from the press

Eng. Semuli Moses is the brain child of the Rural Transport Vehicle, a product of Makerere University’s Faculty of Technology and Katwe Metal Fabricators Cluster. The vehicle looks like an old disused lorry, although, from afar, it can easily be mistaken for an old tractor. By all means, this vehicle, made almost from a scratch, with different scraps of metal and engines put together, pulled crowds at the Freedom Square, Makerere University.
As Eng. Semuli said, the vehicle is designed with one piston. This makes it a highly fuel efficient machine. The vehicle uses diesel. A litre is enough to power it for 20 kilometres. Although there’s no complete combustion of the fuel, Eng. Semuli insisted that its degradation of the environment is very small compared to human beings.
“The engine requires tuning so that the air mixtures can enable it to start,” said Eng. Semuli adding that it is an internal-combustion diesel engine.
The vehicle has eight major sections, of which the breaking system is the most important.
Bicycle technology, motorcycle technology, vehicle and aviation technology were used to bring the vehicle into being. The compatibility and use of such technology makes it easy to repair when the vehicle breaks down. “If it gets a problem in the garden, one can repair it from there,” Eng. Semuli noted.
Although the vehicle is still a prototype (not a complete/finished product), the Ushs9 million injected into its assembly from a scratch have seen to it that it runs. It was manufactured using the tri-lemur philosophy of economy, energy and environment.
Specifications from abroad were used to test it for quality and safety standards since the Uganda National Bureau of Standards (UNBS) does not have the machinery to carry out the tests. According to him, every engine has got three standards; emissions, vibration and sound. “It should not exceed 70 decibels when you are a metre from it.”
However, he often drives the vehicle to Uganda Police and to the Central Materials Laboratory at the Ministry of Works for mechanical audit and evaluation.
The engineer, who is an electrical engineer by training, with a speciality in small and industrial machinery, acknowledged the effort injected to come up with the eye catching vehicle.
“If you saw this vehicle during Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in 2007, it did not have an engine. And the first time we tried it, we used an engine of 6.5 horsepower, which was donated by Car and General Uganda Ltd. It (the vehicle) could not even climb a hill. People had to push it,” he said. Now they keep improving it day by day although whatever is left is for professionals.
The project was started in 1993 when Eng. Semuli was still a university student in Punjab, India. What inspired him to venture into the task many people find tasking to undertake, was the way people in India overcame their transport problems with ease. They apply their knowledge to the indigenous systems to make something that can sustainably work for themselves.
“I said, can’t I copy this and take it back to Uganda?” He did it. But when he came back to Uganda, he did not get any attention. He professed that when he went to Uganda National Council of Science and Technology (UNCST) to solicit for the hardware, he couldn’t get the assistance he needed.
“I couldn’t even get attention,” he said. “That is why I decided to try a ‘Jua Kali’(local/domestic industry). So, in 2006, after gathering all the required data, I got a job in Sudan. I was working as a maintenance engineer for United States Agency for International Development (USAID). All the money they paid me, I just put it in the research.” So far, the research he initiated in 1998, has run into Ushs400 million, which has been spent on air-tickets and research material.
The notable thing with the vehicle is that it is a jack of all trade, with the multiplicity of tasks it can perform. It can act as a welder and at the same time a generator, when it’s put on. It generates 7.5 Kw of electricity. It can also be used in mining and transportation. The vehicle was nicknamed the ‘punda’ because of its capacity to do such a lot of work.
Lack of partnership and funding he requires has impeded him from manufacturing more of these vehicles. Granted that he gets the funding, they will start to manufacture these vehicles for the mass market, although, no demand from the people has yet been forthcoming.
Eng. Semuli not only works at Victor Machinery as the technical officer, where he is one of the members of the Katwe Metal Fabricators Cluster, but he is also a part-time lecturer at Kampala Polytechnic in Mengo. He teaches Workshop practice to certificate and diploma students and engineering to higher diploma students.
He credits Eng. Dr Yasin Nakuzirawa, of Makerere University Faculty of Technology for helping him with materials and stress test since 2006. Eng. Mutambi Joshua helped him with capacity building, patronage and co-ordination.

By Joshua Masinde and Nelson Wesonga