THE DEFINITIVE TRUCKING SITE

October 2008

Comment

As I write this - in mid-September just a few days before departing for the 62nd IAA Truck Show in Hannover - I am as thrilled as everybody else that the price of diesel is down to below R10 a litre with the oil price heading down below $100 a barrel.

But behind my smiling face is deep concern that we will once gain be lulled into thinking the problem is over or well on its way to disappearing. Let us not be naïve. As I have repeatedly said in my columns, articles and presentations: it is not what we pay for fuel, it is how we use it. 

Let’s not take our foot off the pedal and relax on our determination to control all owning and operating costs as never before. During recent weeks, I have had the great pleasure of speaking with a large number of transporters, fleet managers, equipment suppliers and service providers. To a man (and a woman) they confirmed that careful control over all costs was the only way to ensure long term survival and ultimate prosperity. Too many transporters have gone belly up, sold out or are downsizing their businesses. Now is the time to consolidate, review, assess and evaluate policies, plans and procedures that lead to ongoing cost and service improvements. 

Let us never forget that the fuel market is capricious. Speculators latch onto any international spat – and there are plenty of those around – which drive up the price of oil. Do not underestimate the determination of the speculators who make fortunes out of futures and warrants. Let’s be sensible and prudent, keep on enforcing the basic disciplines that curb waste, stop theft and fraud and promote improvements in transport efficiency. 

Max Braun

TIPS - Tyres and alignment. A discussion on the costs incurred when tyres are not properly maintained. Ideas and suggestions on how to eliminate the obvious and the less known profit eroders. The tip of the month takes a look at what trucks do out on the highways and byways. How many of these are yours? 

IS BIG BETTER? Is the biggest rig always the most efficient way to transport goods. The discussion looks at an interesting comparison between the ubiquitous 7-axle interlink and a five-axle articulated vehicle The way to better fuel-efficiency motivation and incentives for drivers. Do they work? Are they a good investment? A review of how incentives can be successfully implemented with recipes for success and failure. 

TRENDS – update graphs and comment.

WARNING - Fuel starvation fines

Low inflation – High Costs

This is not about the consumer price index, the price of food or crude oil or even the US$. It’s about what is probably the most talked about fuel saving homily: “keep the tyres properly inflated”. When you realise how few motorists, drivers, fleet controllers, et al remember to do this, it should not come as a surprise that it is now a fuel saving mantra. 

To bring home the importance of ensuring tyres are properly inflated as part of an ongoing basic tyre management procedure, FuelWatch plundered the archives of tyre heavyweights – including Bridgestone and Goodyear – as well as a number of leading and respected technical sources. The objective was to present you with as much evidence as limited space allows in a bid to convince even the most sceptical among us that under-inflated tyres are expensive, dangerous and polluting as well as an avoidable expense derived from ongoing waste of fuel, reduced casing life and retreadability. 

The dangers reside in reduced braking distances and vehicle stability, not to mention increased aquaplaning in wet weather. Tyre manufacturers remind us that it is the air in the tyre that supports the vehicle and load. The casing is just a container to hold the air. Let’s consider what the manufacturers and experts say about under-inflation: 

Properly inflated tyres are now a fuelsaving matter.

What is the impact on casing life?
At 10% under-inflation, casing life will be shortened between 9% and 16% depending on the operation.

At 20%, you can expect no more than 60% of the kilometres you should  get. Even at 50% with many modern tyres, it is not always easy to detect tyres are seriously under-inflated. 

What is the impact on fuel consumption? – When considering the many problems associated with under-inflation you can expect anything between 2% and 4% of your entire fuel bill. In practice the outcome will be determined by the choice of tyre for specific transport tasks and vehicles, maintenance of correct inflation, the degree of tyre maintenance and management generally and driving styles and attitudes. The impact of a 4% saving in fuel costs is enough to double some transporters’ profits or, alternatively when it’s not controlled, it could put them out of business. 

How much heat is generated?

• Tread separation

• Belt edge or ply-end seperation

• Tread reversion (porosity)

• Circumferential breaks

• Liner separation

• Run flat

• Uneven wear

• Bead area separation/bead deformation

• Upper sidewall cracking

• Fast shoulder wear

• Heel and toe wear – lug tyres

• Use a decent tyre pressure gauge.Have them calibrated regularly

• If using on-road filling stations make sure their gauges are correctly calibrated

• Select pressure for maximum load

• Add 70 kPa for air loss between checks

• 24 hour air retention check

• Cold check preferable

• Do not bleed hot tyres (4°C = 7kPa)

• Maintain design % of deflection (load, inflation, rim) 

Summary

Under-inflated tyres are responsible for a large number of expensive and potentially dangerous problems. 
These include: 

• Increased fuel consumption

• Impingement on vehicle stability and control 

• Increased braking distances

• Excessive heat generation resulting in damage to casings

• Risk of tyre failure

• More air pollution

• Maximum load + high freeway speed + hot weather + insufficient tyre pressure = a lethal cocktail

According to TPM Automotive Systems, under-inflated tyres worldwide waste billions of litres of fuel every year and compromise road safety. Tyre manufacturers reporting on the UK market say that an average of 5% under-inflation releases 1,5 million tons of CO2. Millions of discarded tyres clog landfills. Did you know that it takes a half barrel of crude oil to produce just one truck tyre? Keeping tyres properly inflated preserves tyre life and prevents premature wear.

