Truck, also called lorry, any motor vehicle designed to carry freight or goods or to perform special services such as fire fighting. The truck was derived from horse-driven wagon technology, and some of the pioneer manufacturers came from the wagon business. Because of a well-developed system of roads and highways in North America and Europe, trucks have come to carry most intercity freight, with the exception of bulk materials such as ores, which are typically still carried by ship and rail, and time-critical deliveries, which are usually carried between cities by air. Trucks enjoy an almost total monopoly in intracity freight delivery because of their ability to deliver goods directly to recipients.
In 1896 Gottlieb Daimler of Germany built the first motor truck. It was equipped with a four-horsepower engine and a belt drive with two speeds forward and one in reverse. In 1898 the Winton Company of the United States produced a gasoline-powered delivery wagon with a single-cylinder six-horsepower engine.
In World War I motor trucks were widely used, and in World War II they largely replaced horse-drawn equipment. A notable vehicle was the four-wheel-drive, quarter-ton-capacity, short-wheelbase jeep, capable of performing a variety of military tasks.
In the last quarter of the 20th century, new truck sales grew tremendously in the United States. In large part, this happened because of the introduction of utility and sport utility vehicles, which are classified as light trucks but operated as family vehicles. Light trucks accounted for more than 90 percent of all truck sales and roughly half of total vehicle sales in the United States annually by the start of the 21st century. This phenomenon was unique to the American market; worldwide, trucks are purchased mainly for commercial operation.
Types and definitions
Trucks can be classified as either straight or articulated. A straight truck is one in which all axles are attached to a single frame. An articulated vehicle is one that consists of two or more separate frames connected by suitable couplings. A truck tractor is a motor vehicle designed primarily for drawing truck trailers and constructed to carry part of the weight and load of a semitrailer, which is a truck trailer equipped with one or more axles and constructed so that the end and a substantial part of its own weight and that of its load rests upon a truck tractor. In contrast, a full trailer is constructed so that all of its own weight and that of its load rests upon its own wheels.
A device called a fifth wheel is used to connect a truck tractor to a semitrailer and to permit articulation between the units. It generally includes a lower half, consisting of a trunnion (pivot assembly) plate and latching mechanism, mounted on the truck tractor for connection with a kingpin mounted on the semitrailer. A semitrailer may be converted to a full trailer by a trailer-converter dolly, an auxiliary axle assembly equipped with the lower half of a fifth wheel, a drawbar, and other special parts.
Axle assemblies of heavy trucks may be made up of two or more axles, any of which may be powered. Normally, they are spaced so that the distance between axle centres is not more than one and one-half times the overall diameter of the wheel and tire. If the axles are separated by a larger distance, the assembly is called a spread tandem.
Trucks are organized for regulatory purposes in the United States by their fully loaded capacity, or gross vehicle weight (GVW) rating. Light trucks have GVW ratings that do not exceed 10,000 pounds (4.5 metric tons); GVWs of less than 8,500 pounds (3.9 metric tons) are classified as work trucks. These vehicles generally have more in common with passenger cars than with larger trucks. More than half of the world production of trucks consists of light pickup trucks, utility vehicles, and vans. Medium trucks have GVW ratings of 10,000 to 26,000 pounds (4.5 to 11.8 metric tons) and are generally straight designs. They make up about 3 percent of sales. Heavy-duty haulers with GVW ratings of more than 26,000 pounds are cross-country tractor-trailer combinations and off-road construction or mining trucks; these account for the remainder. A small number of off-road vehicles have GVW ratings that exceed 80,000 pounds (36.3 metric tons). About 15 million trucks are added to the world total each year, but since 2004 the ratio of trucks to passenger cars in the world has decreased annually.
Truck operators are taxed and regulated by government agencies. Approximately half of the revenues that are collected from federal and state highway users in the United States come from the trucking industry. Regulations limit the permissible length, height, weight, safety standards, speed, and noise and exhaust emission levels. Standards are generally similar to those for passenger cars.
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Between 150,000 and 400,000 recreational vehicles (RVs) are produced each year in the United States, depending on economic conditions. These are primarily vans and panel trucks that are modified by RV manufacturers. Half of the units are trailers that are not self-propelled. The majority of these are attached to cars and trucks by a ball-type hitch. A portion, however, are towed by light trucks with fifth-wheel hitches mounted on the truck bed. This arrangement permits greater loading on the hitch. Motor homes built on truck chassis that have been supplied by major truck manufacturers to the builders account for the balance of recreational vehicle production.
Truck aerodynamics is important for efficient high-speed highway transportation. Cab designs include extended surfaces that smooth the flow of air over and around the truck and trailer bodies and baffle air flow under the truck to reduce drag and lower the cost of truck operation. Narrowing the space between the truck cab and the trailer has a similar effect. Total operating cost savings of 22 percent have been projected for improved truck aerodynamics.
Truck and truck-tractor frames, except for the very small sizes, have remained separate from the cab and body. The frame is generally made of two channel sections of alloy steel with a standardized width of 86 cm (34 inches) overall. Semitrailers and tank trailers in many instances now employ the integral, or unitized, type of construction. An increasing number of trailer frames are designed to permit the mounting of standardized shipping containers in place of trailer bodies. These units are designed for the more efficient intermodal shipping of products by ship, rail, and trucks, without the need for unloading goods at transfer points.
