Aeolus Truck & Driver News

Traffic began moving through the Desert Road section of State Highway 1 on Friday February 14, after a two-month closure for major repairs.

The reopening is an important milestone for the Tīrau to Waiouru Accelerated Maintenance programme, New Zealand’s largest and most ambitious road maintenance project. The highway between Tūrangi and Waiouru (including the Desert Road) closed to traffic on January 13, with the works meeting the anticipated two-month timeframe.

Roger Brady, Regional Manager of Maintenance and Operations for NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA), says a large amount of work has been achieved in a short time.

“In just over eight we...

A new driver licensing exemption should offer greater scope to introduce light-duty battery electric (BEV) truck models to New Zealand business.

NZTA published the Exemption Notice on February 28, allowing drivers with a full Class 1 licence to drive some electric trucks up to a gross laden weight (GLW) of 7,500kg (instead of 6,000kg previously). 

Keeping battery electric trucks below the 6,000kg weight threshold for driver licence Class 1 reduces payload, due to the weight of the batteries.

The exemption is to compensate for the weight of batteries and has potential to open up new roles for BEV trucks in sectors such as chilled food distributi...

New Zealand’s first Windrose E1400 electric long haul truck has been getting to see a lot of the country. 

The China-built truck has been on show duty in the early weeks of the year, appearing at the Bombay Truck Show and Kamo Touch a Truck events before heading south to go on display at the TMC Trucking Industry Show in Christchurch on March 7-8.

The truck landed in New Zealand at the end of last year and Auckland-based distributor Etrucks says the first series production models are due in February 2026.

“The interest is very high,” says Etrucks director Ross Linton.

“More than any other electric truck, it hits the trifecta of duration, ...

A milestone at Mills-Tui has seen the Rotorua manufacturer deliver its 50th Hino 500 Series water tanker to Fire & Emergency New Zealand (FENZ).

The specialist trucks are built to the FENZ 4x2 Medium Water Tanker specification and are deployed throughout New Zealand.

“Fifty is a bit of a milestone for us,” says Mills-Tui Managing Director Dean Purves.

“We won the tender and started in 2018, turning them out at the rate of about 10 per year since then – although Covid and some supply issues did slow things down a bit for a while.

“Hino look after the cab-chassis and all of the wiring and we do the body build and the equipment fit out,” Dean say...

There’s been an early-February milestone at the Te Ara o Te Ata – Mt Messenger Bypass project in North Taranaki.

Work has now begun on the tunnel which is an important part of the $280m Bypass project, contributing to a much more resilient stretch of State Highway 3.

A 110-tonne road header machine is being used to excavate the project’s 235-metre tunnel.

Road headers have boom-mounted telescopic cutting heads, making them ideal for diverse geological conditions. A shovel plate at the front of the road header collects the excavated rock and soil, which is then conveyed via a belt to dump trucks at the back of the machine.  

NZ Transport A...