At CES 2025, John Deere unveiled the 460 P Tier articulated dump truck, a concept model poised to become a tireless quarry workhorse for construction fleets. The units will be able to be monitored—and controlled, if need be, from a digital operation center. This will become increasingly important for construction fleets as dump truck uptime remains critically important though labor has become scarcer.
At a media event demonstrating the autonomous vocational truck attended by Fleet Maintenance affiliate Construction Equipment, Jahmy Hindman, SVP/CTO for Deere, noted that “88% of contractors struggle to find available labor,” though quarry equipment is expected to run 24/7.
Demand has tripled in the last 20 years, according to Russel Hatfield, a quarry manager in the Las Vegas area testing the autonomous 460 P tier. In a video produced by Deere, he said two decades ago the norm was mining 120 tons/hour, and now it’s upwards of 375 tons/hour.
He lamented that skilled labor is not what it once was due to a lack of vocational education programs, and these trucks programmed to run specific routes non-stop will solve that.
“To be able to run and see a machine and be able to operate it from my desk will eliminate the training, eliminate safety factors,” Hatfield said. Overall, he surmised these robotic dump trucks should increase productivity while freeing him up to spend more time thinking of creative solutions to future operational challenges.
The kits were also designed to be retrofit, which would be done at Deere dealers when the system becomes fully commercialized.
“The computer and cameras are relatively inexpensive,” Pell said. “[They are] designed as a kit to be added so that tractors that have already been sold can become autonomous.”
The system also uses Deere’s Starfire Guidance and StarLink for data transmission, giving it a complete control system, said Kristen Camden, ADT specialist.
“We are removing the operator,” she said, “so anything having to do with steering, velocity control, or dump actions is upgraded with the right functional hardware.”
How it works
The autonomous 460 ADT, which has a 92,197-lb. payload capacity, is equipped with Deere’s second-generation autonomous software and a 16-camera array that provides triple overlap as opposed to the double overlap of normal stereo cameras, Willie Pell, CEO of Deere subsidiary Blue River Technology, told Construction Equipment Editor-in-Chief Rod Sutton.
“We can get incredibly accurate depth maps at large range with a mechanically lightweight, no-moving-parts, cost-effective solution,” Pell explained. “We’re pushing more intelligence into the software.”
For the full story, visit ConstructionEquipment.com.
