Highway Care has unveiled a second, smaller, more agile Falcon Automated Cone Laying Machine (ACLM) model following feedback from local authorities.
The award-winning Falcon ACLM was first launched by Highway Care in 2022 for the strategic road network, following National Highways approval.
Now with local authorities having requested a more compact system for use on local and rural roads, Highway Care has added the smaller Falcon 75 ACLM to its range.
Ben Duncker, commercial director at Highway Care explains: 'Millions of cones are in use across the UK road network, but the manual process of deploying and removing them involves inherent risks for highways operatives.
'The Falcon 100 ACLM was developed for use across National Highways’ strategic road network (SRN) to work with the commonly used 1m cone. It has since become clear there is an appetite for a smaller machine designed to work with the 750mm cones more commonly used across the major road network of local authority managed A roads and non-SRN roads.
'With the Falcon 75 ACLM, we are adding a solution to our range that can be deployed more flexibly, on narrower roads that are less straight or come with height restrictions and require a smaller vehicle to suit the needs of the operation. This gives local authorities the automated equipment they need to deliver safer cone laying activities for both road workers and road users.'
Allowing cone laying operations to be controlled from inside the cab, the Falcon 75 ACLM enables cones to be placed and picked up across the back of the vehicle, to the left or right, with preset modes for working in medium and narrow lanes.
The smaller Falcon 75 ACLM is suitable for use with 750mm, 5kg cones, and is designed to be mounted on the back of a truck bed or inside a curtain side body.
The equipment is available in three capacity arrangements ranging from 240 to 480 cones in each machine and runs on a 48 VDC / 180 Ah on-board battery, which enables up to 600 cone cycles on a single charge.
While there have been technical questions around the economies of scale in the business case over the original Falcon 100 ACLM, the innovation heralded a new era of boots-off-the-ground works.
It was initially picked up by Balfour Beatty and Connect Plus Services as part of their delivery of the M25 improvement programme.
