Managing a fleet can be a challenging task. Fleet vehicles require constant monitoring and maintenance to ensure that they perform at their best. Operating a fleet can also be costly. Many factors can impact a fleet’s bottom line, including fuel consumption, the number of services or deliveries completed, mileage, idle time, and level of operational safety.
One important factor to keep track of when you determine how your fleet is performing is the amount of wear and tear on the vehicles. Wear and tear accumulates whenever the vehicle is operating, and it’s wise to arrange a maintenance schedule based on how hard the vehicle is working.
There are several metrics that can help determine how much wear and tear a vehicle has accumulated, but one of the most accurate is engine hours to mileage conversion.
Read on to learn more about hours to mileage conversion calculation and how it can help you develop a comprehensive program for vehicle replacement, optimize maintenance schedules, and manage the total expenditure on your fleet.
Mileage as a Tracking Performance Indicator
There are several different indicators of vehicle performance that can help owners and operators determine when maintenance will be needed, but the most commonly used is often mileage. The more miles a vehicle has traveled, the more wear and tear it accumulates, so this makes sense. Plus, most vehicles are equipped with odometers that accurately measure how many miles a vehicle has covered, so it is an easy statistic to use.
However, for work trucks, mileage alone may not be the most accurate measurement of a vehicle’s condition and maintenance needs. There are several reasons for this.
Idle Time
When a vehicle is not moving but the engine is running, the vehicle is still doing work. This may not make much of a difference for passenger vehicles, but work vehicles tend to spend much more time idling at job sites and in traffic. Heavy-duty work vehicles also tend to consume much more fuel while idling. These factors mean that while a work vehicle’s mileage may remain low, its engine is accumulating more wear and tear.
Different Kinds of Mileage
Not all miles a vehicle travels are alike. Miles a vehicle has traveled on rocky back roads in rural areas are likely to put much more stress on a vehicle than the same amount of miles traveled on smooth, paved city streets.
Specialty Vehicles
Some vehicles have features that put more stress on an engine regardless of how many miles the vehicle has traveled. For instance, vehicles with a power take-off feature have to run to charge the vehicle battery, which leads to more idle time and more engine stress.
Similarly, specialty vehicles like cranes, vacuum trucks, and refrigeration trucks perform work while standing still, which causes wear and tear to the engine and other mechanical components without increasing the mileage on the odometer.
For these reasons, work and utility vehicles often use engine hours as an additional metric for vehicle performance.
Engine Hours to Mileage Calculation
Engine hours are the total number of hours the engine of a vehicle has run. By itself, this is not an accurate measurement of the vehicle’s condition, as it is next to impossible to record every hour a vehicle has had the engine running since its manufacture.
However, when the recordable number of engine hours is converted to mileage, you can get a much more accurate understanding of a vehicle’s overall condition, which you can then use to more accurately predict when your fleet vehicles will need maintenance.
The formula to calculate the conversion from engine hours to miles is as follows:
Mileage = (Engine Hours x Average Speed) / 60
To do the calculation step by step:
- Determine the engine hours of the vehicle.
- Determine the average speed of the vehicle in miles per hour.
- Divide the average speed by 60 to get the average speed per minute.
- Multiply the engine hours by the average speed per minute to get the total miles driven.
For example, if a vehicle has been running for 1,000 engine hours and the average speed is 50 miles per hour, the calculation would be as follows:
Mileage = (1,000 x 50) / 60
Mileage = 83,333 miles
This hours-to-mileage calculation can help fleet managers more accurately determine how hard a vehicle has worked over its lifespan, which can then help you optimize your maintenance schedules and develop a comprehensive program for vehicle replacement. In turn, these steps can help you get more out of your fleet and reduce your operational costs.
If you want to find more ways to optimize fleet maintenance and your overall fleet management, turn to Summit Fleet. We offer fleet management solutions to a variety of industries alongside our convenient and cost-effective fleet rental services. Contact us today to learn more about our available fleets and services.
