two 13.5 tonne rigids, as they ticked all the right boxes for us.”
David continues, “The main priority for our distribution fleet is payload due to the diverse range of agricultural products that we deliver. We are running two 12 tonne vehicles however these are struggling with our payload demands and, although we didn’t want to move up to 18 tonne GVW trucks because of the extra capital and running costs, as well as the increased vehicle footprint, we found the Isuzus at 13.5 tonne to be the ideal vehicle.”
“With these Isuzus we can get an extra 1.5 tonne payload, yet the vehicles are the same footprint as the incumbent 12 tonne trucks, which facilitates access along narrow country lanes to farm properties that can often have tight entrances and overhanging branches. In addition, the Isuzus are really manoeuvrable as they literally do turn on a sixpence,” said David Wardle, “Another important element of the Isuzu 13.5 tonner is that its low chassis height enables easy access to the curtainsided body for the manual unloading of deliveries whilst at customer premises.”
Both vehicles have been supplied to Carr’s Billington Agriculture Ltd by Cumbria Truck Centre and will be operating in the company’s fleet for at least seven years, covering 50,000 km per annum, working on delivery routes handling from six up to 16 delivery drops per trip.
“All throughout the vehicle acquisition programme, the service we got from Cumbria Truck Centre was absolutely top-notch, making the whole process very easy and smooth and what I would call a really personal service,” commented David.
Carr’s Billington Agriculture Ltd has established its position as one of the UK’s leading agricultural supplies companies, operating compound feed mills at Carlisle, Lancaster and Stone, with blend plants at Kirkbride in Cumbria, at Lancaster and in Wales. It currently has 30 Country Stores throughout Northern England, Scotland and Wales, several of which have machinery sales and service departments and fuel distributions depots.
“Since their introduction, the Isuzu 13.5 tonne truck range has attracted the attention of many companies who can benefit from their significant payload advantages, whilst retaining a compact footprint comparable with smaller GVW trucks. These unique advantages make the trucks ideal for distribution operations such as those being operated by Carr’s Billington Agriculture, which concentrate on deliveries predominantly within rural areas,” said Pete Murphy, managing director, Isuzu Truck UK.
