GT Mid Atlantic (GTMA) has established a dedicated unit to monitor its rental fleet of 600 machines, including 74 Rokbak articulated dump trucks. It has integrated Rokbak’s Haul Truck telematics system to aid in the task.
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GTMA has machines at work across Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Washington D.C., Philadelphia, northern Virginia, and West Virginia. It houses its technical control area—dedicated to telematics monitoring—in its New Jersey branch. For example, with data from Rokbak telematics system, they can detail the precise location of each truck within a specific fleet, see where each unit has been working, track loads, and calculate the hours worked. The dealer can also monitor speed, fuel consumption, and idle time.
“There are times when we’re aware a machine has a problem before the customer knows,” said Eric Marburger, GTMA VP/general manager, Maryland, and Delaware, in a statement. “When we go out to the site, we know exactly where the fault is. For example, it may be low fuel pressure, which means we’ll bring fuel filters with us so we’ve got the parts we need to fix the issue.
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“Fundamentally telematics enables increased uptime and productivity for the customer and reduced travel time and mileage for us.”
A full-time telematics manager monitors the multiple screens that the telematics groups are superimposed onto. It is his job to proactively monitor machine health via easily understandable diagnostic and preventive maintenance data. The machines can be tracked anywhere that receives a satellite signal, with the location of the machine shooting up on screen with a red marker when there is an issue.
“Our telematics unit allows us to proactively tell the customer about an issue and fix it in a timely manner before it becomes a problem,” said Anthony Nuzzo, GTMA product support. “Telematics detail exactly what’s going on; it bleeds into everything we do. I’ve got as much information at my fingertips as I need. The telematics system will let you know where the truck is, when it’s due for service, whether it’s running and how many hours are on the machine.”
Maryland contractor Potomac Excavating has two Rokbak RA30s that are used for cut-and-fill operations on both small and large job sites ranging up to 30 acres.
“Telematics allow me to keep better track of both the health and use of the trucks without having to be on-site every day to monitor them,” said Aden Price, Potomac’s excavating equipment manager. “Being able to use the location services helps me keep track of which machine is at which location for transportation purposes, and the health monitoring service allows me to do general diagnosing from my phone. This way, if a machine has a fault code come up, I can easily access the code and the serial number of the truck and get in contact with the service department to get it worked on without having to go and find the machine and obtain that information in person.”
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Marburger said customers appreciate the proactive nature of the product support offered by monitoring machine data.
“Telematics systems like Haul Track are helping customers to work in the most efficient way,” he said. “It is about catching things before they’re a problem and acquiring information to make the machines better performers.
“It’s a hard, demanding industry, so we need to keep machines running as much as possible. And, if they do ever go down, telematics helps get them back up and running in the quickest and most efficient manner possible.”
