A fully integrated mixer dispatch and automatic vehicle location (AVL) system now undergoing beta testing in southeastern Florida may already have justified itself after only two months, and is on the way to complete payback within a year, say users at Tarmac's Eastern Region. The benefits are measured in increased customer satisfaction and enhanced fleet productivity. In the meantime, Tarmac is working to make sure drivers know the system is intended to optimize customer service, not to monitor their whereabouts.

As implemented in late 2002 by Tarmac's Eastern Region in West Palm Beach, the system integrates a mixer truck dispatch system with a global positioning system (GPS), providing real-time location status with a wireless communications network and Internet connectivity. Mixer truck “events” — such as the start and stop of the loading process, departure from plant, arrival at job site, and start and end of pour — are automatically and accurately captured and “time stamped” in a database without any effort by either the driver or the dispatcher.

And in a new application — via truck-mounted sensors — the system also captures and logs mixer data such as the number of drum revolutions or the amount of water added at job site. More sensors are in the offing.

“The main benefit of the system is that it improves our delivery efficiencies, thus improving customer service,” says Tarmac Eastern Region General Manager Tom Tichacek. “Our main purpose is to improve customer service.”

The total system is unique, he adds. “I've been in this business 31 years, and this is the first, real change in dispatching that I've seen in my career.”

PRODUCTIVITY IMPROVES

“In the beginning, we determined that a 5 percent improvement [in productivity] would be needed to justify the capital expenditures,” says Jock Irvin, dispatch manager for the Eastern Region. “We're already realizing that.”

Thus, in mid-December 2002 the payback was coming faster than anticipated. “In terms of payback, we've exceeded what we had hoped for just the past few months,” Tichacek says. “If we continue with our efficiencies we'll achieve complete payback in a year.

“We've hit some potholes in implementation,” he concedes. “But at the same time, we're able to take more orders because we are improving our yards-per-driver hour. Under the old system, when a truck would re-enter the plant, it might sit for 15 to 20 minutes before dispatch would realize the truck is back. It was a guessing game as to where the trucks were.”

But with the new system today, Tichacek continues, “We know the instant the truck is back in the plant. We know its status, and that allows our dispatchers to better utilize our assets. We know exactly what the trucks are doing, any time of the day. And, if a customer calls for same-day service, it gives the dispatchers a better tool to gauge whether that can be provided.”

Also, Tarmac's dispatch room — once a tumult of noise — is as quiet as a library. “It's a whole lot calmer there,” Tichacek affirms, “because there's a whole lot less radio traffic.”

“We have two individuals, running four plants and 57 trucks,” Irvin adds. “You will find it to be the calmest, quietest dispatch office you have ever been in.”

In southeastern Florida, Tarmac's Eastern Region runs about 250 miles north to south, and about 110 miles east to west. Within that region there is a northern and a southern area. The northern area has 52 mixer trucks and five plants, while the southern has 57 trucks and four plants.

In the southern area, concrete mixer dispatch software from Systech Inc., Darien, Ill., has been integrated with the Telvisant fleet management system from Trimble Navigation, Sunnyvale, Calif., to provide automatic truck status and dispatch capabilities that can increase fleet productivity. “We are a beta test for the new Trimble/Systech product,” Irvin says. “Stand-alone systems have been available, but we are the first to have a fully integrated system.”

CUSTOMER SERVICE

While such a system is conventionally called an AVL system, Tarmac prefers to downplay its tracking benefits — which suggest an Orwellian approach to employee management — instead emphasizing how it will enhance customer service and satisfaction. And, after only a few months, Tarmac observed customer service benefits, some of which are founded on improved communications.

“With the old system, when a customer would call, many times we were in the dark when trying to communicate with a truck,” says Tarmac Eastern Region Operations Manager Dan Whitman. “Now it's instantaneous. We know exactly where the trucks are. It adds credibility to dispatch and helps them make better decisions on upcoming work and how to service customers that already have started pouring.”

BYPASSING DISPATCH

Ultimately — in the system's final iteration — the customer may be able to bypass dispatch altogether. Some day, Tarmac's system may be linked to the Internet, so that any customer will be able to access the system through a secure site with his or her account number to see where orders stand and trucks are located, and how much has been poured.

