ZF: 100,000TH PORTAL AXLE FOR BUSES AND TEN YEARS OF AS TRONIC
The 100,000th bus portal axle rolled off the line at ZF Passau GmbH, the Off-Road Driveline Technology and Axle Systems division. With this product, low floor technology - where ZF is the market leader today - found its way into buses.
After only one year of development and production preparation, the first axle with the product designation "AV 130" rolled off the line in 1983. Together with ZF, the following companies were trailblazers of modern low-floor technology: Heuliez from France, Kässbohrer, and Neoplan.
The great breakthrough came in 1995 when the third generation of the AV 132 portal axle with disk brake was developed. In the low-floor technology area ZF can call itself the market leader. In the case of the portal axle, the above mentioned business unit managed to achieve a market share of considerably more than 90 percent by continuously improving costs and quality and thus increasing its competitiveness. The most important customers are, among others, Evobus, Neoman, Irisbus, Solaris, KAMAZ, VDL Bova and Temsa.
However, there is further growth potential. "With new markets, such as Russia, China, India or South America and new concepts in public transport, e.g. BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) we will see fast-paced development also in the future. With these prospects we are already looking forward to the 200,000th portal axle", states Klemm.
The ZF AS Tronic robotized transmission, the most successful automatic transmission system for coaches, was also recently celebrating a milestone anniversary: For ten years, the ZF-AS Tronic has been relieving drivers from clutch and shift work, thereby ensuring comfort, safety, and economic efficiency, mainly in trucks and other commercial vehicle applications. Thus, ZF's AS Tronic is the international benchmark for automatic transmission solutions for trucks and coaches.
