Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/751200
commercial carrier journal | november 2016 27 JASON CANNON is Equipment Editor of Commercial Carrier Journal. E-mail jcannon@randallreilly.com or call (205) 248-1175. "We don't have a career ladder – we have a career lattice," he said. "With that founda- tion education, you can go anywhere [in the trucking industry] you want." A diesel technician's job is about as advanced a technological career field as any- thing on the market and hits just about every major push in the STEM (science, technol- ogy, engineering and mathematics) curricu- lum. But that oen is undersold against the stigma that it's a "greasy" job. "e first letter of STEM is science," said Greg Settle, director of corporate and stra- tegic alliances at the TechForce Foundation, which financially helps students enrolled in technical programs nationwide. "We all know about it, but outside of our industry, how many people know about it?" ere are dozens of tiny computers on a truck that govern every process in the ma- chine. at level of complexity needs to be emphasized, Southerland said. It's also important to not get hung up on "kids today" and how lazy or difficult you may view the entire generation. Lou Stumpp, national account manager for Navistar's fleet service, feels that for the most part, from ages 21 to 65, techni- cians are not all that much different. "All technicians are wired similarly," he said. "ey all like to fix stuff. ey don't like to waste time waiting on parts. ey don't like to waste time walking around the shop." A sense of belonging – "feeling like part of a family," Arrants added – will make your shop attractive in ways a fat paycheck never could. A reinvention of the trucking industry is underway, just as it began for newspapers about a decade ago. You can either resist and defy it, or adapt and thrive. WANT MORE EQUIPMENT NEWS? Scan the barcode to sign up for the CCJ Equipment Weekly e-mail newsletter or go to www.goo.gl/Ph9JK. In the quest to find techs, you have to hunt on their grounds and not on your terms. Navistar says SuperTruck obliterated DOE goals N avistar announced its SuperTruck demon- stration vehicle, CatalIST, achieved a freight efficiency improvement of 104 percent – more than double the 50 percent goal set by the U.S. Department of Energy for its SuperTruck program. Against a 2009 baseline model truck, CatalIST achieved fuel efficiency of 13 mpg and demonstrated 50.3 percent brake thermal efficiency and a path toward 55 percent BTE, Navistar said. Mark Stasell, Navistar vice president of product development, said CatalIST demon- strates the potential for reduction in the trucking industry's consumption of energy. "In addition, a number of the technology innovations we have achieved through the program are already being implemented in production vehicles today," Stasell said, pointing to Navistar's predictive cruise control technology. Other improvements over the course of the five-year project included: • Advanced integration of Navistar's N13 Engine using proprietary intelligent controls and high-efficiency combustion; • Reduced aerodynamic drag through replacement of cab- and hood-mounted mirrors with a series of cameras and interior-mounted monitors, which also yield equal or better indi- rect vision for the driver; • A new LED headlamp system that reduces lamp size for a more aerodynamic shape and cuts electrical power requirements by greater than 80 percent, while improving luminous output and light color for improved nighttime direct driver vision and reduced driver fatigue; • An all-new shape with a sloped windshield and a wedged cab for improved aerodynamics; and • Innovative use of lighter-weight carbon-fi- ber panels in the upper body, roof headers, back panel and dash panel. – Jason Cannon