From: Preventive Maintenance Pays Off
Deflating Problems Before They Happen
The best maintenance is that which you don’t have to perform. “When waste management companies walk around and gauge the tires manually, that can actually be pretty expensive over time,” says Jim Samocki, Cincinnati-based Doran Manufacturing general manager.
Doran has had a long background in producing monitoring equipment, and before that the company manufactured terminals and terminal boards for electric motors. In the ’70s Doran started supplying fuse panel boards to truck and school bus manufacturers. From there it evolved into producing such things as Sleeping Child Check or LED/incandescent light monitors to let the driver know the bus lights are working.
In the early 2000s Doran expanded into tire-pressure-monitoring systems. The company’s new system, the Doran 360, has been on the market for almost two years. It was a natural fit to move into the waste market with monitors on trash-hauling trucks, as those tires go through so much wear and tear, heavy loads, conditions, and so much stopping and starting. Now the operator is able to go into the cab of the truck, press a button, and know the pressure of all the truck’s tires.
 |
Photo: Doran
The product is a valve-stemmounted
system in which the typical valve cap is removed and one of the Doran caps sensors is screwed on. |
There’s a green light allowing for actual programming of pressure on the tires, so when it’s glowing green it means all the tires are within 12.5% of that programmed baseline pressure. “What this new system does is minimize the expense of manual pre-trip inspections as well as the possibility of pulling out of the terminal with a bad tire or catastrophic tire failure when the vehicle is out on the road, which in turn means a road call will be involved. These tend to be rather expensive, involving a service vehicle.”
Doran has a half-dozen waste-hauling fleets in various stages of trial and implementation with its product. “Depending on how a fleet evaluates tires and maintenance costs, we’ve seen about a nine-month payback for them. It saves on labor and extends the life of tires.”
The product is a valve-stem-mounted system in which the typical valve cap is removed and one of the Doran caps sensors is screwed on. Once the air hits the sensor, it activates the battery. The sensor then becomes live and transmits signals wirelessly through radio frequency signals. Once the sensor is active, it sends data packets of tire pressures out wirelessly, and the monitor has been programmed to pick up that signal to make the system work.
Truck fleet tires can be programmed for whatever pressures are desired, including differences on tires on the front or back of a vehicle. System installations take 30 to 45 minutes per truck and are relatively inexpensive to acquire, approximately $50–$60 per tire.
The system’s unique Fast Leak warning system lets the vehicle user know whenever the pressure in the tire drops 2.8 psi in less than 12 seconds; a warning is automatically triggered to let the driver know there is a leak or problems. “In the dead of winter in many places in the US, you’re not going to want to go around and check those tires,” says Samocki. “Instead, you go in and turn the truck on and see from the gauge the exact psi. There are simply too many variables involved with manually checking tire pressures.”
In October 2009, Doran launched its new Doran 360CE tire-pressure-monitoring system for commercial equipment. The system operates in the same manner, but it comes with “large bore” sensors to accommodate the bigger valve stems that are typically associated with massive tires.
March-April 2010
From: Preventive Maintenance Pays Off
Deflating Problems Before They Happen
The best maintenance is that which you don’t have to perform. “When waste management companies walk around and gauge the tires manually, that can actually be pretty expensive over time,” says Jim Samocki, Cincinnati-based Doran Manufacturing general manager.
Doran has had a long background in producing monitoring equipment, and before that the company manufactured terminals and terminal boards for electric motors. In the ’70s Doran started supplying fuse panel boards to truck and school bus manufacturers. From there it evolved into producing such things as Sleeping Child Check or LED/incandescent light monitors to let the driver know the bus lights are working.
In the early 2000s Doran expanded into tire-pressure-monitoring systems. The company’s new system, the Doran 360, has been on the market for almost two years. It was a natural fit to move into the waste market with monitors on trash-hauling trucks, as those tires go through so much wear and tear, heavy loads, conditions, and so much stopping and starting. Now the operator is able to go into the cab of the truck, press a button, and know the pressure of all the truck’s tires.
|
Photo: Doran
The product is a valve-stemmounted
system in which the typical valve cap is removed and one of the Doran caps sensors is screwed on. |
There’s a green light allowing for actual programming of pressure on the tires, so when it’s glowing green it means all the tires are within 12.5% of that programmed baseline pressure. “What this new system does is minimize the expense of manual pre-trip inspections as well as the possibility of pulling out of the terminal with a bad tire or catastrophic tire failure when the vehicle is out on the road, which in turn means a road call will be involved. These tend to be rather expensive, involving a service vehicle.”
Doran has a half-dozen waste-hauling fleets in various stages of trial and implementation with its product. “Depending on how a fleet evaluates tires and maintenance costs, we’ve seen about a nine-month payback for them. It saves on labor and extends the life of tires.”
The product is a valve-stem-mounted system in which the typical valve cap is removed and one of the Doran caps sensors is screwed on. Once the air hits the sensor, it activates the battery. The sensor then becomes live and transmits signals wirelessly through radio frequency signals. Once the sensor is active, it sends data packets of tire pressures out wirelessly, and the monitor has been programmed to pick up that signal to make the system work.
Truck fleet tires can be programmed for whatever pressures are desired, including differences on tires on the front or back of a vehicle. System installations take 30 to 45 minutes per truck and are relatively inexpensive to acquire, approximately $50–$60 per tire.
The system’s unique Fast Leak warning system lets the vehicle user know whenever the pressure in the tire drops 2.8 psi in less than 12 seconds; a warning is automatically triggered to let the driver know there is a leak or problems. “In the dead of winter in many places in the US, you’re not going to want to go around and check those tires,” says Samocki. “Instead, you go in and turn the truck on and see from the gauge the exact psi. There are simply too many variables involved with manually checking tire pressures.”
In October 2009, Doran launched its new Doran 360CE tire-pressure-monitoring system for commercial equipment. The system operates in the same manner, but it comes with “large bore” sensors to accommodate the bigger valve stems that are typically associated with massive tires.