“One day, our customers on the job site or in their office may be able to go onto our web site, and using a secure code, bring up their own information,” notes Tom Tichacek. “The customer will be able to watch his or her trucks being batched, leave the plant, and arrive on the job site. Customers will get a feel for how efficient their crews and subcontractors are on site — not just how the concrete supplier is doing.”

Not only will the tightly integrated system let a customer know how the supplier is performing; it will also enable suppliers to quantify which customers are “higher maintenance” than others.

“Every movement is time-stamped,” Tichacek explains. “With that data, we can better analyze who is handling our product on their job sites better than other customers. We will be able to make decisions as to how to better fit those customers into our structure, or even sit down with the customer to see how they may make their job sites more efficient. Increasing their efficiency will help them make money.”

Also, if Tarmac has trucks on a job site that aren't pouring fast enough, and the job is moving slowly, dispatch can divert future mixers to another customer. “We can more efficiently use our trucks to improve customer service,” Whitman says.

PRODUCTIVITY VIA COMMUNICATION

As Tarmac acclimates to the system, staff expects it will be become more useful to them. “Ultimately, we will fully integrate the dispatch department with the plants, and they will be able to fully message the drivers,” Jock Irvin says. “The system already is making life easier at our remote locations, as well as in the central dispatch arena.”

Now, radio traffic has been reduced substantially, because if a customer inquires about the whereabouts of a truck, dispatch no longer needs to call to see where it is. The new system replaces an obsolete one that was giving Tarmac staff major headaches. “We had a manual tracking system, in which an operator would push a button to status himself on our dispatch screen,” Irvin says. “Our region is the largest in the company and our RF backbone had five radio towers to pull it all together. It was a nightmare. As drivers would move to other regions they'd have to tune their radio to that tower. There were dead spots for some of the equipment.” Now drivers are able to get through to dispatch, he adds, and stopped carrying their personal cell phones as back-up.

Supporting this capability is a series of up to 20 custom messages — actuated by pressing a button — that are displayed by an EchoLDX terminal mounted in the cab. This cuts down on routine radio messaging. “The driver can send a message such as ‘concrete on board, 10-5’ just by pressing a button, and the plant knows he's returning with concrete,” Whitman explains. “It's cut down a large part on the radio traffic directed at the plant, and that's where we're seeing a big improvement.”

Also, drivers must acknowledge receipt of a message, so dispatch knows it's been received.

MIXER SENSORS AND GPS

The combination of integrated dispatch and GPS with truck-mounted sensors has given Tarmac a powerful tool for monitoring quality control and mix condition, as well as managing mixer use, Tichacek notes. “Once a truck is batched, the system then tracks revolutions of the mixing drum, plus water added from the system on the truck. Those two items help us in quality control; our quality control manager can then monitor a particular customer.”

For example, if a customer is plagued with low cylinder breaks, not only does the driver sign for water the old-fashioned way on the ticket, but Tarmac can know exactly how many gallons of water actually went into the load of concrete. “We know what's going into that load of concrete,” Tichacek adds.

“When a customer asks for water, the sensor automatically transmits how much water and when, and it's recorded,” Whitman adds. “It even has the logic to differentiate wash-down water from water added to a load. Once the truck is completely discharged, it separates added-water from wash water. And the driver doesn't have to do anything.”

“Our sensors and system give us the ability to collect every status [datum] needed by the ready mixed industry,” Irvin notes. “We know when they're in the plant loading, when they're loaded, when they leave the yard, when they're en route to the job, when they arrive on the job, when they begin pouring, adding water and how much, when they're washing down, when they're leaving the job, and when they're back in the plant.”

COUNTDOWN TO START-UP

In the morning, when the driver turns his key on the truck, the system begins counting down a set number of minutes for that driver to execute his pre-trip checklist, such as oil level, brake fluid and tire checks. “We've determined how many minutes it takes for a driver to do a pre-trip,” Tichacek says. “After those minutes the truck then registers automatically that it's ready to load.” This information is displayed in the dispatch office.

