Digitising Chassis Crack Mapping Across a Fleet of 100 Large Mining Trucks
The Problem
A large mining operation was managing structural inspections across a fleet of 100 large off-highway trucks and their dump bodies.
The fleet operates in an extremely demanding environment, with truck frames and dump bodies subjected to high structural loads, wet and muddy haul roads and, at times, extreme freezing temperatures.
Cracking is an expected maintenance issue in these operating conditions. If cracks are not identified, monitored and repaired correctly, they can propagate and ultimately result in major structural failures, expensive repairs and significant equipment downtime.
Structural inspections were being completed during the 500-hour preventive maintenance interval. Inspectors recorded identified cracks on PDF check sheets, which were then passed to the welding team for gouging and repair.
While the inspection process identified the immediate maintenance requirement, the information remained largely trapped within individual inspection documents.
This made it difficult to analyse cracking across the fleet and answer a more important question:
Why are these cracks occurring, and are the same structural areas repeatedly failing across multiple trucks?
The TrackTreads Solution
TrackTreads digitised the structural inspection and crack-mapping process.
Using a tablet, inspectors record each crack directly against its exact location on a digital representation of the chassis or dump body. The inspection record can include:
- Exact crack location
- Crack length and severity
- Photographs
- Inspector comments
- Recommended maintenance action
- Repair requirements and welding instructions
- Previous crack and repair history
Once the inspection is completed, the information is immediately available within TrackTreads and a detailed inspection and repair report can be produced for the welding team.
The Outcome
The time required to perform the inspection was not significantly different from completing the previous PDF-based process.
The difference was what could be done with the information afterwards.
The inspection data was now structured, searchable and available for analysis across the entire fleet.
Maintenance teams could immediately provide welding crews with clear information showing where repairs were required and the specific repair instructions for each location.
More importantly, management could analyse structural cracking at fleet level.
Fleet heat maps identified recurring crack locations and highlighted problem areas across the truck chassis, dump body bolsters and rails.
This enabled the mine to move beyond simply repairing individual cracks and begin investigating the underlying causes, including:
- Haul-road conditions
- Truck loading practices
- Repeated cracking in specific structural locations
- Differences between machines
- Recurring failures following previous repairs
- Potential chassis, bolster and rail engineering improvements