Shell: New Engine Oil Categories Making the Grade

Since 2011 the company has amassed 60 million test miles on CK-4 formulations, and 50 million miles of tests involving the High Temperature High Shear (HTHS) formulas required by FA-4 specifications. Photo: Shell

SANTA BARBARA, CA – A new generation of engine oils is in the North American market, passing a battery of tests developed for specific engine brands. But the work of convincing buyers about related features and benefits continues.

The transition from CJ-4 to CK-4 and fuel-efficient FA-4 categories has essentially been seamless, said Dan Arcy, Shell Lubricants' global OEM technical manager, during a media briefing in California this week. The new formulas, which went by PC-11 during the development process, were officially released in December. The chemistry was driven by ongoing calls for longer drain intervals, better fuel economy, lower emissions, and increasing horsepower.

And these are hardly the engine oils that have flowed through pumps in years gone by.

Oxidation stability had to improve to handle higher under-hood temperatures. When oil oxidizes, it becomes acidic and thickens, Arcy explained. At the very least, that shortens potential oil drain intervals.

Tighter controls on aeration are especially welcome in off-highway applications, where trucks traveling up and down hills tend to suck air into the oil pump, breaking up the all-important layers of lubricant. Shear stability, meanwhile, had to improve to help keep oils from shearing out of grade into lower viscosities.

At this point, he said, manufacturers are all recommending CK-4 engine oils, and many have also increased maximum drain intervals in conjunctino with the new oil, Arcy said. “There's some caveats" when extending those drains, he noted. "There's fuel economy requirements. There's idle requirements.”

Cummins has increased standard drain intervals up to 50,000 miles with CK-4 or FA-4 formulas compared to the 40,000 miles with the CJ-4 that came before them, and will boost ...Read the rest of this story

AAA: Truck safety technology can prevent 63,000 crashes a year

Equipping large trucks with advanced safety technologies has the potential to prevent up to 63,000 truck related crashes each year, according to new research from the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.

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Driving trucking improvements through data

Mills Carter, business analyst for YellaWood – a $1 billion lumber company – recently made an extremely straightforward case as to the value proper data analysis can offer trucking companies.

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Going Beyond Electric and Natural Gas

Director of Fleet Procurement Mike Casteel says UPS has “a lot of experience with propane autogas,” including running over 2,000 propane-powered package cars in the U.S. and Canada. iStockPhoto

Even as natural gas yet reigns as king of alternative fuels for trucks, and electric drive and fuel cells are gaining interest as up-and-coming technologies, there are still other fuels that fleets may consider as worthy alternatives to straight-up petroleum diesel.

For commercial vehicles, these other choices chiefly include propane (aka autogas), biodiesel, renewable diesel, and dimethyl ether (DME). Each has its advocates. Propane autogas has been in use for years, and the two diesel alternatives can be adopted simply by fueling with them. DME is more of an outlier in that it caught a lot of attention a few years ago but is not engendering much high-level interest of late.

“All alternative fuels are viable, but not in all applications,” says analyst Kenny Vieth, president of ACT Research. “Because each company's goal for its fleet is different, even two similar fleets may make different fuel choices. Each fleet will assess its own corporate goals, the local/regional availability and price of the respective alternative fuels, and any regulations and incentives for the areas in which the fleet operates before making the fuel decision. Cost, range, weight, performance, and time will all factor into each fleet's decision.”

Bob Carrick, Freightliner's vocational sales manager - natural gas, who is a former fleet manager, handicaps the other alternatives succinctly: “Propane autogas makes sense and is gaining traction in the lower GVW classes, up through Class 7. Renewable diesel is a very clean alternative to diesel, and so far has demonstrated fine performance with no significant downsides. Biodiesel works in low concentrations [blends]. DME, however, is still a long way from any adoption. There is no fuel supply, and ...Read the rest of this story

FCA recalls HD pickups, chassis cabs over potential engine compartment fire

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TMC Panel Educates Fleets on Real-World Electric Truck Operation

A policy of “opportunity charging” that has drivers putting trucks on charging devices during lunch, breaks and other downtimes is a key component in keeping the trucks' state of charge high for longer periods of time. Photo: Orange EV

ORLANDO, FL – Electric trucks are much simpler to maintain and operate than diesel units. But that doesn't mean there aren't challenges for fleets that elect to evaluate and/or operate them. A session this week at the Technology & Maintenance Council Fall Meeting offered advice and answers for fleets considering electric trucks for their applications.

Opening presenter Mike Saxton, chief commerical officer for electric truck manufacturer OrangeEV, said that “range anxiety” concerns aside, his company has all-electric yard trucks operating for more than 24 hours on a single charge. However, he added that a policy of “opportunity charging” — a policy that has drivers putting trucks on charging devices during lunch, breaks and other downtimes — is a key component in keeping the trucks' state of charge high for longer periods of time. Furthermore, Saxton added, most fleet facilities today, as well as existing structures that could be converted into a fleet facility, already have the necessary electrical capacity to handle charging electric trucks.

Saxton said all-electric truck drivetrains last significantly longer than comparable diesel drivetrains, and that a truck's battery pack should last as long as the life of the truck itself in most operating conditions.

“Lithium-ion batteries do degrade over time with repeated charges,” he explained. “However, it takes about 2,000 charges before your battery capacity degrades — usually about 80%. You won't notice this as a drop-off in performance. But you will notice you're having to charge the truck more often.” But, he added, it generally takes between 7 and 10 years before this become an issue.

One potential limiting factor that ...Read the rest of this story

Fleets Share Best Practices on Implementing New Technologies

TMC panelists Bill Brown, Colin Crowley, Peter Savage and Deryk Powell outlined what they've learned as more and more fleets struggled to adopt new technologies and make them work effectively. Photo: Jack Roberts

Selecting and implementing new technology and making it work can be a challenge for all of us. It's especially daunting for fleets, which must not only control costs during the implementation process, but also put new technology to work effectively to ensure downstream return-on-investment.

Four fleet experts with recent experience in adopting new technologies and making them work gave an overview of their experiences and hard-won lessons during a panel discussion entitled “The Challenges and Pitfalls of Implementing New Technology” at the Technology & Maintenance Council Fall Meeting in Orlando, Florida, this week.

Deryk Powell, president and chief operating officer of technology company Velociti, noted in his opening remarks that in our rapidly evolving tech world, “trucking is at the epicenter of all new technology today, because we enable this new economy. And while there is a lot of new, scary stuff coming your way today, you cannot afford to get wound up about it. Because you are going to have to deal with it.”

Powell said his first advice when talking with fleet customers (Velociti specalizes in " technology deployment services") is to suggest they “synergize” their technology adoption efforts in order to make them more complete and easier to handle. For example, he said, if your fleet is looking at putting collision avoidance systems on your trucks, why not put them on your yard tractors and forklifts at the same time? Likewise, instead of dividing the tasks of putting different safety systems on vehicles such as electronic logging devices, in-cab camera systems, and lane-departure warning systems, treat all those initiatives as a single, unified action plan.

“That way,” he said, ...Read the rest of this story