Truck

A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport cargo.

Cargo now covers all types of freight, including that carried by rail, van, truck, or intermodal container.

However, steam wagons were not common until the mid-19th century.

It was the earliest form of lorry (truck) and came in two basic forms: overtype and undertype – the distinction being the position of the engine relative to the boiler.

Commercial trucks can be very large and powerful and may be configured to be mounted with specialized equipment, such as in the case of refuse trucks, fire trucks, concrete mixers, and suction excavators.

The suction unit is roughly rectangular-block-shaped, about 2.5 metres wide and 3.6 metres high, and is usually mounted and used on the back of a truck, which must have power takeoffs to run the suction unit's air impeller and hydraulics.

The first truck in the United States was built by Autocar in 1899 and was available with optional 5 or 8 horsepower motors.

The Autocar Company is an American specialist manufacturer of severe-duty, Class 7 and Class 8 vocational trucks, based in Hagerstown, Indiana.

In the European Union, vehicles with a gross combination mass of up to 3.5 t are known as light commercial vehicles, and those over as large goods vehicles.

A heavy goods vehicle (HGV), also large goods vehicle (LGV) or medium goods vehicle, is the European Union (EU) term for any truck with a gross combination mass (GCM) of over 3500 kg.

Other companies, such as Peugeot, Renault and Büssing, also built their own versions.

Büssing AG was a German bus and truck manufacturer, established in 1903 by Heinrich Büssing (1843–1929) in Braunschweig.

Modern trucks are largely powered by diesel engines, although small to medium size trucks with gasoline engines exist in the US, Canada, and Mexico.

High-speed engines are used to power trucks (lorries), buses, tractors, cars, yachts, compressors, pumps and small electrical generators.

Commercial trucks can be very large and powerful and may be configured to be mounted with specialized equipment, such as in the case of refuse trucks, fire trucks, concrete mixers, and suction excavators.

The name is derived from the fact that the large ladder is mounted on a turntable on the back of a truck chassis, allowing it to pivot around a stable base.

The first modern semi-trailer trucks also appeared.

It is variously known as a semi, semi-Truck or Transporter in Canada; semi or single in Australia and New Zealand; semi, tractor-trailer, big rig, or eighteen-wheeler in the United States; and articulated lorry, abbreviated artic, in the United Kingdom, Ireland and New Zealand.

After World War I, several advances were made: pneumatic tires replaced the previously common full rubber versions.

Pneumatic tires are used on many types of vehicles, including cars, bicycles, motorcycles, buses, trucks, heavy equipment, and aircraft.

A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport cargo.

For legal purposes, motor vehicles are often identified within a number of vehicle classes including cars, buses, motorcycles, off-road vehicles, light trucks and regular trucks.

Modern trucks are largely powered by diesel engines, although small to medium size trucks with gasoline engines exist in the US, Canada, and Mexico.

Before the use of diesel engines became widespread, petrol engines were used in buses, lorries (trucks) and a few railway locomotives.

Commercial trucks can be very large and powerful and may be configured to be mounted with specialized equipment, such as in the case of refuse trucks, fire trucks, concrete mixers, and suction excavators.

Special concrete transport trucks (in-transit mixers) are made to mix concrete and transport it to the construction site.

Commercial trucks can be very large and powerful and may be configured to be mounted with specialized equipment, such as in the case of refuse trucks, fire trucks, concrete mixers, and suction excavators. For the UK and the EU the weight is between 3.5 to 7.5 t. Local delivery and public service (dump trucks, garbage trucks and fire-fighting trucks) are normally around this size.

A garbage truck is a truck specially designed to collect municipal solid waste and transport it to a solid waste treatment facility, such as a landfill or transfer station.

These limits are some of the highest in the world, a B-double can weigh 62.5 t and be 25 m long, and road trains used in the outback can weigh 172 t and be 53.5 m long.

A road train or land train is a trucking vehicle of a type used in rural and remote areas of Australia, the United States and in Europe to move freight efficiently.

For the UK and the EU the weight is between 3.5 to 7.5 t. Local delivery and public service (dump trucks, garbage trucks and fire-fighting trucks) are normally around this size.

A typical dump truck is equipped with an open-box bed, which is hinged at the rear and equipped with hydraulic rams to lift the front, allowing the material in the bed to be deposited ("dumped") on the ground behind the truck at the site of delivery.

Often produced as variations of golf cars, with internal combustion or battery electric drive, these are used typically for off-highway use on estates, golf courses, and parks.

BEVs include automobiles, light trucks, and neighborhood electric vehicles.

Cab-over, also known as cab over engine (COE), cab forward (U.S.), or forward control (UK), is a body style of truck, bus, or van that has a vertical front, "flat face" or a semi-hood, with the cab of the truck sitting above (or forward of) the front axle.

Each State determines the maximum permissible vehicle, combination, and axle weight on state and local roads.

For this reason trucks with a high axle weight are heavily taxed in most countries.

"Lorry" has a more uncertain origin, but probably has its roots in the rail transport industry, where the word is known to have been used in 1838 to refer to a type of truck (a goods wagon as in British usage, not a bogie as in the American), specifically a large flat wagon.

A significant proportion of North American manufactured trucks use an engine built by the last remaining major independent engine manufacturer (Cummins) but most global OEMs such as Volvo Trucks and Daimler AG promote their own "captive" engines.

Volvo Trucks (Volvo Lastvagnar) (stylized as VOLVO) is a global truck manufacturer based in Gothenburg, Sweden, owned by AB Volvo.

Truck is used in American English, and is common in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Puerto Rico, Pakistan and South Africa, while lorry is the equivalent in British English, and is the usual term in countries like the United Kingdom, Ireland, Malaysia, Singapore and India.

The names of some American inventions remained largely confined to North America (elevator, gasoline) as did certain automotive terms (truck, trunk).

Heavy electric trucks and hydrogen-powered trucks are still in the prototype and field-testing stages, although media reports indicate that there is substantial interest in them from major freight haulers.

An electric truck is an electric vehicle powered by batteries designed to deliver cargo.

Pneumatic, hydraulic, water, and electrical systems may also be present.

A significant proportion of North American manufactured trucks use an engine built by the last remaining major independent engine manufacturer (Cummins) but most global OEMs such as Volvo Trucks and Daimler AG promote their own "captive" engines.

Cummins also services engines and related equipment, including fuel systems, controls, air handling, filtration, emission control, electrical power generation systems, and trucks.