Uptime and Efficiency: The Role of Proactive Truck Maintenance

Because truck maintenance is so near to truck repair, it is one of the least enjoyable aspects of any fleet manager’s work. It occurs at the worst possible time, interferes with logistics, and costs the company money they’d prefer not to spend. How can fleet downtime be reduced? How can managers make decisions that are both cost-effective and take into account wear and tear? Proactive truck maintenance is the solution. This document serves as a roadmap for implementing your preventative maintenance plan.

What Exactly Is Fleet Upkeep?

In its simplest form, fleet maintenance is anything you do to prolong the life of a fleet of vehicles. Without a fleet, no logistics business can run, and maintaining vehicles is essential to keeping all logistics assets in excellent condition. There are two forms of fleet maintenance: proactive maintenance and reactive maintenance.

Preventive maintenance may only sometimes be practical because fleet managers prioritize maintaining their essential assets’ condition. With a sound preventive maintenance schedule and the appropriate safety management tools, it is still far superior to reactive maintenance. 

Advantages Of Preventative Maintenance

We’ll now review the clear and less-clear advantages of preventive maintenance for trucks and equipment.

• Lower Repair Expenses

Even if this one seems too obvious, it’s still important to discuss. Nobody enjoys fixing trucks. Make sure to adopt proactive maintenance rather than waiting until you need to replace truck parts or complete cars.

You can limit the danger of items breaking and lower the long-term cost of repairs by regularly inspecting your trucks and critical components like the engine.

• Increased Truck Lifespan

Preventative maintenance service is always a brilliant idea when trying to extend the lifespan and avoid fleet failure. Frequently performing truck inspections may prevent your system’s resources from being pushed to their absolute maximum.

Similar to how it’s advised to change your oil every six months rather than waiting for your engine to overheat, it’s a good idea to plan for wear and tear rather than waiting for things to break down.

• Enhanced Driving Safety

The safety of the people using your equipment depends on it; it is never just a valuable asset that could break down on you. Reactive maintenance puts your driver-crew in danger even if no incidents have occurred. Therefore, it is never healthy for them.

Maintaining a proactive maintenance program will keep your personnel, who are your most valuable asset, safe, which is always beneficial for your company and clients.

• Prolonged Service

Your trucks will spend more time on the road fulfilling orders if they have less downtime. Routing commercial vehicles is a genius approach to lower delivery costs, especially when booked in advance. The state a truck is in significantly impacts how many orders it can deliver. A robust, preventive maintenance service plan will only benefit you.

• Reduced Operating Expenses

Contrary to popular belief, routine truck inspections are less expensive for your logistics organization than waiting for truck problems. Proactive maintenance can be incorporated into every delivery route using transportation management tools like Track-POD, which includes a delivery driver app.

Let’s say that software like Track-POD enables you to assign proactive maintenance to truck drivers, ensuring tasks are completed promptly and according to schedule. More on that later.

Checklist For Vehicle Maintenance

Keeping up with fleet maintenance (acting proactively) is the safest, most straightforward, and most efficient course of action. Let’s examine the specifics of doing that. How is a proactive fleet maintenance schedule created?

• Fluids. Keeping your vehicle fluids clear will save wear and tear, enhance the driving experience, and boost overall performance. This includes preventing under-truck leaks, engine oil leaks, and brake fluid leaks.
• Brakes. Specific training is required for performance brake maintenance. This can be covered in your driver education course so that all of your drivers can help with preventative maintenance.
• Tires. Tires are essential but also highly prone to deterioration. Regular maintenance helps safeguard your assets, from monitoring tire pressure to ensuring nothing has become jammed in their surface.
• Wiring. Preventative maintenance entails paying attention to all electrical components, not just the apparent ones like the alternator, starter, and battery. Think about additional features like your headlights and wipers. The little things you do now will prevent you from wasting time later.
• Emissions Regulation. While not all businesses can achieve carbon neutrality overnight, the transport sector is increasingly taking emission control into account. Think about items like catalytic reduction systems, diesel particle filters, and diesel exhaust fluids. Here, proper upkeep will result in continually superior emission control.

Last Thoughts

The best method to truck maintenance of your fleet safely and effectively is to be proactive (instead of reactive) with fleet management. One thing that happens when you utilize the services of B & S Truck Repairs to offer total visibility and provide your drivers with pre-start checklists is that you can be sure that everyone on your team is staying on top of what’s required.