Another Boring Work Related Story

[Gnarvan]

Latest boring work related story is the recent push for fuel economy. Management is harvesting the data from the GPS in my truck and giving me a weekly score card. I am now being graded on 4 things.

1-time over 65mph
2-sharp accelerations. Gaining more than 5mph per second
3-hard braking. Slowing faster than 7.5mph per second
4-excessive idle time. All time over 10% of engine run time.

Big brother at its best. But since its their truck and fuel I'm all for playing this game. I get paid by the hour so I'm willing to drive as slow as they think they want me to.

I've been playing around at different speeds and watching the fuel display on the dash. At 60mph on the flats I get somewhere around 6.5 mpg. When I drop down to 55 it goes up to 7.5-8 mpg. That's a 15% swing in fuel Consumption. Pretty big number. Once I start to climb its a different story. Climbing a hill in 9th gear I get around 3mpg. When I have to drop another gear and pull a hill in 8th it drops down as low as 1.8mpg.

Oh yea.....no more whining from you guys about the crummy mileage you get from your SMB's.

[larrie]

Originally Posted by Gnarvan

At 60mph on the flats I get somewhere around 6.5 mpg. When I drop down to 55 it goes up to 7.5-8 mpg. That's a 15% swing in fuel Consumption.

Wind resistance, got to love it. I have played around with similar speed scenarios with my SMB. I know I will get better MPG at 55 than at 65 but I get impatient to get there. Have to discipline myself to do more experiments to prove that it is really worth the money to go slower, especially on the way home.

[Gnarvan]

Larrie


It's pretty easy for me to go slow. I look at it this way. I get paid by the minute. If I can drop my average speed for the week by 3 mph it takes me 1.2 hours longer to do my weekly route of 1400-1500 miles.

My new rule, all in an effort to help the company with their fuel program, is when ever I'm getting paid overtime I will drive 3mph below the speed limit. Cha-Ching!

[daveb]

Lucky you're not going north on I-5 or 99 right now....friggin wind!

[jage]

Originally Posted by Gnarvan

My new rule, all in an effort to help the company with their fuel program is, when ever I'm getting paid overtime I will drive 3mph below the speed limit. Cha-Ching!

It's all fun and games until they analyze the data and decree that you are only ever allowed to go down hill from now on.

[larrie]

Have you ever figured out which costs the company more, the fuel or the OT? If they are asking you to drive slower it must be the fuel but I find it hard to believe.

On a side note a friend just retired from the brown service after 30 years. He is adjusting nicely to retirement.

[Gnarvan]

Larrie

This week fuel economy is the important goal. Next week the goal will change to something else. Probably cutting employee hours. Company goals come and go then circle back around again on a regular basis.

On the drive last night of 286 miles I was able to get 8mpg. Next week I'll kick the speed back up to 5 over the speed limit and see what it drops to. I'm betting it will be somewhere around 6.5mpg. That would be a swing of 8.25 gallons. Assuming a diesel price of $4 per gallon that's a $33 difference in cost to run the truck. That is an example of one employees daily drive. Multiply that by thousands of employees a day and it becomes clear why the company is pushing for better driving habits to improve fuel economy.

[jage]

Originally Posted by larrie

Have you ever figured out which costs the company more, the fuel or the OT?

Boss, I ran the numbers and... sounds like something I'd do.

[daveb]

What's with those wind barriers I'm seeing on all the bottom of the trailers? Are those something your companies are using to curb fuel costs?

[Gnarvan]

Originally Posted by jage

Boss, I ran the numbers and... sounds like something I'd do.

My response would be "Boss, I ran the numbers and since I know you don't care what I think I'm not even gonna bring it up."

Dave....FedEx express doesn't run any of the air dams under the trailers. My guess is it would be to expensive to set up the thousands of trailers in our system. I'm not sure how much they improve fuel economy but I'm seeing more and more of them on the road. All of the trucks I've seen from Europe run them. It may be a legal requirement over there but I'm betting its more of a fuel economy requirement. When you expense things out over a million miles small savings in fuel economy add up to big numbers.