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Reducing maintenance costs

20th April 1973, Page 31
20th April 1973
Page 31
Page 32
Page 31, 20th April 1973 — Reducing maintenance costs
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

NRDC programme takes a step further

A PROJECT, financed by the National Research and Development Council, to develop a "rapid-strip" goods vehicle is now a definite possibility. This was revealed last week by Mr L. A. Wilson, of the NRDC's planning department.

A paper on maintenance costs by Mr Wilson was reported in Commercial Motor last year (June 30) which requested operators and manufacturers who required development assistance to contact the NRDC. There was substantial response from operators and manufacturers to the report and a summary of their views, together with some pointers to future policy, has now been published in a further report.

Mr Wilson told CM that a project for developing a low-maintenance cost vehicle was close at hand. It would probably be in conjunction with a manufacturer and the vehicle would incorporate rapid-strip principles of faulty component replacement. Though Mr Wilson declined to name a manufacturer he did indicate that views expressed by Fodens Ltd in CM, January 12, seemed to be along the same lines.

In his report last year Mr Wilson said he had calculated the whole-life maintenance costs — including down-time — of maximum-weight artic tractive units as totalling £8200.

The report took 17p a mile as a typical running cost of a 32-ton artic.

This was made up as follows: fuel and oil 4.5p; tyres 1.2p; maintenance 5p; driver's wages 6p; and cleaning, etc, 0.3p. Standing charges, including depreciation, amounted to £120 a week.

From analysis of a 10-vehicle fleet it was concluded that over a 200,000-mile life 326 maintenance jobs would be carried out — overall cost £5000, divided roughly equally between labour and materials. An additional cost of £3200 covered the 1600 hours off the road while maintenance work was carried out.

The report listed three innovations which thould lead to less costly maintenance: vehicle-mounted monitoring instrumenta:ion, workshop diagnostic equipment and .apid-strip vehicles.

This paper stimulated comments from a vide range of people and organizations and hese have formed the basis for a second mper, "Commercial vehicle maintenance," .eported here for the first time, which says sIRDC would like to contribute to the :reation and development of inventions in hree fields in order to reduce the whole-life :ost of operating commercial vehicles, vhich can amount in real terms to at least hree times first cost.

The three, fields referred to are the wishes — of operators for vehicles spending more ime in service and less under maintenance; if builders to develop vehicles more reliable Lnd easier to repair; and of manufacturers

of test, equipment to develop new item§ for which .a market can be foreseen.

The response by users and manufacturers is summarized separately and at some length (see What the operators and manufacturers have to say).

Other comments are coveted under the headings:

Whole life costing; costs; instrumentation; rapid-strip principle; conclusions; and contribution by NRDC.

Whole-life costing El Increasing attention is being given to the problem of reducing or at least containing, the overall cost of vehicle maintenance. At the recent IMechE Conference on the "Reliability of diesel engines and its impact on cost," Prof A. D. S. Carter put whole-life costing at the top of the list of topics of importance to engine users. He concluded that "Eventually manufacturers must guarantee the whole life cost."

Prof Carter also stressed the desirability of a closer collaboration between the users and the manufacturers.

A paper presented at the FISITA Congress last year by Mr H. C. B. Bradfield of MVEE described the Ministry of Defence purchase strategy for vehicles, which is based on the calculation of lowest predicted whole-life cost. Tenderers have to provide a' considerable amount of information on life expectancy and man-hours required for repairs.

Comments on costs El The expenditure on maintenance plus the cost of down-time over the vehicle's life can amount to a sum about as great as the original purchase price. This is generally

agreed to be the present state of affairs.

The figure given previously for the typical cost of down-time appears to be too low; British Road Services says the loss of revenue due to down-time• can amount to 13.75 per hour.

There were many criticisms of the operating cost given in pence per mile. This can vary so greatly with different operating conditions and mileage run that it is not a particularly useful way of calculating costs for the present purposes.

The working life suggested of 200,000 miles seems to be rather lower than the average already obtained, at least for the larger vehicles, and efforts are being made to raise the figure to something nearer 500,000. This will have the tendency of increasing the importance of maintenance costs in the whole-life cost calculation.

A transport manager needs an information system quickly providing details of all elements of cost related to each' vehicle; showing up exceptions and highlighting trends.

It was pointed out by Mr,D. W. Mansell, lately md of Mainstem Ltd, in a recent paper that a 10 per cent cut in the maintenance bill could mean a 6 per cent increase in profit for an average haulier.

