Esa Majoinen, Metsämajoinen Oy:
"Tyres must function so well that you can forget about them"
| In line with Nokian Heavy Tyres’ principles, all new products undergo thorough testing under actual circumstances. The tests are carried out by professional tyre users – top contractors interested in developing the products as well as their industry in general. Tyre failure is difficult to fix in the forest One of the contractors co-operating with Nokian Heavy Tyres is Esa Majoinen from Metsämajoinen Oy. ’Mr. Manager’, as his crew likes to call him, started the co-operation because he wanted to participate in the development of even better forestry tyres. ”If a tyre breaks down in the forest, it is difficult to fix. It takes hours to change tyres, especially in the winter. Furthermore, it is really difficult to get the broken tyre out of the forest for patching and then back to the machine,” he says. ”The most important thing about tyres is functionality. Tyres must function so well that you can forget about them,” he sums up. Boys follow in their father’s footsteps Majoinen has four children, one daughter and three sons. All three sons have followed in their father’s footsteps and work in the family business. During this interview with his father, Timo, the second son, is thinning in the forest. For him, the choice of profession was quite easy, as was the case with the other two brothers as well. It has felt like his kind of work from the very beginning. Esa is happy for his sons’ interest in forestry, as well as for having someone to take over his business some day. In the course of his 26 years as a forestry contractor, Esa has seen the changes in the industry up close. Forest machine development has taken huge leaps in this time; the harvesting efficiency has gone up nearly ten-fold. ”Whereas in the old days one lumberjack would complete 20 logs per shift, today a machine completes 200,” Majoinen tells us. Majoinen lives in eastern Finland, in Hankasalmi village 30 kilometres from the nearest town, Kitee. He operates three harvesters and two grapple skidders. At its height, his business employed 15 men; today his crew consists of his sons and five other employees. However, all the 3,000 inhabitants of the idyllic, rural village could almost be considered family. 15,000 hours in the forest on the test tyre Majoinen has tested the Nokian Forest Rider, which will be introduced to the market soon, under his grapple skidder. During the test he did not know which tyre it was - only during the interview did he learn that it is the first radial forestry tyre. He was not surprised to learn that it was a unique product as the tyre showed excellent durability in the forest. ”I don’t know what it is that makes the test tyres so durable but they have remained in very good condition,” says Majoinen, commenting on the Nokian Forest Rider he tested. He tells us that after some 15,000 hours of test-driving even the tyre sidewalls are still intact. After hearing about the unique properties of the product he states that it was not surprising. He knew there was something special about the tyres because they were so unbelievably durable. Read more: Nokian Forest Rider >> The size range of Nokian Forest Rider expands >> |
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