Goodyear CheckPoint rounds out tire management offerings

CLEVELAND, Ohio—After successful testing with select U.S. fleets and a prolonged use in Europe, the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company has made its CheckPoint drive-over-reader available via lease for North America. Combined with the manual Tire Optix digital measurement tools, onboard tire pressure monitoring system, and Fleet Central management platform, Goodyear now offers a comprehensive assortment of options within its Total Solution to fit virtually any and every tire management need.

The automatic tire tread depth and pressure solution can be used for vehicles ranging from passenger vehicles to Class 8 tractor-trailers, with options for in-ground installation or 2-3” ramp style above ground option.

Using micro-transducers, lasers and cameras, CheckPoint scans the tire the footprint and measures the load to identify underinflation and excess wear, which negatively impact fuel efficiency and safety, while also puts a fleet at risk for CSA violations. And the device does this without any human intervention.

“Tires are one of the biggest costs of fleets and labor’s a little scarce, so this really helps you focus your efforts on the tires that have issues that were identified by CheckPoint,” said Austin Crayne, Goodyear business development manager, discussing the rollout at the American Trucking Associations’ Technology & Maintenance Council Fall Meeting and Transportation Technology Exhibition in Cleveland. “We're looking at it as truly a lease where you have the monthly subscription as a fleet, and you focus on just using the data and reacting to it.”

A fleet can set up the data to be sent to Fleet Central or another preferred maintenance platform.

“The key part is around the connectivity of the tire to the vehicle and to the service network,” noted Johnny McIntosh, director of Integrated Solutions & Tire Management Services at Goodyear. “And you're going to get more out of your tires—you're going to be able to retread more, because you're not going to be running them underinflated, or running mismatched in a dual configuration.”

McIntosh said fleets that have used CheckPoint discovered better fuel efficiency and more uptime.

Installations are best positioned near a facility’s inbound security entrance or dedicated inspection lane, and Goodyear visits the site to do an assessment on the best location, Crayne said. For the in-ground version, installation can take a few weeks, and Goodyear also factors in how to keep operations going as usual while that lane is shut down.

A truck can roll over the in-ground option at 11 mph, while the ramp version requires a slower speed. The solution has been used in Europe for about eight years and Crayne reported one European fleet using CheckPoint “found out that they have about a 90% reduction in labor inspection time on checking tire tread pressure and tread depth.”

A national account in the U.S. piloted the solution at three facilities and inspected 2 million tires over the course of one year, Crayne said. Fleets with 100 or more assets, or facilities that see regular traffic, would benefit from the solution, he added. According to Goodyear, this year CheckPoint has "inspected 1.5 million tires and already fleets to 126,000 potential, costly issues."

At the booth, Crayne also noted Goodyear’s TPMS Plus solution, which requires pressure and temperature sensors on the wheel, have yielded positive results as well. The onboard sensors combined with telematics allows a fleet to create a geofence to keep vehicles with unresolved issues from leaving without notice.

“It's like wrapping an imaginary fence around a location as a vehicle enters it, and we can alert a fleet as a truck is leaving with a flat tire,” Crayne explained.

Using predictive analytics, TPMS Plus can also detect leaks early to provide a fleet additional time to react and prevent issues related to underinflation and possibly emergency roadside service.

The Tire Optix digital tire tool was also being demonstrated. One end is a pistol-grip device with needle-thin digital gauge to measure depth, and longer rod on the other that attaches to the valve stem to measure pressure. Via Bluetooth, the device immediately sends data to the Goodyear mobile app, with problem tires marked in red.

“We inspect about 2 million tires a year with Tire Optix, and it's all about creating efficiencies and accuracies during this tire inspection process,” said Jamie Redmond, Goodyear customer engagement specialist.

She said this can also ensure fleets are spec’ing the best tires for their duty cycle: “You can start to see how they wear over time, and that will tell you how your products are performing and what products work best within your fleet.”