Maintenance Aspects of Off Highway Trucks - A Case Study

Engineering availability of the 120/200 tonne Wabco haulpak fleet at Mt. Whaleback was in the mid fifties and unstable. The project to achieve a reliable 66% during 1980 highlighted "plannable" maintenance, short cycle scheduling, condition monitoring, backlog control, and, above all, the importance of involving all affected people. It is not sufficient for consultants to design systems and make them work. The people who use the system must understand it, support it and "own" it. In this way, they will develop it and improve results after the outside help has been withdrawn INTRODUCTION In early 1979, PA proposed a programme to improve engineering availability of the Mt. Newman Mining fleet of 70 Wabco haulpak trucks of which 53 were 120 tonne and 17 were 200 tonne units. (Subsequently five 200 tonne trucks from Hamersley Iron were added to the fleet). The ore truck workshop was also responsible for 75 tonne trucks used as water trucks and general purpose vehicles. The need for action was clear. The fleet was achieving availability in the "mid fifties" with wide variations indicating that the fleet was becoming unreliable. Projected tonnages required a reliable 66% availability to be