Fleets already concerned about '07 engine costs

Diesel Progress North American Edition, April, 2004 by Jim Winsor

Last month's "Emissions Summit II" held in conjunction with The Maintenance and Technology Council's (TMC) annual meeting produced good news and bad news, to use a well-worn cliche.

The good news for truck fleets is that all the engine manufacturers said they would be able to meet EPA's '07 emissions rules for N[O.sub.x] and particulates and do it with sufficient lead time so some fleets would be able to get pre-production engines in the second half of'05 for testing and evaluation so they could have two full winters of operation, something that didn't happen with the accelerated '02 EPA deadline. All the truck diesel engine builders confirmed their '07 technology of choice: cooled EGR for N[O.sub.x] management and exhaust aftertreatment traps for particulates. Caterpillar, of course, is staying with its ACERT technology, plus traps.

The bad news is that the rumored cost increase for the new engines, exhaust aftertreatment for the first time and truck chassis changes (especially in cooling capacities) would add at least $15,000 and possibly as high as $20,000 to truck price tags. That's the likely cost to users to comply with the next round of clean air rules. The offsetting good news is that there should be no further fuel penalty for '07 and, in fact, a good possibility to regain part of'02 engines' 3% to 7% lost mileage.

Speakers on the engine panel were: Steve Duley, vice president of purchasing for Schneider National; Marty Fletcher, director of technology and training for U.S. Xpress; Dennis Beal, vice president of physical assets for Fed Ex Freight; and Jim Salas, director of maintenance and field support for Ryder Transportation Services. Collectively, they own/operate 80,000 Class 8 trucks and tractors.

Among their concerns was the huge increase in capital equipment costs for '07 and a general desire by much of the trucking industry for some kind of tax incentives to buy the new equipment to help avoid another '02 type pre-buy. Facing up to a $20,000 price increase for '07, some fleets are already buying equipment which they had deferred in '02 and '03 because of EGR unknowns in '02, coupled with a $4500 to $5000 increase in tractor prices.

The members of the engine panel shared some of their experiences with the '02 products. Fed Ex Freight, with 9130 tractors, is operating 758 of the '02 engines, the highest mileage being 175,000. Beal said he experienced an initial fuel mileage drop of 15% but after 50,000 miles the penalty "improved" to 4%. He said the duty cycle of tractors in LTL service is much harder on fuel mileage than in truckload service; that there's room for improvement as manufacturers upgrade ECMs and alter axle ratios. He said his fleet had been experiencing failures with sensors, EGR valves, EGR coolers and injectors. "No huge horror stories, but lots of pain and extraordinary costs," Beal said.

Schneider's Duley, with 9000 tractors, said the 3% to 5% drop in mpg with '02 engines "has wiped out 10 years of fuel economy improvements.

"We've torn down one engine at 250,000 miles and everything looked pretty good," he added. "Operating costs are 2 to 3 cents per mile more than pre-'02 engines for a total projected increased cost of $15,000 per tractor.

Fletcher's experiences at U.S. Xpress were similar. Between engine brands, fuel mpg is off as much as 9%, he said. U.S. Xpress is a major user of automated manual transmissions. He says this means engine ECMs have to "talk" to transmission ECMs for shifting to happen at optimum rpm. He reported that when an engine sensor picks up a higher than normal turbocharger temperature when pulling a hard grade, it often derates the engine suddenly, which surprises the driver and frequently the transmission won't shift when it should. This causes a driver to think there's a failure. Hours--and sometimes days--have been wasted in shops trying to find the problem which went away when the turbo temperature returned to normal.

"Do engine OEs really need to be so conservative on when their engines derate?" he asked. "We still need plenty of help with our '02 engines and we need our suppliers to stay with us."

Ryder's issues were similar to others but compounded by operating 800 shops. Getting technical training to their thousands of mechanics covering several brand of engines is difficult and time-consuming, Salas said.

Next month, we'll look at the General Accounting Office's report on '02 engines and how the EPA handled things. We'll also cover engine oils under development for the '07 engines. There's good news here.

STREET SMARTS IS A MONTHLY COLUMN DEVOTED TO THE ON-HIGHWAY ENGINE MARKET, JIM WINSOR IS EXECUTIVE EDITOR OF HEAVY DUTY TRUCKING AND DIRECTOR OF MARKETING FOR NEWPORT COMMUNICATIONS.