lways looking for a better way and not getting stuck with the same old way has been a driving force behind this award winning

workshop manager. Glenn Griffiths, Fleet Maintenance Manager with Wodonga-based Ron Finemore Transport, was presented with the Craig Roseneder Award for Technical and Maintenance Excellence in the Workshop at this year’s ATA Technical and Maintenance Conference.

The award is presented annually and aims to recognise “exceptional skill and dedication in Australia’s professional workshop personnel, with a particular focus on innovation, mentoring and industry involvement”. Glenn is always looks for that better way and, as a result, delivers good financial savings.“Implementing comparative trials on a regular basis, in order to compare an established method with a new way, helps ensure we have the data on which to solidly base our conclusions,” says Glenn. “Even if you only save, say, $50 per truck, per service, that saving soon adds up to many thousands of dollars annually when spread across the fleet.”

One of Glenn’s easy-to-implement trials was related to his company’s servicing and replacement of the engine-mounted air filters across the fleet. This, ultimately, lead to a changed maintenance practice that delivered thousands of dollars in savings each year across the fleet.

Explaining the process and speakingin overall terms, Glenn said that one of the approaches he adopts is to start with the workshop staff and train them from the floor up. But he tries to do so with the support of the component manufacturers.“We find, with the component manufacturers involved, staff embrace the new ideas more enthusiastically and the comparative trialling becomes their own trial if they are involved from the outset,” says Glenn. “Getting them to take ownership really helps. As a result, the people in the workshop often come up with good suggestions in the overall process.“After the training sessions, we have toolbox meetings to cover how to best implement the processes identified.Following the training sessions and toolbox meetings come the programmes of comparative trialling. The toolbox

meetings cover the special requirements with different vehicles, as well as the monitoring procedure throughout the life of the trials. Everything is marked and we finish up with really solid data.”

The air filtration trials turned out to be relatively easy to conduct and delivered good financial savings. The outcome was the adoption of a better maintenance procedure for the filtrations systems and the savings were substantial when applied across the entire Ron Finemore fleet.

The programme started with Glenn extending an invitation to a filtration manufacturer, in this case, Donaldson Filtration Solutions, to run a training session with the main workshop staff.The team heard what the Donaldson technical people had to say and recommend and then ran some comparative trialling to ensure the data matched expectations.

Prior to the visit to the workshop by the Donaldson people, the mechanics used to remove the filters from the air housings and then send them off for washing each time the vehicle came in for service. “It was a procedure that I would rather not

CASE STUDY

FINEMORE TRANSPORTSavings can be made by changing your approach to filter maintenance.

A

Glenn Griffiths of Ron Finemore Transport (left) showing both the factory fitted indicator (the smaller unit) and Donaldson’s improved graduated gauge (the larger unit). With Glenn is Donaldson’s technical representative Tony Cooper (right).

An award-winning workshop manager has found real savings can be made by changing the approach to filter maintenance.

DONALDSON DELIVERS

REAL SAVINGS!

Brochure No. 15ENG007 (02/15)© 2015 Printed in Australia. All rights reserved. Donaldson Company, Inc. reserves the right to change or discontinue any model or specification at any time and without notice.

Donaldson Australasia Pty LtdPO Box 153, Wyong NSW 2259

Freecall: 1800 345 837Ph: +61 2 4350 2000Fax: +61 2 4351 2036

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Ph: +64 9 579 2790Fax: +64 9 579 0322

www.donaldsonfilters.com.au

carry out … I felt it was not good practice,” says Glenn. “But, rather than knee jerk and move into a new procedure, we arranged for the Donaldson technical people to visit our workshop.“At the training, the workshop team learned that removing and washing the filter during every 100,000 km service or more was not the best way to go about it. In fact, it could be called a bad way.”

The Donaldson staff explained servicing the air filter in this manner could often result in the filter being removed from the housing prematurely when in fact it’s likely it still has plenty of ‘life’ left in it. Air filters actually become more efficient when cleaning air as they load with dust, thus the cleanliness of the air reaching the engine is improved.

Best practice when servicing the air intake system is to leave the air filter in the housing until the filtration ‘media’ is known to have reached the end of its efficient working life. It was explainedto the workshop staff that you cannot

reliably judge the condition of an air filter by visual inspection. The optimum point at which the air filter should be replaced is when the maximum restriction level, as specified by the engine’s designer, has been reached, and this can only be accurately determined with the use of a restriction indicator.

Restriction is the measure of resistance to the flow of air, and this increases over time as the air filter loads with dust, requiring the engine to work harder to draw in air for combustion. All diesel engines are designed to operate with some restriction, and the specifications for engines include the range of acceptable restriction for the engine to operate efficiently. The workshop staff found that when adopting the service by restriction method instead of removing the air filter every 100,000km, they could leave the filter in place for 300,000km before replacing it, thus getting at least three times the life. In some cases the efficient working life would go beyond 300,000km.

“We were able to demonstrate that implementing a service by restriction approach was a much more cost-effective maintenance practice than washing and re-using filters,”explains Tony Cooper, Donaldson’s Territory Manager for the region. “It was also pointed out that the replacement of the factory fitted restriction indicator with our graduated ‘informer’ indicator was important when implementing this service practice, as it shows the condition of the filter throughout its life. It was by monitoring the graduated indicator that the workshop staff found that their air filters were lasting in excess of 300,000km before reaching the maximum level of restriction.”

The Finemore workshop now fits a small low cost indicator to the filter housing, which shows when the filter has reached

the end of its life. A simple glance at the gauge, which only takes a second, tells the servicing mechanics all they need to know. The ratchet style graduated restriction indicator shows either a graduated scaled green section (more life in the filter) or red (end-of-life for the filter).

The other thing Donaldson advised was not to remove the filter for inspection during its working life because trials had shown that such a process can allow the entry of some dust and foreign matter, the very contaminant that the filter is there to protect the engine against. It is best to eliminate that possibility.“My push with maintenance protocols now is ‘no touch’ wherever possible,” says Glenn. “Every time the mechanics touch something, there is a possibility of introducing foreign material as well as the overall servicing process taking more time. Many mechanics want to touch things, and in the case of air filters, want to take them out and bang them against a hard object to knock off the dust. This is a big no-no.“Trials on many advanced designs for truck components, including the new technology which we see being introduced, prove it is usually best practice to adopt the ‘no-touch’ policy. We therefore feel it is up to us to advance in our methods and procedures out in the workshop. “When you stop and think about it, it takes time to pull out a filter, inspect and ‘clean’ it. It could easily approach an hour … multiply that across the fleet and you have a significant number of hours.”

Glenn’s trials found it is best to installa low cost ratchet style graduated gauge to indicate the state of the air cleaner filter. They also show it can be detrimental to touch air cleaners at the time of truck servicing, unless the indicator gauge shows a filter replacement is needed. The money which can be saved with the procedure recommended by Donaldson is significant, calculated to have the potential to reduce air filter maintenance costs by more than 60 per cent. This figure is based on a fleet of trucks serviced as per regular monthly maintenance schedules and the reduced number of new filters which would have otherwise been purchased.“I’m very fortunate to work with a company that embraces change, it gives me the scope to involve the manufacturers for world best practice, conduct comparative trials, motivate the workshop crew … and, as a result, deliver significant cash savings,”says Glenn.

ADAPTED FROM DIESEL MAGAZINE JAN/FEB15

One of the Donaldson filters similar to that used in thesuccessful comparative trials. The trials resulted in a changeto maintenance procedures and a reduction in labour and partscosts. Left, workshop staff member Brad Harrison and right,Glenn Griffiths.