Looking for a solution for long chassis lead times?
While the US and Canadian chassis shortage has eased somewhat, there are still long lead times for chassis, especially compared to pre-pandemic availability. Municipalities and contractors are still searching for street sweepers, and chassis when they need to replace a sweeper or add to the street sweeping program. The bottleneck for most street sweeper manufacturers is the wait for the chassis.
What’s the solution(s)?
First off, preventative and ongoing maintenance using Bucher Municipal North America genuine OEM parts and service from our trusted dealer network can significantly prolong the life of your street sweeper. We are please that multiple Johnston and Bucher sweepers are in the 15-year plus club. Yes, our sweepers can last long last the industry average of 5-10 years with proper maintenance. Bucher also offers a free audit to evaluate the health of your street sweeper. The free audit allows you to get an actionable report of your sweeper’s health along with recommendations to prolong the life of your sweeper.
In some cases, sweepers reach the end of their life, just like cars. In this case a new sweeper is the usual go to solution. Speaking with our customers and dealers, we realized some chassis still had a long life ahead of them. While the sweeper brushes, chassis, hopper, and sweep components may be at the end of their efficient usefulness, the chassis may still have many more hours of work ahead of them. We asked ourselves, “why get rid of a perfectly good chassis?”
Competitor’s sweepers?
The other eureka moment we had was during a conversation with a municipality that had a competitor’s sweeper. We noticed the competitor’s sweeper wasn’t ever in use and asked why. The municipality explained the sweeper didn’t pick up the majority of the debris conditions of their curb miles, and the return of their sweeper investment was extremely low and was not an asset to their street sweeper program. We went back to our assembly and engineering teams, and discovered, after taking measurements, that our Bucher V65 pure vacuum street sweeping skid, or guts would work on their chassis. The elimination of the new chassis lead time saved the municipality over a year! Bucher Municipal North America has now used this rebody solution successfully several times, and saved our customers not only time but money.
How do you determine if you can rebody your chassis?
- We examine your chassis’ condition.
- Take truck chassis measurements.
- Determine complexity of removing the sweeper components from your existing chassis and its condition.
- Determine a realistic time frame for removing the sweep gear and rebody with your new Bucher sweeper components.
Which sweeper if right for you?
Rebody not the best solution for you at this time? Do you have questions on which sweeper or sweepers are best for your street sweeper program? Bucher has mid-size and compact purpose built non-CDL sweepers. We offer an industry report (educational, not a sales document) to help you make the best-informed choice when purchasing a sweeper. The 5 Things You MUST Know BEFORE Buying a Street Sweeper. The report is available for free on our website: www.buchermunicipal.com/us/en
About Bucher Municipal North America, Inc.
Cities and contractors turn to Bucher Municipal when they feel frustrated and stuck being pigeonholed into cleaning their streets with no other options while failing to meet stormwater compliance. We free cities from this trap of one size fits all by supplying and supporting a full product line to fit every sweeping challenge better than any other manufacturer on Earth.
Bucher gets you unstuck with first pass sweeping = Endless Sweeping Solutions.
Bucher Municipal North America, Inc.
105 Motorsports Road
Mooresville, NC 28115
704-658-1333
www.buchermunicipal.com/us/en
By Matt Starnes – Product Marketing Manager, Bucher Municipal North America, Inc.