In the 2018 Fleet Maintenance Readership Study, we asked readers to describe their regular maintenance schedules for equipment. While 90 percent of respondents confirmed they adhere to some form of a preventative maintenance program, the type of PM scheduling varies from developing and continually updating a comprehensive PM for each type of equipment to following manufacturer’s recommended guidelines for maintenance.
Not to mention, just because you’ve got a PM process in place, do your technicians follow it? It’s one thing to have procedures in place, it’s another to follow PMs and ensure they’re being completed accurately and thoroughly. Plus, how do you keep things consistent from tech to tech and asset to asset?
One way to get consistent PMs
I recently got a first-hand look at how one facility is implementing a more consistent and efficient PM process. Penske launched its digitized, voice-command PM process earlier this year. I got to see the process in action while touring a local Penske facility in southeast Wisconsin.
The process begins with the driver completing a digital DVIR via an iPad kiosk when they arrive at the facility. Having the information in a digital format has helped to streamline the vehicle service process, provides a consistent format for details from customers, and coincidentally, aided in getting more information out of drivers.
“It’s a lot quicker than filling out the paper form,” Tony Popple, senior director of maintenance for Penske, told me. “And we’re getting so much more detail from the drivers on this, than on paper. It’s really helping us out when we’re trying to figure out what’s wrong with the vehicle.”
Dependent on the needs of the customer — whether they need a regular PM, additional repairs or diagnostic work — this information goes back to the service desk, and is placed in a queue to prioritize service. The job is then assigned to a technician. Then it gets
interesting …
At this location, Penske has two dedicated bays specifically for PMs. Technicians completing the PMs wear a headset, equipped with headphones and a microphone, so they can listen to and follow step-by-step commands, providing verbal responses that are then recorded. The full PM is completed and sent back to the service management system as a digital log of the PM, and saved as part of the service history for that vehicle.
Many of the questions require only “yes” or “no” responses; but PACE, as the program’s voice is known, guides the technician through each step, recording responses and repeating back simple values. For instance, a technician will provide the tire pressure by reading off individual numbers (e.g. one-zero-three). Pace then repeats this information back to the technician, to confirm. And, if necessary, the technician can go back and correct this information.
Technicians are provided a cheat sheet with the list of commands available - such as “sleep” “wake up” and “say again” - but Popple confirms they pick up on the process rather quickly and rarely refer to the cheat sheet.
What about employees with heavy accents, speech issues or shop environment noise? All of this has been taken into account, based on customizable, individualized voice recognition setup for each technician, and noise cancellation or enhancement functionality, respectively.
Each tech has his or her own personalized login, complete with customized and individualized voice recognition set up when their account was first created. At the beginning of a shift, the technician checks out a headset from the brand service manager’s office that they use for the day.
Other takeaways
In addition to setting up the digitized voice-command process, Penske also employs some additional strategies for optimizing PMs.
As mentioned earlier, this Penske location has two bays cordoned off specifically for PM service. In this area of the shop, they had a specific toolbox setup with all the tools and equipment needed in one location for the PM.
“One, you control the tooling,” Jim Sukow, district service manager for Penske, says. “Two, it’s also for new hires and entry-level technicians. There’s 50,000 dollars worth of tools. We can hire a technician straight from college and they can work solely out of that box (without buying their own tools).”
Analysis and adaptability are also critical. Take, for instance, the steps on a PM procedure. Sukow provided this example:
“It’s going to get to the point where it’s going to know exactly by unit number what type of truck it is – Volvo, Freightliner with a Detroit, Freightliner with a Cummins – and it’ll change the process or flow. On a Volvo you’ve got the fuel filters on your right-hand side, and on the Detroit it’s on the left-hand side. It’s going to know, and (the PM process steps) can be tailored to the unit exactly.”
In the future, Popple says Penske hopes to expand this technology out further. The company has already developed comprehensive maintenance schedules for year one through three. They would like to focus on completing the maintenance lifecycle scheduling (through year eight), before expanding to other areas in the shop such as battery tests, new vehicle inspections, guided diagnostics, yard checks and more.
The mantra of the maintenance industry is best encapsulated by the famous Benjamin Franklin quote, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”
While it may not be feasible for every fleet to adopt this specific technology, there are certainly ways to improve upon the PM process. How do you keep PMs consistent for each technician? Do you have a designated area and/or tool setup just for PMs? I’d be interested to hear from you.
