Most fleets – large and small – are aware of the many benefits of retreading tires. Retreading saves fleets millions of dollars per year, supports many locally owned and operated businesses throughout North America and keeps tires out of landfills each and every year.
Retreads typically cost less than what a new tire costs and are a standard practice in the majority of today’s largest and most profitable fleets. With the latest generation of quality casings, fleets are now able to retread their tires two to three times over six, seven or more years.
More than ever, having a quality retread program is a safe, responsible and smart choice for today’s most successful fleets. The key to a retread program is understanding the long-term value of a good casing, and that retiring casings too early takes away from the bottom line.
The Data
Today’s quality new tires are manufactured to be retreaded, and most tire manufacturers provide a warranty on their casings for multiple retreads – ranging, for example, from two retreads on a Bridgestone Dayton commercial truck tire to unlimited retreads on a Bridgestone Ecopia truck tire. Unlike older casings that were prone to a variety of problems, premium casing construction technologies have improved to a point where casings can endure significant abuse and yet still be retreaded many times.
Automatically retiring a casing after a pre-defined number of retreads or years can therefore leave considerable money “on the table” as perfectly good casings are sent to the landfill.
Through Bridgestone Bandag’s BASys tracking system, the company has collected retreadability data by tracking more than two million tires that have come through Bridgestone retread franchise dealers in North America. The data showed that many casings remain retreadable after multiple retreadings.
Additionally, the research shows that many name-brand casings remain highly retreadable for many years, with some casings continuing to retread well after 10 or more years on the road.
Retreadability is also dependent on tire casing type. While many great wide base retreads have hit the market in recent years, our research shows that wide base casings as a whole continue to be materially less retreadable, on average, than their standard width casing counterparts. Overall, wide base casings are unable to go through the retread process stream nearly twice as often as standard width casings.
Retread Specification
To realize the full savings that a modern casing can provide to a fleet, it is important to set the right retread specification.
Today, many fleets continue to set rigid specifications, either based on casing age, the number of times the casing has been retreaded or the number of repairs that have gone into the casing. While these rigid specs may have made sense in the past, technologies such as shearography help the retreader determine whether or not a casing should be retreaded, regardless of age, number of retreads or repairs.
For some fleets, the first step is to experiment with small changes to specifications, such as adding a year to the casing age specification. If this generates savings without negatively impacting performance, fleets can continue to experiment with other changes to their specs until they determine what works best for them.
As a starting point, we recommend that fleet managers speak with a retread professional to develop the right solution.
The Right Retread Partner
Whether a large or small fleet, maximizing the life of casings is the result of a high standard, comprehensive tire care and service retread program that includes quality retread manufacturing practices and performance tracking. As many fleets have learned, not all retreaders abide by the same rigorous standards for equipment, shop maintenance and employee training.
The difference between retread shops can dramatically impact the quality of the retread and the maximum lifetime that a casing can be retreaded.
To ensure a fleet is getting the most return from its retread program, fleets should perform sound due-diligence on the prospective retread dealer before committing their business. Asking insight questions about their facilities, equipment, process standards, training and adjustment rate (what percent of tires fail prematurely) up-front can save many headaches later.
Making the most of your tire assets by combining quality casings and quality retreads is a fast and effective way to grow your bottom line. Regardless of size, fleets who are committed to driving savings to the company should take time to explore a retread program for their shop, if they haven’t yet done so.
Fleets with retread programs in place should step back at least once a year, assess their relationship with the retread dealer and ensure that they are getting the most value out of their retread program.
Ben Rosenblum is the director of Bandag marketing, commercial marketing, for Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations (BATO). It is a business unit of Bridgestone Americas (www.bridgestone-firestone.com/corporate), whose parent company, Bridgestone Corporation (www.bridgestone.com/regional/americas), is the world's largest tire and rubber company. Bridgestone Americas and its subsidiaries develop, manufacture and market a wide range of Bridgestone, Firestone and associate brand tires. Reporting into BATO are the company's Latin American tire operations; the U.S. and Canadian consumer tire businesses; the U.S. and Canadian commercial tire businesses; and Bridgestone Retail Operations, which operates the largest network of company-owned automotive service providers in the world.