Predictive maintenance is the act of using historical data to improve fleet efficiency. Predictive maintenance tells fleet managers not only what their trucks are doing, but what they will do in the future. Different equipment performs different tasks and therefore they have different needs. Predictive maintenance can help identify which equipment needs maintenance more regularly and which problem areas can occur frequently.
How does it predict the future?
By collating historical data through Teletrac Navman’s DIRECTOR software, patterns in breakdowns or malfunctions can be forecast over time. Identifying when a truck’s components may fail, allows repairs to be scheduled – no longer a surprise inconvenience but a planned improvement. This can also be referred to as equipment maintenance tracking.
Asset tracking also provides insight into engine time, asset idling and utilisation, speed and more. Tracking both jobsite and on-road assets gives companies a better understanding of their productivity and insight for better project management.
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What repairs does it predict?
Services that can be predicted include: brake inspections, oil changes, tire rotations, wheel realignments, and fluid checks. On top of this you can track each vehicle’s WOF, registration and RUC licences, to ensure you’re never caught out without the proper certification.
The need for these repairs can be tracked via distance tracking. This means that services can be performed after a specific amount of distance travelled as opposed to increments of time such as every six months. As a result, repairs and services are booked as they’re needed, giving the most hardworking vehicles the right amount of servicing.
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How can Teletrac Navman help my business with predictive maintenance?
Every construction fleet fears equipment theft or tampering. GPS asset tracking ensures it can be recovered and that fleets know if someone was operating an asset outside of working hours. Long-life internal batteries are used so, even if assets are isolated or trailers are unhooked, they can be located and movement can be tracked.
One customer had surprise savings of over $160,000 when GPS tracking pointed them (and the police) to the barn their loader backhoe was being hidden in as well as the location of another stolen skid steer.
How does predictive maintenance reduce costs?
Electronic tracking accurately records machine hours and mileage, unlike paper records where drivers or operators can easily make a mistake. It can also include integrated fault code monitoring, providing alerts to engine problems before they become a problem. This helps fleets stay ahead of required and preventative maintenance, lowering odds of a malfunctioning or broken piece of equipment that can put an entire project on hold. It also ensures they stay compliant with any relevant regulations, and reduces risk of injury related to issues like a loose machine guard or by machinery abruptly shutting down.
With job sites often spread across state lines, asset location data also ensures people traveling to do repairs and maintenance aren’t wasting valuable time. It’s not uncommon for an engineer or maintenance professional to drive few hours to a site to find the equipment they were sent to work on is no longer there. With asset tracking, costly mistakes like this are avoided.
How else does DIRECTOR benefit my business?
Construction companies must also think beyond heavy equipment and machinery. Asset tracking to manage over-the-road vehicles can also deliver bottom-line savings.
With data on speeding and harsh braking and cornering, fleet managers can address unsafe driving behaviors resulting in accidents, fines, increased fuel usage and higher insurance costs. Asset tracking can also help with route optimisation, routing drivers around weather, traffic and other road hazards, so drivers can choose the safest way to go. By identifying and coaching drivers, one customer saved 10% in diesel costs in the first year of asset tracking.
Using asset tracking to collect data from heavy equipment and on-road vehicles can help construction companies manage assets and drive efficiency across multiple projects and jobs sites to increase productivity and decrease costs.