The cold weather always seems to catch us by surprise. The first winter morning when you’re on the lot to start the trucks and you shiver, realizing you should have brought a jacket. The moment when you have to crank the heat instead of the AC. Or the first time you have to scrape frost off of the windshield and cross your fingers when your trucks are started. As the final leaves that clung to life on tree branches fall, it’s time to make sure your trucks are ready for winter weather operation. Beyond mechanical maintenance, that means checking the integrity of your trucks’ exteriors through proper paints and finishes.
“What you need to look for are any dense imperfections, cracks or body repairs that are needed because once you have a crack or defect in the paint, salts and chemicals attack the surface and they will cause corrosion for a longer period of time,” said Dan Szczepanik, global marketing director for the automotive division at Sherwin-Williams. “Traditional rock salt—sodium chloride—only caused corrosion when wet, and it didn’t absorb a lot of moisture. With the new chemical slurries, they stay wet a lot longer, they absorb moisture from the air, and they cause corrosion for a long period of time.
“My best advice is to repair any damage coming into the winter season. That’s going to support that corrosion protection, and it gives your fleet a better brand image rolling down the road.”
Though winter brings obvious weather concerns, UV protection is an often-overlooked element that should be considered year-round. Fleet managers might be tempted to cut costs with industrial-grade paints that use less durable pigments, risking color fade and even color shifts over time. Automotive-grade pigments paired with acrylic urethane topcoats provide the long-lasting gloss and color consistency that brands need for the rolling billboards that are their trucks. Szczepanik noted that premium coatings with added UV inhibitors, despite being more expensive, offer substantial longevity by absorbing and neutralizing UV damage before it affects the paint layer.
On that theme of looking beyond the seasonal effects on truck exteriors, conducting professional shop audits can identify opportunities for process improvements, ensuring that every step from cleaning to curing is optimized.
“Look for a paint supplier that is going to have professionals at your shop looking at your process from A to Z,” Szczepanik recommended. “You’d be surprised at how much cost can be squeezed out of any process.”
By fine-tuning shop and maintenance operations focused on truck exterior integrity, fleets can reduce downtime and operational costs. And that just scratches protects the surface of Szczepanik tips for making sure fleet trucks roll productively through the winter and into all of the seasons throughout the year. Watch the video above for all of his insight.
No script? No plan? No problem. Welcome to Fleet Equipment Unscripted—the video interview series that connects you with the greatest minds in the heavy-duty trucking world. Fleet Equipment Unscripted is sponsored by Hendrickson.
