One of the world’s leading supplier of trucks and bus came out in full force to show the latest at the IAA Commercial Vehicle in Hanover. The major trade fair for mobility, transportation and logistics enabled visitors to see the full diversity of MAN Truck & Bus models.
The central theme of the new models was fuel efficiency, as innovative technology has resulted in reduced fuel consumption on the part of trucks and buses, resulting in lower running costs on the one hand and less emission on the other.
MAN has also made great strides when it comes to ensuring even more safety features, providing confidence to passengers and vehicle owners.
“In Europe, there are many regulations and stringent laws as safety is a top priority in many countries when it comes to heavy vehicles. But our engineers are also continuously striving to innovate through engineering for safety features,” said Dirk Szusgien, Head of After Sales for MAN Truck & Bus (M) Sdn. Bhd. in a recent interview.
“Bus and coach is one of the largest commercial modes of passenger transport apart from the private car. It provides more than 50% of European public transport services,” he said.
In Europe, according to the CARE (EU road accident database) 2009, statistics shows it is the safest of all road transport modes and equal the safety of trains, despite sharing infrastructure with other users and modes.
From 2007 to 2008, bus and coach passengers represented 0.57% of road fatalities in the European Union, lower even than the 0.79% attributed to agricultural tractors. Private vehicles contributed to almost half of road fatalities at 49.58%.
Among the regulations set up to prevent driver fatigue is to ensure that drivers take breaks and rest periods.
“A driver may not drive for more than 4 hours without taking one break of 45 minutes or several breaks of at least 15 minutes taken over the 4 hours. The daily driving limit is 9 hours but twice a week this may be extended to 10 hours. A maximum of 90 driving hours in two consecutive weeks must be observed,” Dirk said about the driving regulations in the EU.
“In order to record the driving time and rest periods of bus and coach drivers, vehicles have to be fitted with a recording device called an electronic tachograph, which records the hours on a computer chip. Hence, a driver cannot drive more than the stipulated hour, even on another bus because the system is all synchronized,” Dirk added.
Based on many years of accident research, MAN has specifically improved the active safety of its trucks and buses. This has given rise to today´s assistance systems that are available as standard features for their coach and bus in Europe and support drivers in precisely those situations which have proved to be the most frequent causes of accidents, namely Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC), Emergency Brake Assist (EBA) and Lane Guard System (LGS).
Apart from the systems already available as standard features on show at the IAA, MAN researchers also offered a preview of systems on which they are currently focusing with the aim of supporting drivers in other accident-prone driving situations. These will act as an extended "electronic eye" for the driver who, from the cabin, has no direct view of certain points around his vehicle.
All these systems are conceptual prototypes illustrating the present status of MAN´s research in the field of active safety. They include a lane change assistant for multi-lane highways, a turn-off assistant for turning right in urban traffic, as well as a camera system which, in future, will replace a number of various side mirrors and is able to combine the surrounding traffic flow into a single picture.
“However, even without these technological advances, just as important is that the vehicle must be well maintained. Servicing vehicles ensures it road worthiness and also help improves fuel efficiency. Maintenance of vehicles is also a safety issue. Hence, for MAN vehicles on the Malaysian roads, it is important that coaches and trucks be serviced by experienced MAN personnel. That is why MAN is opening up another service center, this time in Seberang Prai, Penang. We have a service centre in Rawang and Kota Bharu and opened in Johor Bahru in June. We will be ready in December for Penang. Our objective is to provide convenience for our customers as we serve the north, central and south region with the best after sales service,” Dirk added
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