Heavy Duty Trucking, September 2019

their success adds Steve Slesinski director of product planning at Dana which has been working on electric drivetrain components for several years and recently announced a new line of hydrogen fuel cell drivetrain components Thats why we are investing heavily now in new training resources for these technologies We want to build that knowledge base now so that when these vehicles do start to appear in fleets their owners will have a positive customer experience At the same time Slesinski notes many repairs on the vehicles of the future may not require a technician at all Many of these vehicle systems will be serviced and updated remotely via telematics he says And that is going to require a different type of technician one that may be very different from our traditional idea of what a truck technician is Cummings agrees noting that Rush is already developing an extensive telematics network that is rapidly becoming more dynamic and capable of making vehicle upgrades in real time And as a natural consequence of that technology he sees the younger generation of technicians as the ones who will take the lead with emerging alternative fuels and other advanced vehicle technologies Our older technicians are actually adapting to all of this new technology pretty well he says But I feel like the young people just entering the workforce are more receptive of these new technologies and quicker to learn them Theyve grown up with new technology as a daily force in their lives So they are more apt to dive into a new technology and embrace it But more than anything Sheehy says the key to success with technicians and new technology is a firm commitment and buy in to go the distance And that has to come from the top he says You cant embrace and adopt new technology halfway It doesnt matter if its clean diesel or natural gas or something else You have to jump in with both feet And upper management really has to drive that from reaching out to OEMs lining up training all the way down to explaining to technicians why youre going this route and asking them to help you make it work There will be many challenges some of them currently unknown to fully integrating new technologies into fleet operations and making them both efficient and profitable And maintenance professionals will be a key component in the success or failure of these new technologies Date 08 12 19Client CMAJob 2821File Name 2821 CMA HeavyDutyTrucking Sept HP iRAccount Director Van NguyenEditor Designer Revised LBProduction LBColor Page 1 of 1Allow to provide you with an aggressive 7 year 3 retread warranty Mission Excellence is a philosophy that shapes the way you are treated as a customer This led us to increase tari free tire output in our Thailand factory Learn more at www DoubleCoinTires com 2019 CMA LLC SEPTEMBER 2019 HDT 63 WWW TRUCKINGINFO COM One advantage early alt fuel adopters have is that they tend to get a lot more OEM support for their efforts says John Sheehy with EVO PHOTO EVO TRANSPORTATION AND ENERGY SERVICES