Rodeo’s Success Rides on Help from Volvo Construction Equipment
June 22, 2010
Volvo’s articulated haulers move material to cover the concrete floors at Reliant Park in preparation for the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.
Preparing
for the world’s largest rodeo is a daunting task. Everywhere, golf carts buzz
around, carrying groundskeepers and volunteer workers. A 25-ton off-road Volvo
articulated hauler zips by, hauling sawdust for livestock bedding. At the
office, people crowd around Greg Golightly, managing director of the Buildings
and Grounds Department, pressing him with questions and requests.
The scene at Reliant
Park in Houston was definitely chaotic in the days
leading up to the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, held from March 2–21 and
attended by more than 2 million people. Part of what made the preparation for
the rodeo so daunting is that the stadium, the six arenas and thousands of
pens, stalls and corridors all have concrete floors. Every surface must be covered
with clay, sand, topsoil, sawdust or wood shavings. Every time one group of
livestock moved out of an area, it had to be cleaned to prepare for the next
round of animals. In all, more than 8,000 cubic yards of material was used.
To move all that material, the rodeo relied on Volvo
Construction Equipment. ROMCO, one of the company’s Texas dealers, supplied the show with Volvo articulated
haulers, two L25B compact wheel loaders and a G960 motor grader.
Articulated Trucks Save Time
A Volvo L25B compact loader distributes sawdust and bedding materials for the livestock stalls.
For 17 years, Archie Peterson, a ROMCO sales representative, has been a member of the show’s Equipment Acquisition Committee. Years ago, Peterson tells us, the show used on-road tandem-axle trucks to haul all of the required clay, sand and topsoil into the arenas and grounds.
“I proposed using articulated dump trucks instead of tandem-axle trucks,” Peterson says. “I figured the artic haulers would be faster. But show management was hesitant to use them, because they thought the tires would tear up the pavement.
“We did calculations to show that the big tires’ loads per square inch would not exceed the limit of the concrete pavement,” Peterson says. “So I brought one artic hauler to the grounds to show that it would not tear up the pavement—and the next day they sent all the on-road trucks home.”
The Volvo equipment saved the show a considerable amount of time—and money.
“We cut the time to haul dirt to the Astrodome from two weeks to three days,” Peterson says.
Compact Loaders a Hit
Like the big articulated haulers,
the Volvo L25B compact loader was also a hit at the show.
“We’ve got that baby loader in use everyplace on
these grounds,” Golightly says. “Everybody wants to use it. That loader
is a godsend.”
Each day during the show, the sawdust
needed to be changed out of the livestock stalls. Both Volvo L25B
loaders distributed sawdust and bedding materials and proved to be
invaluable for their ability to maneuver in tight spaces.
“They really have fallen in love with the L25B
loaders,” Peterson says. “They are easy to navigate around the arena.”
Customers in the Crowd
Because the show is a nonprofit
organization, each year it depends on an army of volunteers to make
everything happen. These volunteers can also be potential customers.
Mike Strittmatter, a product manager at Volvo
Construction Equipment, is one of those volunteers as a member of the
show’s Equipment Acquisition Committee. He says the rodeo provided a
unique opportunity to introduce people to Volvo Construction Equipment.
“A lot of people are operating this Volvo equipment
for the first time, and they’re finding that they like it,” Strittmatter
says.
“This show has more than 20,000 volunteers,”
Peterson adds. “Every time you shake a hand here, it’s a potential
customer.”
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Title: Testing Comments
By: Andrew
Posted: August 30, 2010 11:05 AM
This is a test