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| Ali Yaseena and Michael Mvune does the crucial wheel alignment at the Volvo assembly plant in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa |
WITHOUT trucks, the economy will crash, while safer trucks will
enable us to move the economy along. This was the message from Torbjörn
Christensson, president of Volvo Group Southern Africa.
He said safety is part of Volvo’s DNA and why Volvo can aim for a
world with zero accidents.
The company recently invested almost R6 million in its assembly
plant near Amanzimtoti in order to install the latest active safety systems from
Europe in trucks operating locally.
The system works with a radar and cameras that watch for small
moving objects like pedestrians or cyclists in blind spots and can stop the
truck much quicker than a human driver can react, even around corners.
Christensson said the systems had been tested by several SA clients
for past three years, and will now go into serial production.
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| Malcolm Gush points to the radar unit in the Volvo truck's nose. |
One of these clients is Pietermaritzburg-based Colt Transport,
where 65 Volvo trucks equipped with active safety systems have delivered savings
and can handle even SA’s unpredictable taxi drivers.
Volvo sales director Malcolm Gush said the safety system, which is
sold as a package, costs about R43 000, which is less than the typical repair
cost of even a minor collision on a truck.
He predicted such systems will soon be the norm, not just an
option, for fleet operators. Some 60 operators have been testing the system in
SA, and one fitted Volvo’s Alcolock V3 breath analiser to ensure a zero alcohol
limit.
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| Even a twisted ankle rates as IOD at the Volvo plant in SA. |
After-market service manager Theunis Eloff said Volvo’s proactive
workshops do not require the fleet manager to make booking, but use telematic
service schedules that are customised per chassis to bring trucks in for
service. The workshops have been testing predictive failure for six months and
now boast accuracies of one hour. “The aim is to ensure uptime,” said
Eloff.
Volvo truck owners will from next year also be able to link Volvo’s
Dynafleet app, which enables fleet owners to check the total health of a truck.
The app will be released free to all Volvo owners in South Africa, Australia and
Korea in the third quarter of next year.
This will enable their drivers to enter the Dynafleet compeittion
and rank their skills worldwide — similar to Daimler’s FleetBoard competition.
