Stokey ramp up their Bell ADT fleet

Plant hire firm takes delivery of ninth Bell B40D articulated dumptruck in less than 12 months

MIDLANDS-based Stokey Plant Hire have taken delivery of their ninth Bell dumptruck in less than a year. The first three Tier3b-compliant Bell B40D trucks were acquired at the end of 2011 and the company has since purchased six more B40Ds to add to its 30-plus fleet of trucks, loaders, excavators and dozers.

According to Stokey director Stewart Cox, many customers specify Bell trucks because of their fuel consumption. ‘Word about the fuel efficiency of the Bells has spread fairly rapidly,’ he commented. ‘Fuel consumption is especially important where the muck-shifting work is heavy-going.’

He added that the Bell ADTs were burning between four and eight litres per hour less fuel than rival trucks, and that Bell’s integral GPS-based Fleetmatic management software was a great benefit in terms of accurate data gathering.

‘I’m very pleased with the overall performance and reliability of the Bell ADTs, and the Fleetmatic system is extremely useful for gauging productivity on both our customers’ contracts and our own,’ he said.

The Bell ADTs have worked on a variety of contracts over the past few months, including an opencast coal operation in Scotland, a rock quarry in north Wales, a landfill site in Oxfordshire, sand and gravel extraction sites and general muck-shifting work.

Nick Learoyd, sales and marketing manager for Bell Equipment UK, said: ‘The wide range of work that is typical of a successful contracting and plant hire operation means that the machines must be highly versatile and up to the job, whatever job that may be.

‘The fact that Bell remain confident that the fuel efficiency of their ADTs is by far the best on the market, means that we have a very important additional tool in our box. And it’s fantastic to hear from other sources that the industry is now demanding Bells on the basis of their superior fuel economy.’