OTR tyres are a major part of an operation for any mining fleet. Importance of choosing the right tyre and maintaining them for high operational output is paramount. If you do not have the necessary process or knowledge to select the right kind of tyre or maintain them after the purchase then you could run into problems like excess operational cost, equipment downtime and loss of revenue.
An experienced fleet management team know what kind of maintenance and operation processes are required to identify and fix problems that might affect equipment operation. Based on the experience of keepmining team to deal with OTR tyres, we have come up with most important factors that a mining operations team need to keep mind while buying and maintaining OTR tyres for your fleet.
Selection of the Tyres
Safety standards, cost efficiency, delivery time vs. downtime and tyre life are some of the important factors while selecting an OTR tyre. You could buy a brand new tyre or maybe a used one depending on life cycle and requirement. The type of tyre required also depends heavily on the application of the equipment where it will be used and this is where knowledge of your procurement team is very important. This could also mean setting up relevant process and knowledge session to help your team make a better selection of tyres for your fleet.
After purchase process for maintenance
Buying the right kind of tyre which checks out in terms of safety, cost and delivery time is the first step for effective fleet operation. Once the tyre gets in use, a regular inspection process can help you assess wear and tear to give early warning signs. This kind of process will help you prepare for the worst and ensure that there is no equipment lying idle. Such an inspection can be performed by accredited tyre personnel.
Using technology
A regular checkup or inspection of every tyre might be time-consuming or results in loss of productivity due to human errors. With the advent of IoT(Internet of things), there are tools available in the market which can help you keep a tap on tyre pressure and temperature. These sophisticated tyre management software plus hardware tools can help you get a real-time reading of most important values that help define a tyre ability to stay on field without any surprises. Such tools also help you avoid the unnecessary cost of repair and damage.
Training and processes
Asking your team to perform inspection may not always result in the right outcome unless they have enough knowledge on why and how to perform these inspections. This is the reason why process-driven businesses have a contingency plan and have better productivity. Once your tyre management is process-driven and your team is well trained in maintaining them, you will see a better operational fleet which can give higher mining output for you. Make sure your team has enough training and your business has processes set to identify tyres well in advance which might slow down your fleet movement.
Based on your experience how do you and your team plan to have an effective tyre maintenance and management in place? We might add them here in our article. We hope you keep mining and not a tyre would ever bring your equipment to a standstill.