All it takes is one person to start a state fleet technician championship, and in the great State of Nebraska, that person is Amanda Schuier (pronouced “shoo-er”), from Omaha Truck Center, a Freightliner dealership. Schuier contacted us last month for advice and assistance in launching a statewide truck technician competition, after having been referred to us by Bonne Karim, training manager for the U.S. Postal Service. We here at Fleet Maintenance have put a lot of work into promoting the efforts of state maintenance councils, so we were quite honored both by Karim’s recommendation and by Schuier’s contact.

When I first talked with Schuier on the phone, I was bowled over by her enthusiasm for this project: “This is my passion!” she told me when I asked her how she had gotten the assignment, and it’s easy to tell how true that is.

Soon, Fleet Maintenance readers will be able to see that passion for themselves, because in a few weeks Schuier will be blogging about her experiences launching the first ever Nebraska State Technician Competition right here at www.fleetmag.com. Naturally, we’re thrilled to have this special feature added to our site, and we hope you’ll tune in for Schuier’s regular reports. If you’re a fleet maintenance manager in Nebraska, you’ll want to keep tabs on the latest developments, so you can be sure to enter your top techs in the competition when the time comes. If you’re involved in starting a new technician competition in your state, or operating an existing state competition, you’ll want to compare Schuier’s strategies to your own. And if you just love anything to with technicians competing with each other, you’ll have a good time reading about Schuier’s adventures!

In the meantime, to learn more about the Nebraska competition, contact Schuier at (402) 951-3370, or contact Michelle Drahota of the Nebraska Trucking Association at (402) 476-8504.

According to a report on the demise of Sterling Trucks in the latest edition of Transport Topics the company was counting on a “pre-buy” of trucks in advance of the restrictive 2010 diesel emission standards to keep sales steady through 2009. When it became evident in recent months that the pre-buy wasn’t going to occur as expected, Daimler Trucks North America decided to halt Sterling production in March, 2009, and concentrate on a “two-brand” strategy with their Freightliner and Western Star divisions.

How could the company have gotten the pre-buy strategy so wrong? Didn’t fleets pre-buy like crazy in advance of the 2002 and 2007 diesel emissions standards? Well, there’s an interesting irony there… I can still recall the Freightliner press conference at the Mid-America Truck Show in Louisville where Daimler executives announced the company’s strategy for using selective catalytic reduction (SCR) with urea–or, as it’s now called, “diesel emission fluid,” or DEF–to meet the 2010 EPA emissions standards. The Daimler executives were on the spot, red-faced and panicked, scrambling to defend their controversial strategy to a group of deeply skeptical journalists (myself included). At the time, it seemed like a foolish approach, catastrophically wrong, but over the past 18 months, as most other truck & engine OEMs have fallen in line with the SCR-DEF approach, Daimler had been starting to look downright visionary. When word started to circulate that EPA ‘10 engines with SCR and DEF systems would actually get better fuel economy than the EPA ‘07 engines, the mood in the industry started to shift perceptibly. In fact, it’s now evident that the expectation of better fuel economy in 2010 engines has prompted a lot of fleets to delay their new truck purchases until then… That’s right: instead of a pre-buy, this time there is going to be a “post-buy.”

Yes, there were undoubtedly other reasons for shutting the doors at Sterling, but ultimately Daimler Trucks’ controversial decision to adopt SCR and DEF has helped to create a post-buy mentality, and contributed to the demise of one of their very own brands. What a way to go…

You might have thought I would be writing about the demise of Sterling Trucks, but I’m actually referring to another great nameplate that has passed into the ether.

This week I was in South Bend, Indiana, attending the Hybrid Truck Users Forum (HTUF) Meeting (I’ll be writing about this in my next Fuel Advantage blog at www.fuelpub.com), and while I was in town I took some time to visit the Studebaker museum. I was only five years old when Studebaker built its last car, but as an old car buff I’ve always been a fan. Studebaker may have had a hard time finding a place in the US auto market for the last few years of its life, but, with the help of legendary designers Raymond Leowy and Brooks Stevens, the company built some legendary cars nevertheless. The “bullet-nose” Champion of 1950, and the radical 1953 Starlight coupes are still as eye-catching as they were when new. Even as the company fell into its death spiral in the early ’60s, it introduced the amazing Avanti, a car that still looks contemporary–and desirable–today, 35 years after its birth.

Visiting the museum, and reflecting on Studebaker’s exit from the automotive stage, made the news of Sterling Trucks’ demise more poignant. It’s a sad day when a venerable brand ceases to be, and there may be more sad days ahead, in both the heavy truck and the automotive world. I’m not going to make any predictions about which brand might be the next to fall, but I wonder whether our readers are in the mood to speculate… Anyone want to guess which brand (or brands) might be following Sterling into the history books?

Let me just start out by saying that tires are indisputably round. Are we all in agreement? All right then, moving on… By extension, shouldn’t retreads all be round as well?

The folks at Marangoni Tread North Amnerica believe the answer to that is ‘yes,’ as I learned when I visited their Nashville, TN facility a few weeks ago. It does make perfect sense; if you’re putting a new tread on an old casing, the tread should probably match the true shape of that casing before it’s glued on. That’s where Marangoni’s RINGTREAD System comes into the story. In 1976, the Italian company pioneered the splice-less, pre-cured retread, and in 1998 it brought the technology to North America. The process itself is nothing short of amazing; on a production line that is almost completely automated, Marangoni molds circular RINGTREADS that, the company claims, will wear better and provide a smoother ride once they are glued snugly onto your casings. At the end of the line, the RINGTREADs are twisted into tight little bundles, shrink-wrapped, and sent out to tire centers across the U.S.

Did I mention I’m a sucker for plant tours? Whenever I get a chance to see how something is made up-close, I’ll be there. The Marangoni RINGTREAD plant was one of the most unusual production facilities I’ve ever seen, and their unique product and manufacturing process deserve a long, healthy life in the North American transportation market.

The big news at the recent Technology & Maintenance Council (TMC) Fall Meeting in Nashville (besides the crowning of this year’s SuperTech winner) was the announcement that TMC is partnering with the U.S. Army on a four-year, $12 million project to study “Condition-Based Maintenance.”

What is conditon-based maintenance, you ask? Well, it’s not reactive and it’s not predictive (the transportation industry wastes $25 billion on unnecessary PM and unrealized cost-reductions on predictive maintenance, according to TMC’s man on this project, Duke Drinkard); instead, it’s based on the real-time condition of the component. Or, as the Army’s representative Paul Skalny said, it’s “maintenance based on evidence.”

According to Drinkard, the applications for commercial trucks include: brake stroke/overstroke detection, tire tread depth, failed lamp detection, battery condition, alternator, starter and turbo failure, internal engine and drivetrain failure, and more. Drinkard said that from 1/4 to 1/3 of all “failed” batteries are still good, and condition-based maintenance is designed to correct that kind of rampant misdiagnosis. All it will take is new sensors, a lot of historical data, dependable wireless transmission and new failure-predition algorithms.

Maybe it’s just me, but if the system depends on historical data and failure-prediction algorithms, how is it any different than reactive or predictive maintenance? Oh well, TMC and the Army are going to spend $3 million a year over the next four years to find out. I hope the answers are good ones.