Last words

Contact Bridgestone–Firestone and secure a copy of “The S.M.A.R.T. WAY” an excellent and comprehensive booklet on how to select, maintain, align, rotate and track your tyres.

Surviving the high cost of fuel is very much about the consistent application of several basic disciplines, some of which have been discussed in previous editions of FuelWatch and other fuel-related articles. However, an equally important aspect to consider is the matter of “Transport Efficiency” (TE). TE is about the production of transport commodity and how effectively it is taken up and at what cost to and profit (if any) for the operator. Transport commodity is expressed in terms such as tonkm, pallet-km, litre, case or any other measure that is relevant to the transport task.

The ongoing love affair South African operators have with the ubiquitous 7-axle interlink is an ideal example to illustrate that “big is always best”, is a myth. The example that follows sets out to illustrate that a 5-axle articulated vehicle (6x4 truck-tractor and tandem-axle semitrailer) is a more cost-effective way to transport full truck loads over long distances when compared with a 7-axle interlink set (6x4 trucktractor and standard tandem-tandem interlinks). The methodology is generally based on the hypothetical model developed a few years ago by the talented and experienced transport engineer, Hugh Sutherland. 

The hypothetical task requires the transportation of 6,500 000 ton-kms a year for a period of five years (a total of 32,5 million ton-km) for whichever vehicle is chosen to do the work. The objective of the exercise is to determine which of the two vehicle configurations would be the best investment for the operator and what the likely impact on fuel and related cost drivers will be.

Table 1 Indicates a 15% saving in capital cost in favour of the 5-axle vehicle. While there is a 6-ton reduction in payload, the 5-axle vehicle offers a better payload to gross combination mass ratio than the 7-axle interlink. This means that 7 tons less dead weight is hauled on every trip. 

The 5-axle vehicle spends an hour more a day on the road than the 7-axle vehicle to complete the task but manages a slightly better average speed to cover the extra kilometres needed to produce sufficient ton-km a day. 

The larger vehicle produces 11% more ton-km/hour and generates R90 more in revenue. But, at what cost? 

Table 2 reveals a number of important technical factors in favour of the 5-axle unit. These include significantly better power and torque to gross mass in terms of kilowatts and Newton metres per ton of gross mass. Final drive and transmission ratios may well differ depending on make and model choices. These factors provide a useful insight as to how better equipped the 5-axle vehicle is to cope with five years of full truck loads over long distances. 

The large difference in the number of tyres on the road represents a significant factor in total lifecycle costs. 

The contemplated fuel consumption of the two vehicles as depicted in Table 3 (overpage) is a realistic expectation for such vehicles operating along the N3 highway between Durban and Johannesburg. The 5-axle unit produces almost 11% more ton-km per litre of fuel consumed, thus completing the annual transport task of 6,5 million ton-km at a 10% saving in litres consumed – equal to a cash saving of R104 200 a year. 

Summarising the factors over the envisaged five years, the total fuel savings comes out at R521 000. While the 5-axle vehicle would have travelled 36 111 kilometres further than the 7-axle interlink does, the favourable difference in estimated tyre costs would add another R53 625 to the bottom line. Due to the countless variables encountered with various cost drivers, this hypothetical example of transport efficiency has purposely ignored maintenance costs. The message is look carefully at what various vehicle configurations are capable of achieving before just accepting that big, multi-axle rigs are the only way to tackle full-truck-load, long-distance freight transport. While the above exercise is hypothetical, practical experience confirms that under real-time operations, the lifecycle costs of the 5-axle rig would have little difficulty in achieving the ton/km task offering a much better return on investment while making a healthy contribution to the reduction in total energy used. The 1.2.2. configuration is well-known for its excellent mass distribution characteristics, ease of loading and stability on the road. 

With acknowledgements to
Crest Assignments

INVESTIGATIONS by the KwaZulu-Natal Road Traffic Inspectorate of an incident on the N3 South between Peacevale and Key Ridge revealed that the articulated heavy vehicle combination incident was caused as a result of the truck tractor running out of diesel and rolling back into a jack-knife position causing a major blockage of the south bound roadway. 

RTI Officers are frequently deployed to breakdowns to protect the scene and provide advance warning so as to prevent secondary accidents. This absorbs considerable RTI (scarce) resource. In many cases, it now appears that the breakdowns are as a result of vehicles running low on diesel (to economise). 

The low diesel levels are aggravated on long up gradients which cause a surge in the tanks resulting in diesel starvation and stoppage. 

The obstruction of National and Provincial main roads by broken vehicles is economically disruptive to the province’s motorists and other users in the freight industry as well as the long distance bus industry. 

Unnecessary obstructions such as these, caused by lack of diesel, are highly disruptive and lead to missed connections/ appointments. 

With immediate effect, the RTI will charge drivers of such vehicles for obstruction of the roadway for which the Road Traffic Act makes provision of a fine of R1 000; and order that such vehicles are immediately towed away, at cost to the operator, with or without such owner’s consent.