When an order is added, the GPS coordinates of the job are automatically created without being manually entered, along with a dynamic “geofence” radius or perimeter around the site. This dynamic geofence also automatically adjusts as the job conditions dictate, such as on a paving or curb job. “When you begin assigning the same information, the coordinates are retained for future orders to that job site,” Tichacek says.

A geofence has been established around the loadout. When the truck enters the loadout, the entry signals to the dispatcher that the truck is batching. “When the truck is batched, and the driver takes it from full-charging down to a lower rpm, and pulls away from the bin, it indicates that the truck has completed a batch,” Tichacek notes.

A geofence also has been established around each plant. When the truck passes through the geofence, it indicates that the truck is en route to the job site. The truck's movement into the geofence at the job site indicates it has arrived.

REMEMBERING AVERAGE TIMES

The ability to track trucks in real time means they can be easily rerouted if traffic conditions dictate. “We can see how a truck is proceeding to a job site, just by seeing how long it takes to get from point A to point B,” Tichacek says. “If we need to redirect, we can do so. If there's an accident, the lead driver can message back to us and we can reroute the trucks behind him.”

In addition to remembering the exact total mileage a truck is driven in a year without odometers, the system also logs average delivery times between a plant and a job. “If a truck takes longer than those ‘learned’ minutes, our dispatching system will flag those trucks, indicating the truck is beyond the average time,” Tichacek says. Specifically, a flashing red box appears around the delayed truck's number on a screen, or icon on a map. “The dispatcher then can investigate why the truck is delayed,” Tichacek adds. “He has the ability to message the truck and ask why it's taking him so long to get to the site.”

The dispatch screen does more. “If there's any variance on our dispatching screen on times — whether it's in getting to the job, waiting to unload, or returning or even batching — our dispatchers have the ability to question exactly what's going on,” Tichacek says. “They can see it in real time, whereas in the past it was a guessing game. The old technology might not have worked, or the driver might not have punched a button, or the truck might have gone behind a building and lost coverage.”

LOOKING TO THE FUTURE

As of mid-December 2002, Tarmac was using truck-mounted sensors for monitoring mixer drum revolutions and adding onboard water. The company envisions additional sensors for further increasing productivity in the near future.

“We would like to know how much concrete is being returned from the job site, without the driver guessing,” Tichacek says. “They now have ability to add those sensors to the drum. That way we can make the decision in advance as to whether to use that concrete or dump it. It also will give us the exact amount of concrete that's coming back.” Oil and tire pressures may be monitored in the future.

“We're pleased about our decision to partner with Systech and Trimble on this system,” Tichacek says. “I'm not aware of any other truly integrated systems of this type in the industry. Our main goal in business is to differentiate ourselves from our competitors, and determine we can improve our customers' satisfaction and service, ensure repeat business and increase new business. This tool allows us to talk with customers and give them facts, where before we were guessing.”

ALLIANCE SUPPORTS TELVISANT PLATFORM

Trimble Navigation Ltd. and McNeilus Companies Inc., a subsidiary of Oshkosh Truck Corp., now offer Trimble's fleet management solution as a factory-installed and aftermarket option on McNeilus' mixer trucks. The leading manufacturer of concrete mixers, McNeilus is the industry's first to offer customers a complete Internet-based location service, greatly improving fleet utilization.

As part of an alliance formed last year, Trimble's recently introduced Telvisant Fleet Management System with AutoStatus is marketed, distributed and sold through McNeilus' sales channel. Customers access fleet information from a co-branded McNeilus/Trimble web site. In addition, the companies are working together to develop future technology that will continue to improve mixer-fleet management.

While the Telvisant system used by Tarmac profiled here was mounted on existing mixers and is integrated with dispatch software from Systech Inc., the McNeilus/Trimble partnership offers technology that is factory installed, so customers have a single-source for the complete package.

Concurrently, Systech and Trimble have joined forces to provide a fully integrated auto-status dispatch system to the ready-mix market. The solution feeds location and status data from Trimble's Telvisant Fleet Management System to Systech's dispatch system through a seamless interface. The result is reduced dependency on drivers to provide status information, improved dispatcher productivity, and ultimately increased yards delivered per man-hour. The package is available through McNeilus, Systech or Trimble.