Wheel Security
KEEPING YOUR WHEELS SAFE AND SOUND
Words: Barry Drew
Above: Wheely-Safe believes it offers a fresh approach to wheel security and wheel loss
The constraints of a standardised wheel and hub design mean that wheel loss remains a major concern for fleet operators around the world
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heel loss – and its subsequent effects – are a worst nightmare scenario for any transport operation. A detached wheel from a truck, trailer, bus or coach can cause serious devastation, colliding into anything in its path at an equivalent force of around 10 tonnes. Thankfully, it isn’t a scenario that happens too often, but incidents are still occurring all around the world – including several high-profile events on UK roads in the last few years. The last official report into the issue, published by the Transport Research Laboratory (TRL) for the Department for Transport (DfT), estimated that there are between 150-400 detachments on our roads each year – 10-27 of which result in injury, with three to seven fatalities. Relatively small numbers, perhaps, but those figures are only the reported incidents. “We believe the true figures could be a lot worse than that,” says Gary Broadfield, Group Managing Director at Wheely-Safe – a West Midlands-based technology company, which has taken a fresh approach to tackling the issue. There are many reasons why a wheel
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S T A N D A R D
M A G A Z I N E
may come off a moving commercial vehicle. The TRL report suggested the standard design of wheel fixings – typically a heavy vehicle will use eight or 10 sets of studs and nuts per wheel – requires a thorough maintenance regime to adequately reduce the risk of detachment. However, even the best-
maintained fleets can still be susceptible to issues out of their control. A growing concern “Wheels have been around since the stone age and if people back then couldn’t keep them on now, today’s generation never will,” says Broadfield.
Wheels have been around since the stone age and if people back then couldn’t keep them on, today’s generation never will - Gary Broadfield -
spring 2022
