Peugeot, Henra & Schäffer. That might as well be the name of an established law firm. Something completely different in full though: a 2012 Peugeot Boxer 2.2 HDi with a Henra tandem axle trailer, carrying a Schäffer 2428 wheel loader.
The Peugeot Boxer is clearly one of the Euro-equivalents of the Ram ProMaster. The trailer is multifunctional, it’s a dump trailer that can also be used as a flatbed and -all too obvious- as a machine carrier. The wheel loader is powered by a three-cylinder Kubota diesel engine. Instead of a bucket, other front implements can be attached too. Love the combination’s perfect stance, by the way.
Where we live in Rockland County, New York, the local roads are curvaceous. So, during “landscaping season,” one must be careful not to fly around curves because right around those curves are landscapers’ trucks and trailers, by law with cones to warn you, but the cones are not always placed adequately in advance of your arrival at the scene. It is a good way to sell brakes for vehicles!
Does Kubota sell equipment in Europe or just engines? They have become a very popular brand here in the US, at least in our heavily agricultural (berries, fruit and nut trees, grapes and vegetables) part of California. Tractors, loaders, utility four-wheelers etc.
Small Kubota diesel engines are common, used in all kinds of equipment.
Then there are their small/narrow tractors as typically used by fruit growers/horticulturists/tree nurseries and what they call “minigravers” here (mini-diggers, those small tracked excavators).
I have yet to see heavy Kubota farm tractors and comparable full-size machinery though.
The smaller equipment is definitely more common, but they sell tractors up to 100 hp(4 cylinder 3.8 litre), 4 meters long and 3000 kg. 2 and 4 wheel drive. So not huge, but I see them in the fields. Strawberries, lettuce, artichokes, leafed greens and vines (wine grapes and blackberries/raspberries) are the big crops here. Plus some fruit and nut orchards though they seem to be migrating to areas with cheaper, flatter land in central California further from the coast.
Kubota has multiple dealerships with all sorts of machinery out here in Colorado and Wyoming, usually of course in the slightly more rural farm-y areas.
Kubota has made huge inroads in the small ag machine and small industrial machine market here in the US. I have a friend how owns an excavating company and while his older equipment is mostly John Deere and CAT his newer stuff is mostly Kubota. On the small farms here in new England I think I see more Kubota Orange then JD Green at this point.
I kind if have a soft spot for Kubota as most of my seat time in Tractors were in Kubota, A couple of the boat yards I worked in used them for moving boats as well as property work. I found them to be very tough and durable and not too bad to fix. In particular we had 30-40 hp early 90s 4wd tractor that regularly did everything from plow snow to tow 15 ton boats around.
I’ve got a Kubota shop vac, and there is a Kubota branded dealer here as well.
Interesting, heavy load for the Promaster/Ducato Chassis. Here in the US the max towed weight is 5000 Lbs looks like in EU it’s 2500 KG which is about 500 Lbs more. That loader seems to list around 4300 lbs and I assume the tipping trailer has to be at least a 1000 lbs, I know in the US they run more like 1700 lbs in that size so there seems to be a good chance he’s right at max payload or just over. I’m not a weight police guy, but that is a lot of weight for FWD transaxle to pull.
Also vans pulling trailers is not as common here in the US. In particular, landscapers here love a good pickup truck and seem to be one of the last big buyers of the Reg Cab Long bed variety. One newer trend seems to be using cab over small diesel trucks in landscaping like the Isuzu NPR.
The only trade I see regularly hauling trailers with vans seem to be Electricians that do large commercial work, I see quite a few towing sky lifts or other aerial man lifts as well as trenching equipment fairly regularly, but most seem to use their older Ford Econoline and Chevy Express units for that rather than their newer Transits and Promasters.
Up to 3,000 kg (6,614 lbs) towing capacity for the Stellantis Euro-full-size vans these days.
This one is indeed rated at 2,500 kg. I’d say around 750 kg for the trailer (if it’s an end dump trailer instead of a heavier three-way dumper) and 1,820 kg for the Schäffer (specs found on the interwebs), that’s a grand total of 2,570 kg/5,666 lbs. Slightly above the rating, carry on!
That powertrain is regarded as bulletproof PSA have been using it for many years Ive been considering updating my car to a newer model with the same 2.2 auto setup that van has, theres a barely used example for sale online nearby.
The three nice looking houses look to be architecturally identical except for window & skylight placement and the center house’s dormer sited a couple of meters farther back than the two end houses.
Roughly the same style of houses on that side of the whole street. The originals and the ones that were built later on and more recently, inbetween the first generation.
Window & skylight placements (in the roof) are very often an afterthought. These are called a “dakkapel” in NL (roof-chapel, of course not looking the same as the really, really old ones).