.png)
Elite Industry Driver Habits: Idle Time
As a company it is our responsibility to make sure we keep our drivers informed about good road habits that increase your profits. One of those habits is reducing the idle time of your truck. We talked to Greg Sullivan, Marvin Keller Senior Truck Technician, about idle time and how it affects the overall economy of our drivers.
Idle time is the time that the truck is running but not moving. A lot of drivers are in the habit of keeping their trucks running all night. Typically any time you turn off your engines to eliminate idle times is good. It burns fuel at about a gallon an hour any time you are idling your truck, so it really dents your fuel economy. Plus with the newer trucks it affects the emissions on the vehicle because when you leave your truck running all night, the emissions get filled up with carbons. As a company we encourage all drivers to eliminate all idle time.
One reoccurring issue we have run into as we investigate this problem is that a lot of the heaters on these trucks are not working properly. This is one reason why many drivers end up idling their trucks to stay warm at night. We have been putting a great deal of effort into fixing these heaters as of late. We are currently fixing about 2-3 a day every week. If your heater is not working properly, it will be extremely beneficial for you to bring your truck into the shop to get it fixed.
So far we have been pretty successful in helping our drivers reduce their idle times and save money. In some instances we have reduced consumption of 40 gallons a week. That is a huge amount saved when you consider that fuel costs about $2.50 a gallon, times 60 trucks, which ends up being about $4,500 saved per year. And all that from eliminating idle time in our trucks.
If you are idling your truck because of an issue, contact the Marvin Keller Maintenance team to get it taken care of as soon as possible. We want to make sure you are warm especially in these colder months.