JCB has announced the addition of a new product to its portfolio, named ‘Pothole Pro’. It is a specialized road repairing machine which has the capability to fix a pothole in less than 8 minutes. This machine repairs with no additional tool or crew and thus it proves to be an efficient and economical solution for fixing potholes. The launch of the Pothole Pro was done via a virtual press event on Monday in the presence of JCB’s chairman.
The machine can repair up to 250 square meters (2,691 square feet) of the road at a speed of 25 kmph. In a trial run, the machine repaired the potholes at a rate of 700 per month. In other tests, Pothole Pro proved to fix 51 holes in 20 days which would have taken 6 fillers to complete it in 63 days which is about 3 times slower. The machine is equipped with depth control and hydraulic tilt which aids to repair potholes of larger depth as well.
The working mechanism is based on a backhoe loader, which cuts the edges of the pothole in a very clean manner. The inclusion of a 1,200 mm sweeper acts as a dust cleaner which helps in segregating the new material with leftover residue and the 600 mm planer is used to clean the newly made surface. JCB reports that this machine will reduce the manual labour cost by almost 50% and only a single contractor just needs to add tar following the work of the JCB and the potholes will be repaired permanently.
Pothole Pro is launched mainly for the UK market, where potholes are a major problem although the same could also be said for India. Recently, JCB India had showcased a similar pothole repair machine at the Central Road Research Institute (CRRI) in New Delhi which is based on the JCB 3DX backhoe loader. With technology advancement, we can expect that the Indian government will assign these machines to fix the potholes across all the national highways which are a major cause of road accidents in India.
