Hino to launch heavy trucks in North America

[kscarbel2]

Heavy Duty Trucking (HDT)  /  September 28, 2017

Hino announced that it plans to produce a new line of Class 7 and 8 trucks at a new truck assembly plant in West Virginia, starting in 2019.

The new larger trucks will be powered by Hino’s A09 9-liter engine that is already sold in other markets globally. The engine will produce from 300-360 horsepower. The truck is scheduled to be publicly revealed at the NTEA Work Truck Show next March.

“These are truly exciting times for Hino in the U.S.,” said Yoshinori Noguchi, CEO of Hino North America. “Our growth and customer acceptance in the Class 4-7 market are enabling us to introduce a wider variety of products.”

The new vehicles and facilities are part of a $100 million investment plan to strengthen its U.S. operations. Hino is purchasing the former Cold Water Creek distribution center and converting it into its new truck assembly plant in Mineral Wells, West Virginia. The new plant is expected to be operational by 2019 and will also house cab assembly, an operation currently conducted in Japan.

As part of Hino’s growth plan, the company broke ground on a new corporate office in Novi, Michigan, and is consolidating all operations into its new corporate headquarters. including sales, marketing, service, engineering, purchasing, and manufacturing. Hino’s Insight Diagnostic Center, which monitors vehicle performance and uptime for all Hino trucks equipped with Insight, will also operate out of the Novi headquarters.

Hino Motors currently produces Class 6 and 7 conventional body style trucks in the 245,000-square-foot former Walker Systems building in Williamstown, West Virginia. The Williamstown facility was the first transportation equipment assembly plant for Hino in the United States. Hino began rolling out its first trucks in November 2007, and last month celebrated its 10-year anniversary there.

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[kscarbel2]

Hino to open new WV plant, introduce new line of Class 7 and 8 trucks

Fleet Owner  /  September 28, 2017

Company also building new Michigan headquarters

Hino plans to strengthen its U.S. operations with the introduction of a new truck line and new facilities.

At a press conference yesterday, Hino announced its plan to purchase a former Coldwater Creek women's clothing distribution center and convert it into a new Hino truck assembly plant in Mineral Wells, WV, close to the current Hino plant.

The new facility is expected to open in early 2019 and will also house cab assembly, which is currently done in Japan.

"The new plant, which is four times the size of our current plant, will allow us to combine several assembly operations under one roof which will provide significant efficiency gains," said Takashi Ono, the Hino Motors Manufacturing U.S.A. president.

"West Virginia has enjoyed a very good relationship with Hino," Jim Justice, the state's governor, said. This new plant demonstrates that Hino has confidence in our state, and West Virginia is a great place to do business. On behalf of everyone in the Mountain State, I thank Hino for their continued investment and the creation of new jobs."

Hino plans to invest $100 million in the new plant, creating about 250 new jobs by early 2020 over a two-shift operation.

In addition to producing Hino's current lineup of conventional trucks, the plant will produce a new line of Class 7 and 8 trucks that Hino plans to introduce in 2019. The truck will be powered by Hino's A09, 9-liter engine. Already sold in many other markets around the world, the Hino A09 engine has a horsepower range of 300-360 HP.  Hino is planning a public reveal of the new truck at the 2018 NTEA Work Truck Show. 

"These are truly exciting times for Hino in the U.S.," said Yoshinori Noguchi, CEO of Hino North America. "Our growth and customer acceptance in the Class 4-7 market are enabling us to introduce wider variety of products."

As part of Hino's growth plan, the company broke ground on a $20-million corporate office in Novi, MI, in August. Hino is consolidating all operations in its new corporate headquarters, including sales, marketing, service, engineering, purchasing, and manufacturing. 

Hino's Insight Diagnostic Center, which monitors vehicle performance and uptime for all Hino trucks equipped with Insight, will also operate out of the Novi headquarters.  

[kscarbel2]

Hino building $100M W.Va. plant to assemble its new class 7 & 8 trucks

Tom Quimby, Commercial Carrier Journal (CCJ)  /  September 28, 2017

A Class 8 Hino truck?

Yes, that and a new Class 7 truck will be produced starting in 2019 at a new assembly plant that the company will be building in Mineral Wells, West Virginia, close to its current plant which recently celebrated a 10-year anniversary.

