Continental tyres were introduced to the British fleet operator Fagan & Whalley in early 2014, when an order of 100 new Lawrence David trailers were specified with the manufacturer’s HTR2 product. Since then, with support from Continental’s local Field Service Manager, Paul Ridler, the haulier trialed the new Conti Hybrid HS3 steer axle tyre at the start of 2015, and is now using them on a fast-growing number of tractor units.
“One of the biggest issues any operator can face,” said Simon Brindley, “is the massive financial penalties uneven tyre wear can generate. Degradation on tyre shoulders, just from routine running, means tyres have to be taken off and replaced with anything up to 40% wear still available across the rest of the surface. That’s not acceptable, and it is one big difference I have noticed with the Continental tyres – we get good even wear from them and that is delivering considerable savings for us as we get the full ‘natural life’ from them.”
The Fagan & Whalley fleet consists largely of Scania units, each averaging around 140,000kms a year on long distance tramping work. Through drivers’ daily checks on tread depth, pressures, surface wear and damage, as well as reports from their own in-house routine maintenance inspections, the company keeps a close eye on the overall performance of the tyres.
Our drivers are a good judge of a tyre and they will soon speak up if they don’t feel comfortable with what they’re running on,” says Brindley, “They are the first to notice uneven wear causing a vehicle to get pulled around too much by road camber. The same with pressure levels, they know they get a better, more comfortable drive when pressures are kept consistently accurate.”
