On a weekday you don’t need to spend very long watching the traffic in Blenheim or around the Marlborough highways to see the multi-shaded blue trucks belonging to Gills Construction at work.

One of the newest of the Gills Construction trucks – and one that is busy on Blenheim streets and around the edges of the town – is this new Isuzu CYZ 460 tipper.

The latest Isuzu in the Gills colours went on the road immediately after the Christmas-New Year holiday break last summer. The manual transmission 6x4 has spent seven months shuttling between local quarries and crusher plants, the Gills Construction depots in town and at Rapaura Rd, and to job sites around the Marlborough district.

Just a few days before New Zealand Truck & Driver caught up with the Isuzu for this month’s Giti Tyres Big Test, it had just been for its 15,000km service.

How important is an 18-speed manual transmission today? This month I head to Blenheim where we catch up with Gill Construction to test their new Isuzu Giga Series CYZ 460 tipper.

As far as I can tell from asking around and my general knowledge, Isuzu is the only Japanese brand still offering an 18-speed manual transmission, although I’m happy to be corrected on that.

This Isuzu is a 6x4 tipper powered by the 15.7-litre six-cylinder engine developing 460hp. It’s a sharp looking truck painted in the Gill’s blue livery.

Before we hit the road there is a quick morning catch up with the Gill Construction team and a tour through the workshop. There’s a pretty cool classic rebuild in progress that is meant to be finished for the next (and last) Wanaka truck show at Easter 2025. I won’t say what it is, as I’m not sure if I am allowed to.