Hino Motors Manufacturing U.S.A. President Takashi Ono made the announcement Wednesday at a press conference where local government officials and residents applauded the truck maker’s $100 million plant investment which is expected to add 250 jobs.

“The new plant, which is four times the size of our current plant, will allow us to combine several assembly operations under one roof which will provide significant efficiency gains,” Ono said.

“In addition to producing our current winning line-up of trucks, we will start the production of new Class 7 and Class 8 trucks in 2019,” Ono continued.

Those new trucks, which will be powered by Hino’s 300-360 h.p. A09, 9-liter engine, will debut at the NTEA Work Truck Show next year.

Hino’s new plant will be housed in the former Cold Water Creek distribution center. Besides truck production, the plant will also house cab assembly, an operation currently conducted in Japan.

Though a family emergency prevented West Virginia Governor Jim Justice from attending the press conference, a representative read his prepared statement.

“West Virginia has enjoyed a very good relationship with Hino. This new plant demonstrates that Hino has confidence in our state, and West Virginia is a great place to do business,” Justice wrote. “On behalf of everyone in the Mountain State, I thank Hino for their continued investment and the creation of new jobs.”

As part of Hino’s growth plan, Hino broke ground last month on a new state of the art corporate office in Novi, Michigan.  Hino is consolidating all operations in its new corporate headquarters, including sales, marketing, service, engineering, purchasing and manufacturing.  Hino’s Insight Diagnostic Center, which monitors vehicle performance and uptime for all Hino trucks equipped with Insight, will also operate out of the Novi headquarters.

“These are truly exciting times for Hino in the U.S.  Our growth and customer acceptance in the Class 4-7 market are enabling us to introduce wider variety of products,” said Yoshinori Noguchi, CEO of Hino North America.

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[kscarbel2]

Hino's heavy Class 8 is the 12.9-litre equipped 700 Series.

However this Class 7 / Class 8 will be based on the heavier end of the mid-range Hino 500 Series.

http://www.hino.com.au/500/

 

[kscarbel2]

Hino Motors Announces $100-mil Investment, 250 New Jobs

TriState Update WOWK  /  September 27, 2017

Millions of dollars invested and hundreds of new jobs are coming to Wood County as Hino Motors will take over the nearly 1,000,000 square-foot Coldwater Creek Site and convert it to a truck production plant.

Hino Motors has called Williamstown home for 10 years, but production has increased 500 percent. The company has outgrown it's current facility, so Hino is relocating to a bigger and better site,adding several hundred employees to the growing company.

Senior Vice President at Hino Motors, Steve Stalnaker, says, "In the 10 years that Hino has been in business here, team members again and again have demonstrated they've risen to the challenge of producing world class trucks."

Hino officials say it was an easy decision to pick the old Coldwater site, it is just a few miles from the current Williamstown plant.

"What was really important to us to be able to maintain our team members. So the fact that we're just about 20 minutes away from Williamstown, is a huge bonus for us, that we can potentially move all our team members to a new facility," said Executive Vice President at Hino Motors, Davey Jung.

Hino will take over the 60 acres Coldwater Creek sits on, 20 acres to the side, and 35 acres in the back to combine and streamline operations. The company will bring over its 300 Williamstown employees, and add 250 additional jobs.

West Virginia Commerce Secretary Woody Thrasher said, "I think things like this and the Toyota announcement that happened yesterday speak volumes about the quality of workforce that we have, the training, the commitment, and the real craftsmanship that's needed in the automotive industry. We still raise and train significant craftspeople in the state of West Virginia."

Hino is also working to purchase more raw materials locally.. supporting the mountain state economy.

"We currently have a lot of parts still coming from Japan, and so we're making a lot of effort to localize these parts. And with this effort we're hoping we can add some West Virginia manufacturers to our supply base," said Jung

Hino says it still hasn't made a decision as to what will happen to the current Williamstown facility.

The company hopes to have the mineral wells truck assembly plant up and running by early 2019.

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[Red Horse]

16 hours ago, kscarbel2 said:

Hino's heavy Class 8 is the 12.9-litre equipped 700 Series.

However this Class 7 / Class 8 will be based on the heavier end of the mid-range Hino 500 Series.

http://www.hino.com.au/500/

 

Kevin,

So do you think the new class 8 will in fact be a cab over?  If so this will be new ground given the current dim view the US has for cab overs.   And as they talk about a new class 7, can we assume that too will be a cab over?

