THE INFLUENCE OF FUEL COSTS.
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0 NE HEARS SO MUCH of the fuel situation and of fuel prospects that there is perhaps a tendency for prospective users of commercial motor vehicles to feel that the whole qnestion of their economical operation depends on whether or no we are able, after the war, to get our fuel cheaply. As a matter of fact, a cheap supply of fuel is only vital to us inasmuch as very high prices are often accompanied by a positive scarcity of supplies.
In the case under consideration, any actual scarcity does not appear in the least likely to occur after conditions have once reached normality, but high prices are distinctly possible, partly because we have not, in the past, taken sufficient trouble to insure that alternative sources•Ct fuel supply should be properly developed. The result, is that we might quite conceivably find ourselves exploited to the profit of a small ring of importers. Many private vehicle owners form the habit of over-estimating the importance of fuel costs. Because of the fact that such costs exist is continually with them, they are apt to gauge the economy of operation of a ear almost entirely by its, fuel consumption, and when the car owner begins to consider operating commercial vehicles, he may very easily fall into the same error and arrive at the rather thoughtless conclusion that a variation in the price of fuel means an equal percentage variation in the total cost of operation. Now, as has been frequently explained in these columns, the costs sif owning and using the commercial motor vehicle fall under two headings—the standing costs and the running costs. Clearly fuel constitutes one of the running costs, the amount. of fuel used depending directly upon the mileage coVered. If a petrol vehicle is kept fully employed under average conditions of use and roads, the standing costs may amount to about a quarter of the total expenses. For the purposes of rough estimation we may therefore assume that any change in fuel prices affects only a group of items which in the aggregate will be three-quarters of the total expenditure. Let us take the case of a three-ton wagon covering about 300 miles a week, and suppose the running cost to be as follows If fuel consumption is at the rate of one gallon for 10 miles, 30 gallons will be used in a, week, and if the price were is. a gallon the weekly fuel cost would be 21 10s. If the price were to increase to 2s. 6d. a gallon, the cost would rise to 23 15s. Now it has been noted above that standing costs are approximately a quarter of the total cost, or onethird of running costs, if the vehicle is kept busy. On this estimate let us put standing charges at 23. Hence, with petrol at is. a gallon, we get total costs as follows : With fuel at 2s. 6d a gallon, the total will be 215 5s. In lhe first instance, the cost per mile will be B30 10.4d. ; in the second instance the cost per mile will be 12.2d. Assuming a full load of three tons in each case, the cost per ton-mile with the cheap fuel will be about 3.5d., and with expensive fuel just over 4d.
We see, then, that the very large increase in fuel charges represented by a rise in prices from is. to 2s. Gd. a gallon may amount in practice only to an increase of about id, in the cost of carrying a ton over the distance of a mile. Put in another way, it results in an increase of about 121 per cent. in the total operating costs of the vehicle.
Now' if we were to take this same vehicle and run it. half loaded instead of fully loaded, we should double
the cost per ton-mile. Instead of merely increasing the cost from 3.5d. to 4d. we should increase it from 3.5d, to 7d. If we ran with an average load of two tons instead of three tons, our cost per ton-mile would be over 5d., even with fuel at is. a gallon. From this one sees that faulty organization leading to vehicles going out only partly loaded or travelling an unnecessary number of miles light has a much more ' serious effect on the cost of transport than can be produced by any conceivable rise in fuel prices. A '
user whose lousiness is well organized, but who had to pay 2s. 6d. a gallon for fuel, would get a far better.
economy in transport than a user who can get his fuel at 1s. a, gallon, but who has not troubled to re-organize his business so as to make the best use of the motor vehicles with which he has replaced his horsed vehicles.
Faulty organization or unsuitable conditions spay show themselves principally in one or both of two ways. One is that already considered, namely, in the vehicles going out with only a partial load and covering a big mileage empty. The other is by the practice of only covering a daily or weekly mileage very much lower than that of which the speed capabilities of the vehicle render it capable.
Going back to our typical instance, if we were to halve our mileage we should halve some but not all of the items that we have grouped under running costs. We should still have to pay the driver and the assistant and defray the Cost of management. These three items amount to 24 altogether. Of the remain ing 24 10s. we should save about half by halving our mileage, so that running costs altogether would come out at 26 5s. or at best £6; standing charges would, as before, be £3; fuel cost would be 'salved, amounting to only 15s, at is. a. gallon, or 21 17s. 6d. at 2s. Gd. a gallon. Total cost with cheap fuel would, there fore, be 29 15s. a week ; with expensive fuel • 210 17s. 6d. a week. These costs would have to be
spread over a mileage of 150, so that with cheap. fuel the cost of running would be about 15.6d. per mile or 5.2d. per ton-mile with a full load. With expensive fuel the cost would be about 17.5d. per mile or about 5.8d. per ton-mile.
Altogether, it is clear from these rough estimates that no conceivable advances in fuel price could pos sibly make any difference in operating costs at all comparable with that which can be made by an apparently trifling lack of attention to the problem of so organizing the whole service of motor vehicles as to keep each vehicle as fully as possible occupied in respect both of mileage and of the extent of the load carried.
Our calculation, if merely illustrative, at least proves that we exaggerate when we talk about low fuel prices being vital to the commercial motor user. They are important, but not nearly so vital as the provision of means for rapid loading and unloading or the proper sub-division of work, so that each vehicle is able to carry a useful load at a reasonable speed during the largest possible proportion of its working day.