Improving your trailer maintenance process to increase uptime is all about visibility. If you can’t see the problem, then you can’t fix the problem. Great Dane’s new FleetPulse telematics and data platform provides real-time visibility into the health and status of your trailers.
Each trailer on the road is unique in how it was built, and that information is critical when it comes to maintaining trailers – and it’s information that only the trailer manufacturer has. Because FleetPulse is an OEM-built solution, the system is able to provide a high-resolution view into the conditions of the trailer’s components, and then pair that information with other proprietary information on the asset, including things like specs, aftermarket parts numbers, and tools from all of the component suppliers that help drive maintenance costs down. Plus, FleetPulse displays any issues in plain, easy-to-understand language that enables fleets to make smarter trailer maintenance decisions much faster.
“We’ve heard from customers that they don’t want to have to hire people to analyze the data,” said Dennis Skaradzinski, Great Dane chief engineer. “We don’t want to just display the fault code; we want to be able to tell the customer what the actionable item is. We’re taking the analysis out of their hands and simply telling them that there’s an issue with the front-left speed sensor, for example, as opposed to showing an alpha-numeric code that they then have to go look up to determine the problem.”
The FleetPulse web portal or mobile app serves as the trailer data virtual headquarters. If you already have a fleet management system, however, you’ll also have the ability to integrate the data provided by Great Dane’s FleetPulse into your existing system.
“We’ve been very intentional about ensuring that the FleetPulse data can be accessed through other systems,” said Chris Hoyt, Great Dane’s FleetPulse project manager. “We can work with any TMS or ERP system that works with APIs.”
FleetPulse has been carefully designed from end-to-end to meet the high standards of even the most sophisticated fleets. The system’s built-in sensors collect precise measurements directly from the trailer’s components, keeping watch over key indicators. The data is collected and reported via a robust, powerful 4G platform, so fleets are alerted to potential issues and receive reports on what maintenance needs to occur and when.
“With visibility into real-time data, you can deal with service events right then and there,” Skaradzinski added. “Particularly if it’s something you don’t traditionally pick up on as being a problem – things that linger between the time it occurs and your next trailer inspection. That lag period can increase your costs to fix the issue compared with fixing the issue soon after it occurs.”
Since every trailer on the road runs different routes, and every driver has a different driving style, the maintenance needs for each trailer are different.
For instance, while one trailer may need a brake pad change every 24 months, another may need it only every 18 months. FleetPulse provides unique data to fleets based on how that individual trailer is being used. This totally integrated telematics system helps fleets solve problems faster and increase uptime by leveraging each trailer’s usage and health data with access to Great Dane’s parts list.
“The platform and sensors are hardwired, reliable and accurate from day one,” Hoyt said. “And the architecture, both on the physical trailer as well as the architecture of the data protocols flowing throughout the trailer and up to the cloud and truck, are the reasons that an integrated solution like FleetPulse, built at the OEM level, is the only way to provide fleets with the clarity and insights needed to support and grow their operations into the future.”
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