[kscarbel2]

13 minutes ago, Red Horse said:

Kevin,

So do you think the new class 8 will in fact be a cab over?  If so this will be new ground given the current dim view the US has for cab overs.   And as they talk about a new class 7, can we assume that too will be a cab over?

My first thought is, since Hino has made such a great effort to reinvent themselves in the North American market as a conventional truck manufacturer, these new trucks will be conventionals based on the 500 Series. The COE Hino FF and FG trucks sold in the US during the 1980s, imported via Jacksonville, Florida, were superb trucks. But Hino didn't get any traction until they introduced conventionals in 2003. Now they're a success story, while UD abandoned the US market in 2012 (Volvo's decision). Of course at Mack we introduced the conventional "CS" series Mid-Liner, and sold a lot. But I sold more "MS" COE Mid-Liners that CS's.

[RoadwayR]

Is Isuzu still coming out with a tandem for the U.S.?  I would suspect if so that would be a cabover.

[kscarbel2]

1 hour ago, RoadwayR said:

Is Isuzu still coming out with a tandem for the U.S.?  I would suspect if so that would be a cabover.

Yes. Their upcoming US market 6x4 will also be a Class 7/light class 8 like the Hino. But it will be an F-Series COE.

[kscarbel2]

 

[DailyDiesel]

Fascinating.

[Timmyb]

Does the conventional and coe hino share the same cab?

Nothing wrong with Japanese trucks, they are reasonably simple and real work horses. I quite like the one pictured. 

[kscarbel2]

5 hours ago, Timmyb said:

Does the conventional and coe hino share the same cab?

Nothing wrong with Japanese trucks, they are reasonably simple and real work horses. I quite like the one pictured. 

Yes Timmy, the US market bonneted Hinos use a modified 500 Series COE cab.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The original Freightliner Business Class conventional (1991-2001) used a COE cab from the Mercedes-Benz model LN.

The Freightliner Argosy II COE shares the same cab as the Century Class, Columbia and Coronado (the Argosy variant is 305mm wider).

The Mack MS Mid-Liner COE shared the same cab used on the Mack CS Mid-Liner conventional, and Renault’s C, CBH, CLM, CLR and GBC series conventional cab models.

The DAF XT conventional is based on the DAF XF105.

Scania's T-Series used the truckmaker's Bertone-designed 4-Series COE cab.

The global market Volvo NH conventional was based on the FH/FM COE cab. The NH was full-width like the FH COE, while the North American market VN was a narrowed variant.

And the impressive Iveco "Powerstar" conventional uses the Stralis COE cab.

[bbigrig]

I think they are still building Hinos in Woodstock Ontario Canada at the Toyota plant as well. 

Knowing someone at a Hino dealer, it's extremely rare that a valve cover has ever been removed from one of their engines. Some of the engineering on the trucks seems strange, but very reliable trucks.  Lots of Hinos in the Penske and other rental fleets here.

Edited October 3, 2017 by bbigrig

[kscarbel2]

2 minutes ago, bbigrig said:

I think they are still building Hinos in Woodstock Ontario Canada at the Toyota plant as well. 

Knowing someone at a Hino dealer, it's extremely rare that a valve cover has ever been removed from one of their engines. Some of the engineering on the trucks seems strange, but very reliable trucks.  Lots of Hinos in the Penske and other rental fleets here.

https://www.bigmacktrucks.com/topic/48219-hinos-canadian-plant-reaches-1/?tab=comments#comment-357054

 

[BillyT]

Ironically, or amusingly, Mineral Wells is the location of West Virginia's only permanent weigh station! So the new Hinos could leave the factory and get their first DOT inspection! They make good medium duty trucks, a friend of mine had a Hino hotshot rig, but but his dad worked at GMs Packard Electric div.,so he had to remove the Hino badges and replace them with GMC ones so his dad would let him park it at the house!😁

[BC Mack]

Ireland has been assembling Hino trucks since the late 60's... well liked by the operators, used as dump trucks and as tractors on Continental long haul with no real parts or service support in Europe.... that took some trust in the builders..!!!!

BC Mack 

Edited October 5, 2017 by BC Mack