Productivity opportunities with steerable axles

Setting aside the primary (front) steering axles fitted to trucks and prime movers, a wide variety of steerables axles are available for use on multi-axle vehicles. These steerable axles are designed for both trailing (unpowered) axles and driven axles. All of these steerable axle types address, in different ways, the fact that vehicle tyres operate in a sub-optimal way as soon as a vehicle unit is fitted with more than two axles and/or more than one "fixed" axle. This degradation in tyre and vehicle performance can be exhibited in: • Increased tyre wear • Increased vehicle swept path • Increased pavement sUlface wear • Increased resistance to forward motion (and increased fuel consumption) • Potentially undesirable effects on vehicle steering control.