The most common form of front suspension is a drop-forged, one-section front axle attached to the frame through leaf springs and shock absorbers. In 1960 individual front suspension was introduced.
In a truck with a single powered axle, the axle is generally attached to the frame by leaf springs. The axle is always full-floating with the weight carried by the axle housing so that, if a driving axle breaks, the load is still supported by the axle housing. The axle may be a single reduction type, meaning that it has one-gear reduction, or double reduction. A two-speed axle is one in which there is a gear change built into the axle. This makes it possible to have two speeds for each transmission speed. The tandem-drive axle has two powered axles. There may be two drive shafts, one to each axle. There is always a system of levers between the two axles to equalize the load. A powered axle may be either the Hotchkiss type, in which all the driving and braking thrust is taken by the leaf springs, or the torque-arm type, in which the thrusts are taken by the rods. Because the vertical movement of the body is only one-half that of the wheels in a tandem axle, this axle is used successfully with solid rubber springs, reducing maintenance.
Steering of trucks, with their relatively heavy loads, was a problem until power steering came into use in the early 1950s. Steering is always by the Ackermann system, which provides a kingpin for each front wheel. Maximum cramp angle of the front wheels is about 35 degrees. The minimum turning radius is dependent on the wheelbase. A few vehicles have been built with two steering axles in the front.
Engines, fuels, and emissions
Until the 1930s the gasoline engine was widely used for trucks, especially in the United States, but since World War II the diesel engine has become increasingly favoured for trucks used for long-distance hauls. In 1950 the Boeing Company installed a gas turbine in a truck, but such designs have not been commercially acceptable. In 1952 an engine using liquefied propane gas was introduced. While the diesel engine has the disadvantage of high initial cost, the propane-burning engine has the disadvantage of lower output for a given engine displacement.
Under the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, which was published as a final rule on June 5, 1991, the United States set a schedule for progressive improvements in truck emissions (based on vehicle weight and engine type) between 1994 and 1997. On Dec. 21, 1999, a new schedule was adopted, known as the Tier 2 standards (with the earlier provisions termed Tier 1), and was phased in between 2004 and 2009. California emission standards typically precede the federal levels by two years. The European Union also adopted a series of emission standards, starting with Euro 1 in 1994, with Euro 6 set for enforcement in 2014 or 2015 depending on truck class.
Although pneumatic tires appeared on automobiles as early as 1904, large trucks were equipped with hard rubber tires until World War I. Cotton was replaced by synthetics in the carcass of truck tires in the 1930s, with steel wire and fibreglass plies appearing later. Recent developments include the use of a single wide tire to carry the same load as a dual wheel. Tire chains first became available in 1904 and knobby snow tires by 1936. To reduce costs, many trucking firms use recapped tires, extending the life of the carcass about two and a half times. In 1955 tubeless tires became available in large truck sizes.
Automatic transmissions for trucks have been available since the 1950s. For some diesels it is necessary to operate the engine within a relatively narrow speed range. This requires a large number of forward speeds, with some units having as many as 18 speeds.
The first truck brakes were brake shoes operating directly on the wheels. From this simple beginning has evolved one of the most complex braking systems found on any type of vehicle. The first air brakes were introduced in 1918. Seven years later four-wheel brakes were introduced on trucks, and the internally expanding type was introduced by 1930. In the late 1930s the vacuum booster, or hydraulic brake, was introduced. In electric brake systems a floating armature contacts a rotating disk on the wheel when electric current is applied and through a cam arrangement applies the shoes to the drums. Air-over-hydraulic brakes also are used in some vehicles.
Of these methods of application, air is the most widely used. The engine-driven compressor supplies air at a nominal pressure, regulated by an air governor. Air pressure is indicated by a pressure gauge and a low-pressure warning device, either audible or visual. Air is stored in the reservoirs and supplied to the brake valves; a foot valve supplies air to all brake chambers on the vehicle, including those being towed. Another brake valve is hand-controlled and applies the brakes on the towed vehicle only. Both the foot pedal and hand valve supply air to the same service line, which extends back to the towed vehicles. The second, or emergency, line carries full air pressure when the vehicle is in operation. If this line is broken, the emergency brakes are applied on all towed vehicles from air reservoirs located on the towed vehicles. After reaching the brake chamber from the brake valves, the air acts on a diaphragm connected to a push rod, which in turn actuates a cam or wedge that moves the shoes against the brake drum. Other emergency brake application systems utilize the parking brake circuitry and a mechanical spring to keep the brakes engaged in the event of air pressure loss. These are operated by controls in the truck cab.
Modern trucks are easily recognized as a source of noise pollution. The major sources of noise, in decreasing significance, are tire-road contact, engine exhaust, and cooling ducts and fans. The decibel level of each may be reduced by changing tire-tread designs and highway surfaces, by improving exhaust muffler efficiency and shielding the engine with more absorbent materials, and by changing fan blade and engine enclosure designs. The U.S. Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), which sets a wide variety of test procedures for motor vehicles, has developed standard tests for measuring noise levels, and many different federal, state, and local authorities in the United States have enacted 80-decibel noise limits based on SAE tests. Similar regulations exist within the European Union.