Prevent breakdowns with powerful, actionable data. – Vehicle breakdowns are one of the most frustrating and critical events that can happen to a fleet today. It has a major impact on costs, time and customer satisfaction. If you can prevent vehicle breakdowns and unnecessary downtime, you can improve the return on investment of your fleet, boost overall performance and cut down costs.
Maintenance
With predictive maintenance, you can prevent vehicle breakdowns. You can detect errors and possible defects in an early stage so you can prevent the actual breakdown by early maintenance.
You can divide maintenance in three areas:
- Scheduled maintenance: based on manufacturers’ service interval like mileage or engine hours.
- Reactive maintenance: based on defects, errors and/or dashboard lights.
- Predictive maintenance: based on continuous monitoring of the vehicle’s health status.
Scheduled vehicle maintenance
Scheduled maintenance is what we see as standard maintenance, based on the manufacturers’ service intervals. Vehicle manufacturers prescribe specific maintenance for instance, small maintenance every 10.000km and large maintenance every 20.000km.
Modern vehicles will inform the driver with a notification on the dashboard and some vehicles use dynamic service intervals, based on the actual usage and wear and tear, which is measured with sensors.
Even FleetGO’s most basic solution can already be very useful when it comes to scheduled maintenance since it collects mileages as a standard. Based on pre-set intervals, you can easily create an overview of upcoming service intervals, based on mileage. This makes it possible to proactively schedule the workshop visits and maximize vehicle utility.
And when we connect to the CAN-bus system, it’s also possible to get engine hours, temperatures, revolutions, fuel usage etc. to get an even better overview of your fleets’ status.
Reactive vehicle maintenance
Reactive maintenance is needed when it was not possible to prevent a failure or a defect. You have physical defects like a flat tyre or a broken mirror, but the vehicle also communicates ‘internal’ malfunctions with all kinds of lights and indicators in the dashboard. These lights indicate a certain problem or malfunction upon which the driver needs to (re)act.
FleetGO is able to retrieve these lights into the FleetGO platform so the fleet manager can take action to minimize downtime. For instance, he can already book time within the workshop, order specific parts or call a salvage vehicle and arrange a replacement vehicle.
Predictive vehicle maintenance
Predictive maintenance is where the magic happens. Both scheduled and reactive maintenance and other check-ups only provide a snapshot of the vehicles’ health status. Over time, parts may still break down. Computers, sensors and technicians can give an estimate when it comes to wear and tear and possible risks, they are not able to really predict what is likely (or going) to happen. While predictive maintenance still contains a lot of ‘black magic’, with data and the knowledge of specific situations, we’re able to give a very good indication on possible events that can occur. For example:
- When the engine temperature gets higher over time, it may indicate old or lower quality oil.
- When a brake disc on one side of the vehicle shows more wear than other brake discs, it may indicate a stuck brake caliper.
- If the tyre pressure slowly drops, it may indicate a leak.
- If the tyre temperature is increasing over time, or shows other values than other tires, the risk of a flat tyre increases.
Over time, and with the constant analysis of our data, we can predict more and more situations based on all kind of data sources.
FleetGO Predictive Maintenance: how it works
Like most of our solutions, the FleetGO control unit, the Cubiq™, plays an important role. The Cubiq™ can be connected to all necessary data sources like CAN, OBD, FMS and the tachograph. Due to a highly standardized hardware and wiring setup, we’re able to work with most standards without touching the integrity of the vehicle. This means: no soldering, no security threats, no problems with warranty and liability.
Depending on the business case, the Cubiq™ will gather all the data we need and transmits it in real-time to the FleetGO Cloud.
Within the FleetGO Cloud, the fleet manager has a complete overview of his fleet, the live location, status and possible errors. From one single view, he can act proactively and react on unpredicted situations.
And the best part is: FleetGO is brand-independent, which makes it ideal for mixed fleets and/or a fleet with different brands. Using your own system will give you much more control than with manufacturer-specific solutions and it will also reduce your vendor lock-in.
Disclaimer
This content is provided for informational purposes only and is not meant to be an endorsement or representation by FleetGO.com or any other party. This information may contain inaccuracies or typographical errors, despite our efforts to ensure accuracy. FleetGO.com accepts no responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions, and is not responsible for the contents of any linked website or any link contained in a linked website. Please refer to our full disclaimer for more details.
