Caterpillar Inc. and Navistar International have signed a deal to jointly pursue highway truck opportunities world wide, including severe service trucks for North America. Cat hopes to roll out a Cat-branded on-highway truck in 2010.

ESCO has added two new eco-friendly formulas to its line of crusher backing products: ECO-BAK Standard is for standard crushing applications, and ECO-BAC High Impact is for more severe applications.

Detroit Diesel has introduced the DD13, a 12.8-liter, six-cylinder diesel engine for the vocational markets, among others. The engine can develop 350 to 450 horsepower, depending on configuration.

Sterling Trucks is now offering a brochure for its Class 7-8 natural gas truck on-line at www.SterlingTrucks.com/NaturalGas.

More power and lift

Caterpillar has given its new 315D L excavator 5 percent more horsepower and up to 8 percent more lift capacity than its predecessor. Along with a new Tier 3 engine, the 115-horsepower, 38,095-pound machine is factory-equipped for fast installation of auxiliary hydraulic circuits, and its control system stores hydraulic flow and pressure for up to 10 different work tools.

‘Promising’ hybrid research

Volvo Construction Equipment is touting new research that shows diesel-electric hybrid technology can reduce fuel consumption and CO2 emissions by greater amounts than previously thought.

“We are facing the very real prospect of fuel savings up to 50 percent, significant performance increases, and a reduction in CO2 emissions in the order of millions of tons a year,” Volvo CE’s Arvid Rinaldo told Aggregates Manager’s Kirk Landers and a group of international business journalists in June.