Fuel Saving Trailer Tails?

The part you and others on this bandwagon leave out is the added maintenance costs. I've owned an aero truck, and all the added plastic made everything harder to work on. Some like say the ProStar slide the engine back so far under the windshield you can only see the first 3 cyl. You may claim 7% fuel savings but when it takes 1hr+ extra shop time at say $100 per hr to even get to what needs fixed your 7% is BS.

The things that actually do improve fuel mileage are illegal, like proper engine programming. Put the timing back in an Acert, strip the EGR crap off an ISX and magically the MPG goes up and maintenance costs go down. And neither of which requires a truck/trailer to look like a plastic factory puked on it.

 

I have been buying the tabs by the case and sticking them everywhere all over the machines
I guess I was screwing up by not sticking them on the wagon

 

This thing is just a box of air tabs away from being an aerodynamic poster child.

 

Rag, something else you might consider doing is getting your chains and binders teflon coated. I guess it goes without saying that you should install a Turbo3000d on every machine you haul-it's just the right thing to do.

 

I put 8 Turbo 3000d's on my cat and now I'm having to sell all the extra fuel it makes
What a PITA

 

I won't do dirt stuff
It's way to hard on the decking
If that's anything above a D7 he needs another axel on the wagon in GA

 

I'm not sure what engine placement has to do with skirting. Nor do I see any reason various air deflectors systems would negatively impact trailer maintenance. Aerodynamics is a proven field. Reducing drag is a proven solution in other applications, I don't see why it wouldn't work in our industry. Unless you're sure the price of diesel is going down and staying there, I would think keeping an open mind on new technology would be a good thing.

 

Nothing wrong with aerodynamics but you have to factor in at what expense. If it costs me more in maintenance than I gain in fuel savings then what's the point?

You can't honestly believe that this disaster isn't going to cost more to work on.


Both of those are from a Prostar


Those are from a Volvo 780




W900L!

So at say $100 per hr shop time how much fuel will I have to save with the aero truck to pay for the added costs? Keep in mind I just had a W900B and a T800 get 7 and 7.5mpg hauling grain.

Just like the trailer tails or trailer skirts. The companies that are buying them are getting tax credits. Would they still be buying them if they had to pay the full $4,000.00 for each trailer? You pay me $4k and I'll stick chicken feathers on the back of my trailer and say they work.

On paper or in a wind tunnel all these things are awesome. But like I said before do you actually save any money if you factor in initial purchase price, maintenance costs and damage? I see plenty of trucks driving around with broken or missing side fairings. When your measuring fuel mileage improvements in fractional numbers it doesn't take much to kill any benefits.

 

Also people never factor in what the truck is doing. Does anyone think for a second that the shape of the trucks hood on the tractor pulling this load is going to make any difference in fuel costs?



They just automatically assume everyone is puling a dry van or reefer hauling 30k driving coast to coast and we should just be forced to buy this stupid plastic junk.

P.S. this is just the first pic I found that proves my point. No idea who's it is.

 

I hear what your saying......after all it's kinda like an airplane wing. Most of the lift is done on the top side of the wing thru vacum and less then half of the lift is done thru deflection on the underside of the wing. That part I get and understand, however that design in the picture is a piece of junk and no driver is going to take the time to set that thing up. Unless engineers can come up with a design that requires no driver input to set up and requires no more moving parts it will be counterproductive.
Like the aero trucks. They are great but as mentioned they are hard to work on, the parts are not universal (or close) they have poor resale value, , the aero parts start falling apart in 5-10 years, and you'll never find parts for a T2000 in 2025 but you'll still be able to find parts for a 2000 KW900 or Pete379. How many 90's Pete379 versus Pete377's? per units built are on the road? I bet there are at least 3 times as many 90's Pete379's on the road as there are 377's per units built. So from a geo-footprint, the Pete379 or KW900 is more friendly since it will more then likely stay on the road twice as long despite useing slightly more fuel given the same circumstances. And that's comparing a 377 versus a 379. Wait and see what those results will be in 2020 when your comparing a 2000's 379 versus a 387 which has even more plastic, is more model specific, and even harder to work on.