Pain at the pump leaves truckers seeking changes

Ken Bensinger | Los Angeles Times

5/20/2008 -

If you think gas is expensive, be thankful you're not a trucker. Filling up an 18-wheel, 80,000-pound leviathan can top $1,300 these days.

Because of short supply, the price of diesel has risen more than twice as much as gasoline in the past year, reaching an all time high of $4.33 a gallon last week. With little hope of a near-term decline — oil hit a record $127.82 a barrel Friday — the run-up is causing panic and prompting radical cultural and technological shifts in the struggling trucking industry.

Instead of obsessing over chrome trim or the latest cab amenities to ease life on the road, truck owners and operators fed up with getting 5 miles per gallon are delving into subjects like aerodynamics, slower cruising speeds and more efficient tires.

Engineers and manufacturers furiously are developing new fuel-friendly technology. And commercial fleets are using high-tech software to calculate every aspect of their drivers' routes, down to where they should fill up and where they should stop for the night.

Bill Rethwisch, an independent long-haul trucker, recently traded in his Peterbilt 379 for a new Kenworth T660 rig. Although he prefers the traditional looks of the Peterbilt, with its boxy hood, flat, chromed grill and towering exhaust pipes, he knows it was aerodynamically flawed.

The $119,000 Kenworth, marketed as the company's most aerodynamic truck ever, has a streamlined wedge shape and eliminates projections like the smokestacks. The result, said Rethwisch, is an increase from 4.5 mpg in the Peterbilt to 6.5 mpg in the Kenworth, which saves him upward of $2,000 a month at the pump.

"The Peterbilt is the classiest and coolest looking truck around," said Rethwisch, who hauls dairy products from Wisconsin to California and returns loaded with produce. "But cool only goes so far when fuel prices are so high."

The shift is not unlike what's happening with passenger cars, where drivers are abandoning gasoline-thirsty sport-utility vehicles and pickups in favor of zippy subcompacts. But with U.S. trucks burning more than 20 billion gallons of diesel per year and trucking industry bankruptcies soaring, shifting to more efficient vehicles can be a matter of business survival.

"There has long been an aversion to new technology and new approaches in heavy trucking," said Peter Nesvold, a transportation analyst at Bear Stearns. "But as costs of fuel rise higher, that's changing."

This autumn, in an attempt to appease the conflicting desires of truckers for classic-looking vehicles and good fuel economy, Navistar's International brand will start selling the LoneStar, a aerodynamic truck that slathers chrome liberally over bumpers and grille while getting 5 percent to 15 percent better fuel economy than square-nosed trucks.

But Bob Weber, chief engineer for International, expects the company's new ProStar to be its best seller. It lacks bling but offers the best mileage in the business: According to Weber, the truck gets as many as 7.5 miles per gallon — practically Prius-like in the truck world.

"Aerodynamics is huge," said Weber, who explained that wind resistance can account for more than half of a truck's fuel consumption at highway speeds.

Another factor is velocity. In general, the faster a truck goes, the more fuel it uses per mile. Although many drivers are resistant, some fleets have begun using electronic regulators that cap speed, often well below legal limits. Last week, the American Trucking Association proposed setting a nationwide top speed for trucks at 65 mph.

Two major trucking companies, Con-way and Schneider National, said this month that they would dial back their speedometers; Con-way to 65 mph from 70 mph and Schneider to 60 mph from 63 mph. Dennis Damman, director of engineering for Schneider, the nation's largest privately held trucking company, said for each mile of speed reduced below 65 mph, a truck saves 1.5 percent in fuel consumption. "The days of 75 miles per hour on the road are gone," he said.

Fleets, meanwhile, are using increasingly complex computer programs that calculate the most efficient route possible, and minimize time without paying loads, said Clayton Boyce, an American Trucking Association spokesman. Those programs, he said, can tell drivers where they should stop for fuel and when to rest.

Rest stops are themselves a fuel issue. Today's trucks have air conditioning, entertainment systems and even video games, all of which require electricity — and most truckers get it by idling their 600 horsepower diesel engines. That can burn several gallons of fuel per hour.

Now more truckers are installing a small onboard diesel generator, called an alternate power unit, that runs in the engine's place. Truckers used to eschew APUs because they can cost as much as $10,000, but with high diesel prices, the devices can pay for themselves in little more than a year.

Tires, too, are getting a once-over. For decades, the top priorities in truck tires were durability and cost. Now, fuel efficiency has moved to the head of the list.

While new compounds and tread patterns help, another promising technology is so-called "super singles," which replace side-by-side tire setups with a single, wider tire. That cuts weight by as much as 1,000 pounds and reduces rolling resistance — which, after aerodynamics, is the largest contributor to fuel consumption at highway speeds. Experts say super singles can cut fuel consumption by 3 percent.

"This industry is changing," said Bob Weber, the International engineer. "Ten mpg is now feasible."