Vandecasteele takes delivery of 17 new trucks
19 August 2021Vandecasteele Houtimport has taken delivery of 17 new VOLVO trucks. The vehicles were ordered on July 14, 2020 and following some delays caused by the Covid pandemic, were delivered exactly one year later.
“We have opted for the Volvo truck FH of 510 HP with Euro-6 engine, as it is a brand new model which has all possible safety features and ‘top of the shelf’ technologies,” said Stefaan Vandecasteele.
The Euro-6 engines reduce fuel consumption and CO² emissions. These new trucks consume 27 litres per 100km compared to 31 litres for the previous model.
All trucks are equipped with the Volvo Connect fleet management system, an on-board computer consisting of four software components: Positioning, Driver Times, Messaging and Fuel and Environment.
The positioning component is a tracking system that allows the trucks to be tracked down to street level and to monitor speed and load information on the estimated arrival of the trucks. With the 'driver' component, data from the tachograph is transferred remotely, providing insight into the driver's times, the working time used for refueling, loading and unloading. Via messaging it is easy for the drivers to communicate with the office or warehouse and drivers can communicate with each other.
The 'Fuel and Environment' component registers all critical fuel parameters that have an impact on consumption such as idling, the brake-stop ratio, coasting, adjusting speed, the use of cruise control and the efficient use of the engine and gearbox . In addition, the component provides driving advice to the driver. While driving, the drivers are given tips on how to improve their driving style and they are shown scores for the aforementioned parameters on a scale from 0 to 100. Together with the on-board computer, an App can be installed on the smartphone on which drivers can see their results per day, per week and per month.