Comments on Instrumentation The addition 'of new instrumentation or automatic features introduces a further item of possible unreliability: therefore the failsafe principle is needed, probably increasing cost.

A further suggestion is that a wdrning system is of little use if it can be ignored by the driver, so that an automatic shut-down is required for those situations where consequential damage is otherwise likely to occur rapidly. This could operate after a time delay of, say, 30sec to avoid traffic difficulties; and possibly at the end of the journey for less serious conditions.

Vehicle-mounted instrumentation can reduce the time taken by the driver to make the essential pre-journey checks; and (2) monitor certain important parameters and give an alarm indication in time for serious damage to be avoided ----this is generally accepted as desirable, but there is little detailed evidence available on the actual cost of breakdowns, in fact neither users nor manufacturers like to admit that they occur.

Some users would also like there to be some sort of clean bill of health issued before a vehicle leaves a workshop, such as might be obtained from plug-in check-out equipment. It appears that the cost of comprehensive diagnostic equipment may restrict its adoption at first to those workshops handling large fleets (say, over 50 vehicles).

Rapid-strip principle

CI All our vehicles are designed for the utmost ease of maintenance." This kind of statement in a sales leaflet may be true, but progress in this direction does seem to be rather slow.

It will become more economic to replace components with exchange items or modules rather than repair in situ.

There are different opinions on how the costs incurred by unplanned maintenance must be reduced; some hold that rather than adopt rapid-strip design to cut the cost of the repair operation, efforts should be directed to avoiding the necessity of doing component repair or replacement jobs.

Perhaps there is room for improvement in the reliability of components, but it does appear that for some time to come it will be necessary to remove and replace such items as brake and clutch linings, starter motors, fan belts, oil seals, shackle pins, etc.

Conclusions El The fact that users all have their own individual requirements means that it is difficult for manufacturers to identify common needs. The information gathering services now available may in time fill this gap.

Another approach might be the establishment of a central data recording system on the lines of that introduced by the American Trucking Association, recording data in a standardized form.

There needs to be a co-ordinated feed-back of in-service information to the vehicle manufacturers. Users can help with prototype testing (several have offered to do so).

The introduction of tachographs in 1976 will present a new opportunity for the collection of information from vehicles in service.

There may be opportunities for savings in the carrying out of routine servicing, which accounted for almost 80 per cent of the total number of maintenance jobs listed in the earlier paper. One example is the use of an automatic oil topping-up device as made by N. Frankmann Ltd.

The isolation of the driver from the power, unit produced by the introduction of rear-mounted engines (mainly in psv) brings about an increased reliance on instrumentation; the reduced skill required to operate automatic testing devices means that use= be made of labour which is less scarce and less expensive.

BP has pioneered in assessing the cost of accessibility and the value of vehicle health monitoring, as reported in Mr D. E. Mathews' paper to the IMechE Conference last November. He pointed out that fleet maintenance and repair costs are now between 20 and 25 per cent of total operating costs, compared with 15 per cent a few years ago.

Manufacturers seem to recognize • that purchasers will demand more extensive assurances of whole-life costs, including perhaps maintenance contracts at a fixed price per mile. To achieve this may require:—

(a) The development of engines to give a longer life before major overhaul.

(b) Reliability of components to match their life to engine life.

(e) Introduction of automatic features to lengthen component life.

(d) Use of protective features (eg automatic shut-down).

(e) Provision of plug-in connection points for workshop diagnostic instruments.

09 Redesign on • rapid-strip principles so that parts and assemblies can be exchanged quickly, for bench repair.

(k) The collection of in-service data, to identify problem areas.

Many vehicle components are produced as proprietary articles by specialist manufacturers, for example electrical, fuel and brake systems. Even the cooling system (radiator) is not an integral part of the engine and it is perhaps because of this divided responsibility that the incidence of cooling system faults is so high.

Contribution by NRDC El The NRDCs contribution might include: help in identifying needs for novel equipment and steps to encourage the development support for the development of inventions originating from manufacturers or users; financing the construction and testing of prototypes; underwriting the risks of introducing developments into service.

Suggestions are invited from any organization interested in the making or using of commercial vehicles. Instrumentation is needed to perform more quickly and economically the following: (a) The pre-journey check of fluid levels, pressures, etc. (b) Monitoring in service of temperatures and pressures, with alarm indication and automatic shut-down. (c) Diagnosis of faults to establish remedial work required. (d) Checking of repair work, and recording of basic parameters for comparison purposes.


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