Tinkering consigned to history books
There was a time when men spent Sunday mornings with their head under the bonnet of their car, carrying out repairs, performing maintenance duties and generally tinkering. But with the advent of more advanced vehicles, that free tinkering has been replaced by expensive maintenance carried out by a third-party. And those that own and operate construction equipment appear to be heading down the same well-trodden and potentially costly path.
I distinctly remember my father buying his first new car. It was a Ford Escort estate in navy blue. And it had the license plate LGK 16V. It’s weird the things you remember.
Now we were a relatively small family: mother, father, my sister, and myself. We also had a basset hound but she was constantly travel sick so the new car was not for her.
The real reason my father chose to buy an estate car was that he was a keen match angler.
But on the first weekend of new car ownership, the car did not travel to the river, to the canal or to a lake. In fact, it didn’t actually travel anywhere. Instead, my father spent his first weekend of new car ownership beneath said car, applying a liberal coating of under-seal to protect his new pride and joy from rust and corrosion.
Now this was back in the mid to late 1970s when men (and it was ALWAYS men) would tinker with their cars on a Sunday morning. This was, I guess, partly out of necessity as the cars were not as reliable as they are today. But it was also a communal activity; a chance for the men to get away from ‘er indoors and do manly things together.
This was known as tinkering. I don’t know whatever happened to tinkering. Maybe it has been consigned to the pages of history, along with indoor smoking, casual racism and casual sex.
Anyway, after several hours spent under his car applying a thick coat of bituminous black tar to the underside of his car, I remember my father coming back in the house looking not unlike Al Jolson in The Jazz Singer. You see, the past was filled with causal racism.
Unsung Hero
There was a time when every company that owned construction equipment also had a fitter or a mechanic that was able to keep that equipment running.
Whether it was a construction company, a plant hirer, a demolition firm or a quarry, every company had their go-to guy. He was generally armed with a sledgehammer, a screwdriver of unnatural length, and a bag of mismatched Imperial spanners. He, his overalls and his lunchtime sandwiches were always caked in oil and grease.
But this man was the unsung hero of the sector; capable of fixing just about anything with a well-aimed tap with a sledgehammer.
This was, of course, in the days when diesel reigned supreme as the industry’s fuel of choice.
But the industry finds itself at a crossroads. An environmental crossroads that will see the slow eradication of diesel and the arrival and embracing of new forms of power. Companies like JCB, Liebherr and Bobcat have already grasped the nettle with electric power. At the last Bauma exhibition, Case showed a prototype wheel loader designed to run on bio-fuel. And there is a firm belief that hydrogen is the fuel of the future.
Who will fix those machines? Who will ensure that they’re running at optimum levels? Who will get them back into the yard, fixed and back out again to earn a living and — hopefully — turn a profit?
Peace of Mind
I read recently that Volvo Construction Equipment has set in place a specific training course for its own technicians to ensure that they are fully up-to-speed with the inner workings of their rapidly expanding range of electric powered machines. During a recent LiveStream show, a viewer asked much the same question of a senior JCB executive; and they too are busily training up their own in-house teams to make ready for the electric revolution that is heading towards us at full speed. I would assume that those companies currently dabbling with hydrogen and bio-fuel powered machines will soon be embarking upon a similar journey.
And that’s fine. Certainly, if I was investing tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds in new electric or hydrogen powered equipment, I would want some assurance that the manufacturer and the local dealer was ready, willing and able to help keep it on the road. And, frankly, who better to look after a machine than the very people that made it in the first place?
However, that will come at a cost; a cost that will be borne by the owners and operators of the equipment.
All the while my father was tinkering with his car, it didn’t cost him anything, aside from an hour or two of his time. But here we are, maybe 40 years later, and even the slightest issue with a car means a trip — a costly trip — to the nearest car dealer. Here the problem will be identified by a man with a laptop and fixed by another man with a sonic screwdriver. And both men charge handsomely for their role in getting your car back on the road.
My fear is that the wider construction industry is walking blindly into a similar and equally costly situation.
All of this is fine if you are a car owner. You can book your car in to fix whatever ails your vehicle; you can use public transport to get to and from work while your car is in dry dock; or you could catch a ride with a friend or family member.
Such luxuries are not available to construction equipment owners and operators. If a machine is out of action, it has not just stopped earning money; it has started to cost money.
Obviously, we have seen the advent of maintenance agreements in which the local dealer effectively takes care of most or even all maintenance on a machine or an entire fleet. We have also seen the arrival of telematics and remote monitoring that allow those same dealers to identify and diagnose developing faults long before they become an actual breakdown.
But that is not the solution for the fast turnaround required by plant hirers and demolition companies. In an ideal world, “Bob” and his oversized screwdriver and mismatched spanners would still carry out the day-to-day maintenance of machines.
Don’t get me wrong. I am all for the green revolution. I am 100 percent behind the adoption of alternative fuels and advanced machine systems.
But my concern is that we do not currently have a new generation of “Bobs” capable of taking care of these increasingly advanced machines. As far as I can tell, we do not have any current or planned training courses to provide that new generation of fitters and mechanics either. And perhaps my greatest concern of all is that this move will finally kill off the practice of tinkering; that it will place the responsibility for plant maintenance entirely in the hands of the equipment manufacturers and dealers; and that — like my father — that which used to be free and a part of car (or equipment) ownership will become just another cost.
This article was written during a LiveStream show on Wednesday 24 March 2021. My thanks to Cheryl O’Brien and Munashe Chiwanza for joining me on the journey.
Mark Anthony is the editor of DemolitionNews.com
