Following the success of LiuGong’s 4180D motor grader, which won a coveted Red Dot Product Design Award in March 2019, the company is celebrating its second win, this time with the all-new Dressta TD-16N bulldozer.
“It’s a great honour to win back-to-back Red Dot Awards,” said Dressta chairman, Howard Dale. “I think it says a lot about how far we have come as a business and where we are heading. Chinese manufacturers are not usually known for design but our growing reputation for design excellence is making the industry sit up and take notice. Our investment in R&D has reached new records and we are making giant leaps in intelligent and connected machine technology. Two Red Dot Awards are fantastic but they are only the start of our story, we are on an upward trajectory. I’m convinced that the industry will see that Dressta offers something really different in the market – cutting edge design as standard.”
The LiuGong Dressta design team’s brief was simple – create the best all-round dozer for the customer. The winning team headed by executive director of new technology Ed Wagner, and executive director of industrial design Gary Major, knew that the operator was key to designing something truly unique.
“We literally started with the operator, the blade and the tracks and then built everything around them without compromise,” said Wagner. The result is a dozer with unrivalled all-round visibility encompassing 309 degrees. According to Major, “As with our previous award-winning motor grader the 4180D, we set out to create the best visibility in class with the TD-16N – I think we’ve achieved that. I think it’s also true to say that benchmark visibility is becoming one of the defining characteristics of our design ethos. We know how important visibility is, not only for safety, but for productivity and operator satisfaction too.”
The new dozer features a mid-cab design over a mid-mounted automatic, dual path hydrostatic drive train. It comes digital ready and with a standard 6-way angle blade. Controls are easily accessible, intuitive, and easy to use thanks to the electro-hydraulic joysticks. With an operating weight of 19,090kg (42,090lb) and Net horsepower of 170hp (127kW), it has the power and performance Dressta is well known for.
Whilst visibility was high on the design team’s agenda it was not the only consideration; operator safety was also a priority. According to Major, “Every operator out there has a story about falling off the tracks…this is the first machine where you don’t have to get onto the tracks.” Firstly, the team designed non-slip steps at the rear of the machine totally negating the need to step onto the tracks. Complete with safety handrails these steps always allow easy access to and from the cab with three points of contact maintained. The TD16N is the only dozer in its size class with this type of “no tracks” access. Secondly, they ensured that all access points for daily checks, maintenance and fuelling were reachable from ground level. Irish operator Neil John Mckeown, who was a member of select group of operators to preview and test the machine prior to ConExpo was clearly impressed; “The steps up the back give really easy access – good idea! Daily checks are perfect, you don’t have to go on to the tracks, it’s all done from the ground.”
