LAWR

20 Local Authority Waste & Recycling August 2015 ehicle downtime is the curse of waste and recycling operators, whether they are a commercial company collecting waste from businesses or a local authority collecting household waste. Downtime is caused because vehicles break down unexpectedly and engineers are either not available or skilled enough to be able to diagnose and fix the problem. Whilst the vehicle is 'down' it can be difficult to find a suitable replacement vehicle. So the result is a disruption in service, which costs money and resources and ultimately causes customer dissatisfaction. Properly trained engineers and the availability of spare vehicles are all part of the answer, but as prevention is always better than cure the best solution is to stop vehicles from breaking down in the first place and the key to that is proper maintenance. The main contributor to vehicles breaking down is poor or irregular maintenance. Maintaining a specialist vehicle properly not only minimises downtime, but increases the operational lifespan of the vehicle and retains its value for re-sale into the second tier market place or for remanufacturing, which is a huge cost saving when compared with the cost of a new vehicle. For example, Euro 6 has added around £10,000 to the cost of a new refuse vehicle. A remanufactured body and bin lift mounted onto a new Euro 6 chassis is about £20,000 cheaper than purchasing new and usually requires much less lead-time compared with ordering a new vehicle. False economy Most new vehicles come with a three- year manufacturer's warranty, but as soon as the warranty runs out, the vehicle may start to require expensive repairs and the bills start rolling in. The key issue here is that operators are viewing these warranties as a three- year fixed cost for repair and mainte- nance, but that's not what they are. The vehicle does not receive the necessary preventative maintenance required to keep it in optimum condi- tion. Ideally a refuse vehicle needs to be cleaned and greased once a month and only a seasoned refuse vehicle engineer can see when a part is about to fail and do something about it. Once the problems start arising, on the whole operators resort to cheap suppliers to maintain the vehicles because the manufacturer is too expen- sive and perhaps less able to provide an immediate response. At Refuse Vehicle Solutions, we see temporary inadequate repairs undertaken by inde- pendent engineers all the time. Bypassing control systems and bodged wiring can often compromise safety circuits and once electrical circuits and control units have been opened up and tampered with they are vulnerable and unreliable. The right engineer can identify and fix a prob- lem, which is often something simple like a failed proximity switch or loom. However, lifelong problems are caused by an engineer who doesn't know what he is looking for, or doesn't have the technical data available to a main dealer or manufacturer. A downward spiral starts, the vehicle breaks down frequently, becomes operationally unreliable and in many cases not 'fit for purpose' after only four to five years. A well-maintained vehicle that has been professionally remanufactured would provide an The circular economy is a hot theme at this year's RWM. Spencer Law outlines his vision for extending the lifecycle of a refuse truck – a vision which he is already putting into practice Making waste collection logistics more circular V RWM WITH CIWM 2015 PREVIEW Spencer Law (right) with one of his engineers inspecting a vehicle

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