Is it me just don’t seem to be many about as there used to be,have they fallen out of fashion.
bobbya:
Is it me just don’t seem to be many about as there used to be,have they fallen out of fashion.
I think there is more emphasis now from the bigger firms on driver training and getting drivers driving the wagons properly & economically. I suspect that saves more fuel overall than using odd shaped trailers. How many bets trailer manufacturers were charging a premium for them.
I did raise the question regarding fuel savings considering that on one particular route I had to divert round 2 low bridges which the chill load did not need to go round. I had a teardrop ambient trailer and the reefers were conventional trailers. If I remember correctly, the difference was 9 inches which was enough to cause diversions
The issue with a lot of places is how low the trailer door is which means the have to strip pallets down to load then restack once it’s clear of the back end of the trailer and repeat again for unloading,hence why they don’t so widely used.
I wondered how long it would take for them to start disappearing. Never been inside one but they look like a freaking nightmare to get a payload in and I imagine there is a fair bit of wasted space inside which hauliers wouldnt be happy about. I always thought that they were great to begin with so the owners could give it the “Oh look at us Joe public, we care about the environment and have these wonderfully economic new trailers. Aren’t we wonderful?”. Then after a while the novelty wears off and the trailers are deemed too expensive.
I also seem to rember a thread or post on here not long ago where someone was talking about them and the extra cost of them was not cost effective or something like that.
They are about 6ft high at the back door,causes massive issues for loaders in a fast moving warehouse when the pallets are stacked 7ft or higher creates so much work and then even more so when the last 4 pallets are stripped down and they have all the stock off them with literally no where on the trailer to put it,only one thing comes before the environment…profit 
bobbya:
Is it me just don’t seem to be many about as there used to be,have they fallen out of fashion.
They are useless as you dont drive that Fast as that Aerodynamic would work on it. Same is for all the Plastic around,Roof Spoiler higher then trailer very often.
Wanna safe Diesel? Pay diesel Bonus and you will see how it works 
bobbya:
Is it me just don’t seem to be many about as there used to be,have they fallen out of fashion.
Fallen apart if that pile of crap my ex neighbour built is anything to go by…it leaked like a sieve and was held together by luck.
3 wheeler:
bobbya:
Is it me just don’t seem to be many about as there used to be,have they fallen out of fashion.Fallen apart if that pile of crap my ex neighbour built is anything to go by…it leaked like a sieve and was held together by luck.
Your ex-neighbour is building them? We’re guessing that’s one of the smaller US camper-type Teardrop trailers!
Having just spotted this post, we just wanted to add some factual information to offer something to consider.
Firstly, we accept that the rate of increase in demand has tapered off over the last 12 months or so and suspect this is primarily due to lower fuel costs; however, current production rates remain high. Interestingly, fuel prices Bulk Diesel Price History are starting to creep back up again so it will be interesting to see what effect this has.
At the end of 2015, we had produced 5,301 Teardrops (including Teardrop trailers & Teardrop rigid bodywork).
Currently, every trailer built for DHL will be Teardrop unless it is impractical to do so. New customers too are still investing in Teardrop trailers; the latest being Airbus, H&M, Cherwell Valley, Jacksons Bakery, Orange Box, BMW and Toyota. Older Teardrop customers continue to order new Teardrops (including Next, TK Maxx, Tradeteam, Marstons, K&N, Ceva etc.).
As the Teardrop has become a mature (launched 2007) and proven product, we don’t do as much marketing so there may be less awareness than there was in the earlier days.
A good point has been raised here about overall height and rear aperture. In the early days, many operators grimaced at the 500mm increase in height and reduced rear aperture (1st one was 2138mm high), but this has changed significantly over the years. Following a lot of work with various parties, including Universities, we were able to reduce the height increment to just 150mm without any loss of aerodynamic efficiency. In addition, we now taper the chassis down at the rear so the rear floor height is 1 - 1.2m which means we can keep the rear roof height low and retain a generous rear aperture height. We now also do a European version at 4m overall height with no height increase.
In strong contrast to the earlier models which carried a £2,000 premium, we can now produce Teardrop trailers with a very small price increase over and above standard, flat roof trailers.
As for fuel saving, we no longer gather data any more as we already have more than enough to demonstrate performance. We openly publish all these results at donbur.co.uk/gb-en/info/tear … tudies.php.
Going forwards, we are now starting to export as larger global operators are catching on to the ‘quirky’ UK success story!