Put the tires in the bid
Contractors working around the corner where Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma and Arkansas meet bid jobs on fuel, labor, equipment hours and materials. Tires often appear nowhere in that number. They are treated as overhead, paid for when one fails, and absorbed by whichever job happened to be running at the time.
On equipment, that is a sizable cost hiding in the wrong place. A loader working an abrasive surface can wear through tread far faster than the same machine on soil, and two jobs that look identical on paper can cost very different amounts in rubber.
A simple way to price it
You do not need a complicated system. You need three numbers for each machine.
- What a tire costs for that machine, fitted.
- How many hours a tire lasts on the kind of surface the job involves. Your own records are the source; the hours at fitting and at removal are enough.
- How many hours the job will put on the machine.
Divide cost by hours to get tire cost per machine hour, multiply by the job's hours, and the tire line in the bid exists. Do it separately for an abrasive surface and a soft one, because the difference is the point.
What it changes
A bid with tires in it is a more honest bid. It also makes the expensive jobs visible. When one site consistently costs more per hour in tires, the cause is usually something that can be changed: a haul route, a loading area, spillage, or pressure. That is a conversation worth having with the store, which can look at the removed tires and say what ended them.
When a tire needs work
Fitting, repair and supply are all handled here. A cut tire may be repairable, and the assessment decides. The national OTR services page covers the service in more detail.
For machines you own, wheel refurbishing and retreading are at the same store, and both change the cost side of the sum.
Other stores nearby
Springfield and Springdale, AR also offer OTR services. Springfield also runs mining fleet services, which Joplin does not.
About this store
The Joplin store carries all nine Purcell tire categories and is managed by Travis Reeder.
See the national OTR services page for all 41 locations.