Tipping hi the right direction
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Tipper maintenance can be a real heacache for driver, but Greenham's scheme eases as Tim Blakemore finds out Wea erley took
ONE WAY or another, vehicle maintenance is likely to be never very far out of the mind of the owner-driver of a tipper. If it isn't approaching annual test time, then maybe the body or tipping gear are in need of repairs or perhaps a spring has broken again or the brakes need relining.
The very nature of tipper operation means the vehicles need repair more often than the average haulage vehicle, even though a haulage vehicle's annual mileage will be much higher.
As well as putting additional stress on suspension and steering components, the hazards of working on site include operators of diggers and other plant who have little respect for the bodywork of lorries and none for the regulations requiring rear markers, side reflectors and number plates to be left in place.
There's an unwritten law of physics that says 'If something can go wrong, it will go wrong-, so simply fitting extra axles and hydraulic tipping gear to a chassis also makes it more susceptible to defects.
Any scheme that can ease the worry of maintenance for an owner-driver while still leaving him more or less a free agent has to be worthwhile. I recently visited a company in Middlesex with a scheme that does just that.
All the vehicles operating from Greenham Sand and Ballast at Feltham belong to owner-drivers. Some have more than one vehicle and employ drivers themselves. The vehicles are ,painted in Greenham's livery, and one of the conditions of the contract between the owner-driver and the company is that each vehicle will be inspected and serviced once a month at the Feltham workshop.
Shortly after each inspection, the owner-driver gets a report on his vehicle's condition and a letter detailing any repairs that must be carried out before the next inspection.
The owner can have these repairs done anywhere he likes, in fact he can do them himself if he is capable and so wishes or he can ask Greenham to do them. But in any event if the defects are still apparent at the next inspection they will be rectified at Feltham, and the owner charged.
Greenham's charge-out rate to the owner-drivers is considerably less than a commercial garage's, so the cost of servicing and inspection is kept right down. John Bryant, Greenham 's workshop executive, told me that by strictly adhering to the preventive maintenance scheme they were able to keep unscheduled repairs to a minimum. Most of the vehicles operated from Feltham are now Scammell Routeman eight-wheelers fitted with alloy bodies by Charlton Bros of Great South West Road.
The fitters have had a lot of experience with these chassis, and a team of two can easily work through the 53-item inspection checklist in a morning.
When the vehicle comes into the workshop over a pit the body is raised first of all to give good access to the chassis. Nobody at Greenham is allowed to go underneath a raised body until a steel prop is in place. -Safety Comes Firstsays the sign in large letters on the wall—a constant reminder to everyone of the dangers in a workshop.
While the engine is still warm, the engine oil is drained and the second member of the team begins to grease the chassis. There's only one grease point on the Routeman chassis that's awkward to reach, and that's on the gearchange linkage up underneath the cab (which doesn't tilt).
The non-tilt cab also makes the clutch master cylinder very difficult to get at to check the fluid level. An inspection hatch is provided underneath the driver's seat, but it's easier (though still difficult) to check the level by reaching up underneath the cab from the outside.
An Epco jacking beam in the inspection pit saved a lot of time when the mechanics checked wheel bearings and kingpin bushes on the front axles. The vehicle I followed through was less than a year old and showed no signs of wear here.
The Routeman was due for its first WItest on April 22 so special attention was given to the brakes in case a reline was needed but they were only
about half worn. Generally, I was told, the brake linings last about two years (around 46,000 miles).
Greenham's main problem with Scammell brakes has been jamming on, caused either by bushes moving on fulcrum pins or return springs snapping. The springs have been modified to a full coil now, and it's hoped that this will cure the problem.
One of the most common defects with any tipper (particularly one on site work) is a broken road spring and it's something the Department of Transport inspectors especially look for on annual inspections — so they were given close scrutiny by Keith and Peter, the Greenham fitters.
Although the chassis is steam cleaned before the inspection, some dirt inevitably remains on the springs and the only way to be sure that no leaves are cracked is to brush them off and look closely. Front springs on the Routeman fail much more often than the rear, but Greenham's workshop foreman showed me a snapped rear suspension trunnion—unique in his experience.
He had to buy the whole trunnion bracket, at a cost ol around E700, because he couldn't get the pin alone.
Minor defects are repaired al
the same time as the service and inspection, provided they don't take too long, SO when Peter found that the Scammell's windscreen washer motor was faulty, he promptly replaced it. They fail quite often so a stock is kept at Feltham.
It was puzzling that so many of the eight-wheelers were fitted with chrome-plated air horns on the cab roofs. Tippers are hardly the kind of glamour vehicle normally associated with such an expensive accessory.
Peter explained, though, that it isn't just cosmetic. The standard horn is so weak that it can hardly be heard,
continued overleaf When it comes to vehicle and body specification the ownerdrivers have freedom of choice but they, of course, listen to workshop executive John Bryant's advice, and so there is a large degree of uniformity in the fleet. Single rams are preferred to twins, and bolt-on tailgate hinges are specified because they are so much easier to replace than welded ones.
I asked John what he thought about automatic tailgates, controlled from the cab. He remains unconvinced about their practicability. "If they don't operate," he said, "when a driver is tipping, the first he is likely to know about it is when his cab is pointing skywards. And then you've got a broken tailgate to replace."
There is some disagreement among the drivers on the use of "Super single" tyres. John told me that while one does cost more than a pair of 11-22.5's it generally has a longer life— fifteen months on average, compared to the twelve months of the twins and, of course, the danger of bricks caught between tyres is removed.
Whichever tyres are fitted, a separate tyre report is completed with each inspection and a copy is sent to the ownerdriver. On the bottom of each tyre report is the reminder: "Worn tyres are illegal, dangerous, and are your responsibility.'' This is a good example of the allocation of responsibility that is one of the major assets of the Greenhorn scheme. Each owner-driver is ultimately responsible for his own vehicles so he takes good care of them, while leaving everyday responsibility for maintenance to the experts in the workshop.