Most fleets describe themselves as connected because a customer can watch a dot move across a map. That is tracking. It is a reporting feature, and it answers exactly one question: where is my freight right now?
Telemetry answers a different question — what is this vehicle going to need, and when?
What we actually stream
Every unit in the fleet reports on a rolling ten-second interval:
- Engine load, coolant and oil temperature, turbo boost pressure
- Fuel burn against terrain-adjusted expected burn
- Brake wear per axle, derived from pad temperature and application count
- Tyre pressure and temperature per corner
- Driver input signature — braking harshness, coasting ratio, idle time
None of that is interesting on its own. It becomes interesting as a deviation from the same unit’s own baseline.
Condition-based servicing
Calendar servicing assumes every kilometre wears a vehicle equally. It does not. A unit running the Rennes–Rotterdam flat corridor and a unit crossing the Massif Central arrive at the same odometer reading in very different condition.
Since moving to condition-based intervention we have cut unplanned roadside events by sixty-one percent, and — less obviously — we service less often overall. The fleet spends more time on the road, not less.
The honest caveat
This only works if the workshop trusts the signal. The first year we ran it, technicians overrode about a third of the recommendations because the model had not yet seen a full winter. Building that trust took longer than building the system.