Peter Andrews is the owner of Andrews Plant Hire in Dorset. Still firmly holding the reins of the family business after five decades, Peter and his team have managed the overburden strips and material handling contracts for a number of quarries in the South and South West of England for over 40 years.

In 2015 Peter started running used Bell B25D trucks on a load and haul contract in a Devon clay quarry, which proved to be a hugely successful move. The noticeable improvement in productivity and low fuel usage spurred Peter on to switch to Bell from his usual ADT supplier in 2018 when he purchased three new B30E ADTs for a number of existing load and haul contracts. In 2020 he added two more of the trusted B30E dumpers to the fleet.

“Since we invested in Bell Dumpers, we have noticed a real difference in productivity and particularly fuel efficiency. We can see from the machine telematics that this equates to a huge 17% saving on fuel consumption. To put that into context, it means we can run a whole shift without refuelling, which wasn’t possible with our last brand of dumpers. That saves us – and our clients – time, inconvenience and money.”

When Andrews Plant Hire’s contract in the Devon clay quarry was renewed in 2020, Peter had no hesitation in ordering five new B25Es after each of his original used B25E dumpers has successfully completed between 11 000 and 15 000 hours without issue.

The beauty of working with Bell Equipment, according to Peter, is not just machine quality and efficiency, but the customer care and back-up.

“Every machine on the market will have an issue now and then, and Bell is always very quick to respond. When we need a Service Engineer we never have to wait long. Downtime can be expensive and Bell ensures this is kept to a minimum.”

Peter’s operators agree that the Bell machines provide an exceptional operator environment, making special mention of the Comfort Ride feature providing a smooth feel to the truck’s operation.

“For long haul drivers in the cab all day, it makes a real difference to sit in a cab designed around the operator.”

Every Bell Dumper specified by Andrews Plant Hire is supplied with a Bell Care Package to ensure the units are kept in tip top condition and residual value is maximised. New machines also feature Bell Equipment’s fleet management tool, Fleetm@tic®, which constantly gathers machine health data, provides real time tracking and helps to identify the precise loads carried and fuel used each day.

Andrews Plant Hire’s ADT fleet is now wholly Bell and consists of 14 machines with a further two B30Es on order for delivery later this year.