Bendix Begins Brake Fix

TAMPA, Fla. — Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems said it has distributed the first of more than 130,000 kits to fix a defective brake-system valve, but said the process could take about six months to complete as manufacturers, dealers and fleets scramble to repair more than 67,000 affected U.S. and Canadian trucks.

Bendix officials said its plants are working triple shifts to manufacture permanent replacement kits for ATR-6 traction-relay valves put into 2011 trucks, as well as whole units for this year’s models (2-20, p. 54).

Representatives of Bendix and truck makers gathered here last week to meet with fleet maintenance executives at the annual meeting of the Technology & Maintenance Council of American Trucking Associations.

“We are proactively reaching out to fleet customers, and we have an ongoing dialogue with OEMs and fleets. We are being as forthcoming and transparent as possible,” said Bendix spokeswoman Barbara Gould.

The Bendix booth at the TMC meeting displayed a sample of the ATR-6 valve and representatives played videos on how to do the interim and permanent fixes and offered flyers with updated information on the recall, now being monitored by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The valves, some of which have malfunctioned in cold weather, were put into the Elyria, Ohio, manufacturer’s sophisticated stability and collision-mitigation systems in Volvo, International, Kenworth and Peterbilt trucks.

Kevin Romanchok, a Bendix product line director, said all truck operators should get their vehicles fixed through truck dealerships or original equipment manufacturers, which should be the first point of contact.

Bendix does have a hotline for the issue at 1-800-478-1793, and even large national customers that usually deal directly with Bendix should contact their OEMs first on this particular issue, he said.

“We’re working three shifts now,” said Romanchok, adding that it could take about six months to get completely caught up on all replacement production and distribution.

“This will be a long process, and it won’t be fixed overnight,” James Hebe, senior vice president of North American sales operations for Navistar Inc. Navistar revealed the problem at a Feb. 1 meeting with stock analysts, because officials said they were concerned about the financial effect of the defect on the truck maker’s bottom line.

Navistar placed a recall on 23,613 of its heavy- and medium-duty trucks, trailing only Volvo Trucks for the number of vehicles affected. Hebe said some permanent repair kits already have gone to International dealers, and the company is focusing first on trucks running in cold climates, where some of the valves have caused trucks’ brakes to activate spontaneously.

“Anything operating in cold weather gets extreme priority from us,” Hebe said, adding that most customers in temperate climates have preferred to pass on the temporary solution and go straight to a permanent one. The temporary “fix” disables some of the safety systems that are part of the overall braking system.

“For the magnitude of this, Bendix is going all-out. They have a lot of people involved,” Hebe said. Cold-weather operators are getting the temporary fix, Hebe said, even though a side effect is that the stability systems lose some of their functionality in order to maintain proper braking.

In addition to the recalled trucks, OEMs parked a number of completed trucks that contained the defective valves instead of sending them on to their waiting owners.

“Bendix has provided a design solution that uses a different valve, so vehicles currently being manufactured on line at our New River Valley assembly plant and shipped to customers are not affected, Volvo spokesman Brandon Borgna said.

Borgna said customers of Volvo’s tractors affected by the defect are being notified by mail, and they can get the repair work done for free at dealerships.

Borgna said some Canadian customers decided to proceed with the interim repair because of the likelihood of cold weather there.

He also said Volvo is now shipping trucks initially affected by the Bendix defect. Truck maker Paccar Inc. declined to comment last week for this story.

Less-than-truckload carrier Southeastern Freight Lines runs Volvo and Navistar tractors, about 400 of which are affected by the recall. The company was represented at the meeting by Lee Long, SEFL maintenance director and TMC’s new chairman.

“We’ll do the repairs in-house, but no repair kits have been released to us yet,” said Long in an interview with Transport Topics.

“I think we’ll be on the trailing edge” of recipients, Long said, because SEFL’s operating territory is the area south of a line from El Paso, Texas, to Washington, D.C. Long said that when his company gets the kits, his technicians can knock off the repairs in one hour per truck, or about 20 to 30 minutes for each of the two valves that need replacing.

With Southeastern sticking to warm-weather areas, Long said the company is passing on the temporary solutions and going straight to permanent. He estimated he might not see his first kits for three or four weeks but said that SEFL will be reimbursed for labor costs by Bendix in addition to getting the parts for free.