Guide For Proper Heavy Equipment Fleet Management

Regular maintenance, checks, repairs, and even replacements are necessary for heavy machinery. Your business has made a very big investment in this equipment, so, it is important that you handle it well. It can be difficult to maintain a sizable fleet of heavy machinery, particularly if you are attempting to grow your business.

This heavy equipment fleet management guide will go through some maintenance tricks and strategies for increasing the effective management of your fleet.

Just What Is Heavy Equipment Fleet Management?

Managing a fleet of construction equipment requires a few different areas of machinery management, such as:

• Purchasing
• Coordination
• Maintenance
• Replacements
• Reporting data
• Record-keeping

This administrative strategy guarantees that your business always has functional equipment easily available to prevent any project delays and unforeseen, expensive repairs. Fleet management enables you to keep tabs on your equipment and know exactly what needs to be replaced or inspected. Every business, project, and operation will present different issues.

In order to reduce workplace risks, fleet management also entails monitoring and managing your heavy equipment and guaranteeing adequate maintenance, operator training, and upkeep. Although fleet management can take on different forms for various businesses, the main objective is always to raise the efficiency and safety of your fleet as a whole.

Why Is The Management Of Heavy Equipment Fleet Important?

One of the biggest purchases you can make in your construction company is a fleet of heavy machinery. In order to keep your equipment in good working order, identify ways to save costs, and run a successful business, fleet management is a must. Similarly, fleet management may help you boost productivity and efficiency while also simplifying the maintenance of your equipment.

When you do not have a process in place to keep a check on your forklifts and diggers, it can be challenging to locate them if you run a big business or have a number of projects spread out across the city or state. The thing that can have the biggest impact on your bottom line is proper management of the fleet. For instance, if one of your forklifts is late in arriving at a job site, your entire project may be delayed, resulting in revenue loss and a business that nobody wants to work with.

Methods To Improve The Management Of A Fleet

Due to the sheer number of important factors that need to be monitored, fleet management can be difficult. To keep your fleet in top operational shape and prevent costly blunders, use these heavy equipment fleet management suggestions.

Know Your Limits

Effective management requires an understanding of the working capacity of your heavy equipment. You should make it a point to discuss correct usage with operators and ascertain the weight capacity and lifespan of each machine. It is also important to consider how your equipment’s parts may influence how well they work. Similarly, you will need to be aware of any weather changes that can affect how well your machine works.

Reduce Access

It is important to safeguard your resources and maintain equipment security when managing your fleet of heavy machinery. You can also help in preventing theft and misuse by restricting the access to your equipment. Use security precautions like keypads, barriers, or some other security to keep your equipment safely kept in a warehouse or on a job site. Only your employees and trained operators should be around or using your equipment.

Make Routine Inspections

Making use of preventative measures, such as doing routine inspections to look for damage, is one of the best heavy equipment fleet management suggestions. It is important to check that your machine’s components are in good shape whether you have used it for five minutes or five months to avoid later experiencing bigger — and more expensive — problems. Make sure to teach your operators to inspect your equipment’s wheels, tracks, inside, and exterior for even the smallest damage.

Conduct Regular Maintenance

To maintain the condition of your fleet, frequent maintenance is a must. Similar to inspections, it is not a good idea to ignore routine maintenance even if your used equipment appears to be in good condition from the look of it. If you don’t give preventative maintenance the priority it deserves, unexpected problems could arise and cause your initiatives to be delayed.

What you need to remember during maintenance;

• Rotating the tires
• Oil filter replacements
• Fluid update and management
• Cleaning the flanges
• Adherence to load capacity and operating hour
• Recommendations from the manufacturer
• Checks for pressure

Ensuring that tools and accessories are suitable for the season, such as snow tires for severe winter storms

Train Your Employees

To prevent any damage or injuries on your site, it is essential to train your construction workers and operators on how to use all of the equipment in your fleet. If local or federal restrictions are applicable, this training should also include certifications or licenses.

Everyone on the project benefits from understanding how the machines operate and how to take care of them, even if only a small number of workers are using the equipment. Your operators shouldn’t treat your equipment like it’s a disposable item or something that won’t get worn out. This instruction will place an emphasis on the fact that accuracy in operation is more crucial than speed, helping to improve fleet management and possibly even extending the life of your equipment.

Use Used Equipment To Build Your Fleet

As you manage your fleet, you will come to realize that part of your equipment is performing not that good or needs repairs that would be overpriced. Heavy equipment fleet management calls for periodic fleet evaluations to see if newer equipment or backups will improve performance.

Your business might benefit from getting a replacement for a broken-down backhoe right away, or adding another dozer to your fleet, or replacing an older excavator with a new one. Filling in the gaps in your fleet can increase efficiency and result in long term cost savings. In the event that one of your machines is no longer able to meet the demands of the job, purchasing or renting used heavy equipment is both economical and saves project delays.

Tracking Your Equipment

Fleet management can be greatly simplified by installing tracking devices to collect information and identify your equipment at any job sites. For instance, the majority of fleet management software tools, such as mobile apps, let you keep an eye on a number of elements of your equipment in one location, such as;

• Usage of fuel
• Location
• Inventory management 
• Service history 
• Needs for maintenance
• Mileage at Temperature
• Running time

Theft is also reduced a lot this way and, employees making use of your machines are held accountable if you are tracking them. These tracking tags are going to let everyone know that you are constantly monitoring your fleet and are aware of who is in charge of which machines.