Super-safe Caltex trucks

Three new super-safe trucks are the frontline weapons deployed by Caltex in a bold bid for a perfect safety record. The Mercedes-Benz Actros prime movers have joined the Sydney fleet, which distributes fuel to Caltex sites in Sydney.

Caltex Sydney can boast of an unblemished safety record dating back almost three years.

It's one the company is immensely proud of and wants to extend as far as possible, and the new trucks are a crucial part of its plans.

Caltex risk-management staff identified its tanker trucks as having the highest likelihood of an accident or incident that could affect productivity or the health and safety of its employees. Having recognised that risk, Caltex decided to formulate a specification for trucks to minimise it.

For the first time, the company has invested in safety in their trucks, when in the past it had bought trucks simply designed to get the job done with little or no thought to the impact they had on the drivers or the community in which they operated.

The resulting specification identified 168 individual items which needed to be built into the trucks. The list included ergonomics, ease of entry and exit, comfort, ease of driving, visibility, as well as the active and passive safety aspects of the trucks.

"While safety had been in our minds it didn't translate to the cheque book," says Greg Massingham, the company's operations manager.

"We bought trucks that did the job, but there wasn't a focus on the safety of the drivers or the people they came into contact with in the course of doing their job.

"It didn't help that trucks were bought by local branch people around the country who used their own specifications. The result was little or no commonality, so trucks couldn't be moved from one branch to another because what suited one branch often didn't suit another."

Trucks were bought on an ad hoc basis and there was no common specification, Massingham says.

Now, with a common specification being used to buy trucks across the company, such conflicts are a thing of the past.

Once the specification had been decided, Caltex issued tenders to the truck industry. Of those that responded only three, all European, met the requirements.

The three trucks delivered to Caltex Sydney so far are equipped with a two-pedal automatic gearshift, and an array of active and passive safety systems.

Among them are disc brakes overseen by ABS anti-lock electronics, traction control, EBS electronic braking — which Massingham describes as phenomenal for its ability to assess the truck's speed in a corner and apply the brakes as required to stabilise a potentially perilous situation — and rollback prevention.

One of the most daunting things for a driver is rollback, when trying to take off on a hill with a line of cars behind, Massingham says. This system makes a driver's life a lot less stressful and less hazardous for the public. Passive safety is delivered through the safety cab and the SRS driver's airbag.

Driver comfort also plays a part in safety and the Caltex trucks feature power windows, heated power mirrors and cruise control.

Safety extends beyond hauling the big red rig; the tanker trailers also boast several initiatives aimed at making the rig safer. Thanks to an electronic tank level meter, the driver no longer has to climb up on top of the tanker to manually dip the tanks to check the level of fuel.

That information will now be delivered by a series of gauges on the side of the tanker.

Side and rear barriers prevent other vehicles running under the tankers in a crash, while upper and lower rear sensors alert the driver when he is approaching low objects such as parked cars, fences or pedestrians or high objects such as service station awnings, using different tones to identify the location of the danger.

LED lighting and the extensive use of reflective tape around the tankers make them highly visible.

In-built service alert systems, such as those that tell the driver when the brake pads require replacement or a globe has failed, also help keep the tanker trucks in a safe operating condition.