AUTOCARE Services, like most in the automotive industry and supply chain, is feeling the effects of the current downturn in market demand due to COVID-19 economic impacts.

Despite these headwinds, the business is committed to its customers, and is continuing a five-year program to replace all the car carriers in its fleet and in doing so provides insights into a major truck fleet procurement program.

The replacement program commenced with a preliminary order of 20 prime movers: 10 Kenworth T359s and, for the first time in the Autocare Services fleet, 10 MAN TGS540s.

The MAN prime movers are a cab-forward design. It is the first time the company will bring in a cab-over, car-carrying-spec prime mover into its fleet and will complement the Kenworth and Mack Granite bonneted trucks that have dominated the company’s fleet to date.

This initial replacement round sees Penske Australia, distributors of MAN trucks, added to the existing roster of two suppliers, PACCAR for the Kenworths and Volvo for Macks.

Of the current 130-truck fleet, 95 prime movers are Kenworths.

Nathan Suine, head of asset management for LINX Cargo Care Group, told GoAutoNews Premium: “The Kenworth T359/T409SAR and Mack Granite represent the traditional, bonneted Autocare prime mover.

“We run a number of different configurations, the most popular of these being the single trailer which has a seven-car carrying capacity, plus the ability to carry an additional car on a cab frame mounted over the truck’s cab. We also run some B-doubles, road trains, skel trailers and commercial vehicle trailers however the seven-car trailer is certainly the mainstay.

“Traditionally only a couple of suppliers have been able to supply that operational efficiency for us. PACCAR with the Kenworth product and Volvo with their Mack product and our fleet has been very much built around them.

“They have had the ability with their local engineering and the local manufacturing to accommodate some of those really unique performance and technical requirements which our industry requires.

“But Penske with their MAN low-cab TGS model has been able to satisfy our requirements as well and we are excited at having a third viable entrant in our industry to support us with our operation,” Mr Suine said.

“With the traditional bonneted prime movers run by Autocare, if ever there is a mechanical issue with the prime mover or some maintenance has to be performed, it is not such an issue, even with the cab frame fitted, you can get access to the engine. But there is an issue with the cab forward with an extra car located over the cab,” Mr Suine said.

“We have been doing extensive engineering and design work to come up with a solution that will enable the cab to be tilted with a car attached to it and the cab can then be tilted over for maintenance. The system uses hydraulics from the truck’s own power take-off with battery back-up to tilt the entire cab frame.

“As part of our procurement exercise we provided details of our car-carrying trailers with which the prime movers would have to be compatible. We also made it clear that we would require access for maintenance to the prime mover while there is a car fitted to the cab frame.

“So, in connection with the cab-over MANs, we were dealing with Penske for an integrated design that satisfied all those requirements, and also with Doric Engineering in Tasmania who will be manufacturing the cab frames.

“Doric Engineering is currently working on the first cab frame and there will be a control period associated with that to make sure that all the engineering and design assumptions are going to work in practice. The first of the MANs will be sent to Tasmania for fitment and trial prior to doing the batch production of nine cab frames for the other nine prime movers.”

The units were planned to enter into service over a staged phase from early April to early June (although this schedule looks certain to be affected by the COVID-19 emergency).

In addition to the introduction of the MAN 540hp prime movers, the company is upgrading to the latest model 440hp Kenworth T359s that are used for hauling single trailers.

“The single trailers will be the focus for the first year of our prime mover replacement program. In subsequent years we will look at it more holistically in terms of our B-double and road trains and the other configurations that we operate,” Mr Suine said.

Sam Boardman, general manager of transport at Autocare Services, told GoAutoNews Premium: “The big thing for us is we are doing this work as part of a total utilisation review of our fleet so, while it is replacing an ageing fleet, it is also looking at where the business is headed in the future. So we are optimising the fleet itself and the car-carrying capacity of each of the trucks.

“The additional capacity on the MAN trucks will provide us with a degree of flexibility around those combinations moving forward and therefore some opportunity for improving operational utilisation across the asset base which is realistically why we are replacing the fleet.

“The cab-over configuration is more flexible in the operational space with the shorter cab and the single trailer, improving the turning circle access into city dealerships, and there are other benefits that come from the different style of cab against the bonneted truck.”

Mr Suine said that the company had yet to validate the fuel economy claims of the MAN prime movers and that this would be done during the commissioning process.

“We will be closely monitoring that through our telematics systems which gives us full visibility of those numbers. But we are expecting material fuel efficiency savings by bringing in the MAN product, particularly relative to the most aged prime movers that we will be retiring from service.

“Similarly, with the new Kenworths, we also anticipate a significant improvement in fuel consumption and emissions over the trucks we are replacing because this will see 20 of our most aged equipment being retired.

“We are going to see significant repair and maintenance and fuel burn benefits as well without a doubt.”

Mr Boardman said that the five-year replacement program also included trailer equipment.

“Trailing equipment replacement has become a bit more complex and requires a lot more in-depth planning until we land on the numbers and types of trailers that we require each year. There is a big body of work to be done on overall fleet utilisation and that will certainly be considered within the headwinds we are facing at the moment,” he said.

Under the new configuration the truck will run seven vehicles on the trailer and one on the cab frame for both the MANs and the Kenworths. These will both be hauling the same type of trailer.

“We have intentionally targeted a certain type of trailer to be compatible with both types of prime movers,” Mr Boardman said.

By John Mellor