This is a recent contribution to LAPV Magazine by Josh Sweeney, Strategic Marketing Manager at Multevo.
The formidable ‘Beast from the East’ as well as the ‘Pest from the West’ delivered a prolonged period of winter weather the UK hadn’t experienced for some time, arguably since 2010 – ironically the same year Multihog established in the UK.
The only thing that seems certain is the unpredictability of the British climate and as such local authorities are looking for cost-effective solutions that meet this growing uncertainty.
Naturally, the adaptability of plant and equipment within council arsenals to tackle erratic weather will invariably be a key advantage in terms of operational response and long-term efficiency moving forward.
The Multihog is a unique range of articulated multi-purpose vehicles that accept a wide array of attachments to the front and rear for all year utilisation to maximise return on investment through improved fleet efficiency and operational productivity.
The machines have helped over a third of all UK local authorities reduce overheads, whilst maximising service delivery, by selecting one versatile machine to tackle several different highways, grounds and winter maintenance operations.
The robust, road legal and hydrostatic four-wheel drive Multihog machine range is now the UK market leader in its class because of its enhanced manoeuvrability and unrivalled reliability in every application it undertakes – especially winter resilience.
All Multihog users have the unique ability of instantaneous winterisation, as soon as a change in the weather, because all attachments can be easily interchanged within a matter of minutes without the need for mechanical tools or lifting equipment.
Multevo Limited, the UK Multihog distributor since 2010, has the world’s largest dedicated Multihog and attachments hire fleet, which enables existing Multihog customers to hire additional winter attachments such as snow ploughs, gritters, de-icers and snow blowers to integrate with their existing machines at minimal cost.
As well as hire flexibility, many Multihog owners are realising the empirical advantages of utilising multi-purpose machines to replace several traditional single-purpose plant and equipment to allow for increased utilisation and efficiency.
Recently, Durham County Council took the bold move to replace two traditional snow blower machines with two Multihogs – the replacement programme alone produced a shrewd initial saving of £80,000.
In addition to this, their adaptable Multihogs are now also assigned for other applications, such as road planing and site sweeping, saving an extra £50,000 per annum. Durham County Council are one of many local authorities managing to improve service delivery through increased utilisation of more versatile equipment through fleet replacement.
Multihog’s latest more compact machine, the CL, has been designed to offer a simpler solution to assist cash strapped local authorities, already under immense pressure, utilise the basic benefits of the multi-purpose Multihog.
The CL is based on the compact CX model designed for maintenance in tight urban areas, cycleways and footways but requires less of an investment than the CX itself by limiting some functions.
For instance, the CL has one load-sensing hydraulic pump working up to 90 litres per minute making it ideal for attachments such as snow ploughs, sweepers and mowers. Finally, the new unit is lighter too, allowing for greater carrying capacity on the rear for salt spreading.
