The continued success of the Vibroll VM71 pedestrian roller in the UK is not down to one single attribute. I don’t know the statistics about who sells the most pedestrian rollers in the UK from Vibroll, Mecalac and Bomag, it becomes a bit irrelevant as Vibroll don’t sell to national plant hirers, apart from Eagle Plant. However, if you take national plant hirers out of the equation here in the west-country the predominant pedestrian roller you see behind the ubiquitous Ford Transit is definitely the Vibroll VM 71.
The Vibroll VM71 is a well-engineered piece of equipment with one of the lowest hand/arm vibration figures in the market. It’s hydraulic driven vibrator shaft doesn’t rely on a clutch that can slip along with the ¾” Duplex drive chain down to the drum means that you’re not going to have an embarrassing failure when you’ve got a hotbox full of black gold sat there.
Putting all that aside, let’s talk about engines. Both the other OEM’s have gone down the Hatz route which, to be fair, is a pretty good engine. However, the Vibroll have gone down the Yanmar route and fitted the Yanmar L100V, the L series engine being the biggest selling single cylinder air-cooled engine in the universe. Considering the amount of rubbish coming out of China at the moment that’s no mean feat.
Apart from the normal vibration mounts, cables and other consumables that ped rollers consume whilst they are vibrating themselves to death, the only thing that ever seems to go wrong on a roller is the engine. To be fair to the engine its not normally their fault, its normally down to the driver who doesn’t service it or puts diesel decanted from the left over fuel from when they built the Egyptian pyramids. So, here’s the big whammy. To replace the Yanmar L100V on the Vibroll is £1295 plus VAT, to replace the Hatz is an eye-watering amount of money as traditionally Hatz engines have been very, very expensive to buy as a spare part.
If that’s not a reason to invest in a Vibroll VM71 roller and don’t know what is.