GRW kicked off 2022 in grand style with the handover in mid-January of six new Bartec tankers to Bakers Tankers at a function held at GRW’s Jet Park premises. The incorporation of the Bartec units is a first for Bakers Tankers which, according to Waseem Tayoob, chief coordinating officer of the company, heralds the entry of its fleet into a new, high technology era of customer offerings.
The multi-level gauging equipment on these units has been used in Europe since 2004. Bartec is the name of the manufacturer and GRW thus refers to the tankers fitted with the equipment as a Bartec tanker. Bartec enjoys the largest share of the market in Germany for this type of tanker.
According to Tayoob, its fleet of tankers is already comprised of around 70% GRW manufactured tankers but these are the first Bartec units to be bought into the fleet. “It’s all about us giving our customers more value for their buck and being one step ahead of our competitors,” he says.
Stephan Albertyn, sales manager at GRW, tells FleetWatch that the innovations incorporated into these tankers provide multiple benefits in terms of productivity, efficiency and security.
“You can, for example, measure the amount of product going into the tanker at the gantry and should there be any discrepancies, it can immediately be resolved. They also allow for much faster off-load flow rates,” he says, adding that historically, one could discharge between 400 to 600 litres per minute.
“Now you can discharge 1 000 litre per minute. You can also discharge all compartments simultaneously should you wish to. In other words four compartments give a discharge rate of 4 000 litres per minute which results in much quicker turnaround times.”
Monitoring theft is essential in today’s high risk environment and in this respect, there is a meter in each compartment so no matter how the thieves try to steal – even drilling a hole in the barrel – it will be detected. “We also electronically seal and monitor the man lids, bottom valves, APIs and the cabinet door in real time,” says Albertyn.
The security of the load is, according to Tayoob, a top priority and the new ‘click and find’ technology will give immediate notification – as well as location – of any product being either lawfully or unlawfully loaded or discharged. “This is the best of the best in terms of securing the load,” he says.
This security feature, together with the Fleetboard telematics system fitted as standard to the Mercedes-Benz Actros 2645 models hauling the units, gives Bakers Tankers the best of both worlds in terms of remote monitoring of all spheres of its operation.
Also available as an option is a cross-over prevention feature which prevents contamination between different products thus saving huge costs incurred when contamination does take place.
“Customers are looking to get more value for their bucks and we have now invested in the world’s leading technology to give that extra value,” says Tayoob. He jokingly likens it to picking up a lady in a VW Beetle compared to a Rolls-Royce. “We’ve gone the Rolls-Royce route,” he says.
Asvhir Ramnath, Key Accounts Manager at GRW, was all smiles at the function saying that the lead-up to the hand-over had been preceded by numerous meetings between Bakers Tankers and GRW with everyone being on the same page in terms of achieving a top quality, high-tech product that would operate in the best interests of all. “It was a real team effort and one of which GRW is immensely proud,” he said.
And talking of a team effort, the handover function itself reflected a unified team spirit for not only were the management of Bakers Tankers present but so too were their family members – wives and kids.
FleetWatch has always stated that the trucking industry is about relationships and this truth was rubber-stamped when I stood to one side and observed this gathering. It was all the right stuff. A great product born from a great relationship and celebrated as a unified, open partnership between supplier and client – where even the kids were brought into the relationship circle.
