We're at the Bobcat Company shop today,
and we're talking with Chris Girodat
who's a marketing manager at Bobcat, and
he's going to tell us a little bit about
the mid-generation loaders. Yeah, what we
have behind here is our new mid
generation loader, which is our M2-Series
and this builds off the success
of our M-Series with some added
improvements in comfort and productivity.
So there's some noticeable differences
right away, can you tell me a little bit
about that? Yeah there actually are two
notable differences when you look at
this loader. First off the decal scheme
has changed.
We now have larger numbers and also when
you sit inside the cab and you look up,
you'll notice the window, top window has
changed also. On loaders with standard and
ACS controls, I understand there's been
some improvements there. Can you tell me
a little bit about them? Yes, on our 6 and
700 series frame size machines that are
equipped with standard and ACS controls,
we now have a new low effort pump. With
this new pump, it takes 25% less effort
to move the levers forward and in the
reverse direction, which means overall
fatigue is decreased. Another important
feature to these loaders is right
control. Can you tell me a little bit
about that? Yeah, right control is nothing
new to Bobcat, with the M-2 series you
know have an automatic drive control, but
right control is very purist form. It's a damping system on your loader
lift arms, okay, so as you put a load on
to the front attachment, it then cushions
the front attachment when you're
transporting material across the job-site.
So what's the benefit of this for a
customer? The automatic ride control's
benefit is comfort. It's operator comfort
and it allows for less spillage of
material across the job-site. And so
what's different about this and what
some of the other manufacturers are
offering? The Bobcat version it is a
switch inside the cab, so we now have the
ability to turn it on and off for those
customers when they need it when they
don't. Where other manufacturers our
speed dependent, we are not to be dependent.
The automatic feature of it utilized
when there's a low
present inside the attachment. When we
are in the auto mode we're on and when
we turn it off we're off. For the first
time Bobcat is now offering a reversible
fan option. Can you tell me more about
that? The reversible fan option is an
option that customers have been asking
for for years, which allows us to clean
off the debris off of the intake area. We
have two different modes. We have a
automatic mode which goes by time and
temperature, and we also have a purge
mode, so if a customer needs to, they can
do that at any time throughout the day.
Who will benefit from this option? This
option will be a good benefit for those
customers that are in the really dusty
conditions. So take for example, maybe a
ag customer or a customer that's doing
a lot of concrete breakup or any of
those customers that are in that dusty
hard work environment. A lot of customers
work at night or in dark conditions. Can
you tell me about what Bobcat's done to
improve that? We now have an option for a
side light that has its own on an off
switch.
They are a LED low-profile light. They
have an 800 lumens rating, which means
they're on the higher side of brightness scale.
Also for the color scaling, they're
about a 6,000 color temperature,
which means that they're a bright, white,
light. It increases the side visibility
for those customers that are working in
dark conditions. For example, snow removal
companies, anyone that is working in and
out of buildings, just anywhere where
it's dark where you need more side light.
So let's talk a little bit about the the
new cab on the M2-Series. What's been
improved in it? Comfort is always
important so we've made some
improvements to the front door seal, we've
made some improvements to our cab
isolators, amongst other things with
inside the cab for improved cab comfort.
For operators, visibility is important.
Tell me a little bit about the
improvements on this machine. We have
increased our visibility through the top
window. The top window of size hasn't
changed, but the usable space to look
through has increased by 34%,
while still keeping the safety standards.
So Chris for the M2-Series, I know a lot
of customers are going to be wondering
about power. Can you tell me about the
engine in this machine? Yeah the engine
that's going to be powering this unit is going to be
the Bobcat engine. It's a Bobcat design
which is engineered and built by Bobcat,
which allows the machine and the engine
to communicate for more productivity. So
what's different about this Bobcat
engine compared to what other
manufacturers are doing? When we designed
our tier 4 compliant engine, we designed
it so that we utilize a diesel oxidation catalyst.
We have a high-pressure
common-rail. We do not need a diesel
particular filter, and we are using that
fluid for those above 75 horsepower. We
also have improved our horsepower
management software, which means that at
a job-site you have faster reaction time
and more productivity throughout the day.
Well Chris thanks for showing us around
the new M2-Series loader. Where can
anyone find more information? I would
encourage customers to go visit their
local Bobcat dealer or visit the Bobcat.com website.
you