Haul fleet match: whole-pass loads, complete cycles and an arithmetic truck count

It compares one loader’s service time per modelled truck with a steady complete truck cycle and rounds the ratio upward to a whole count. Loads use complete material passes under the entered assumptions. It does not optimize cost or guarantee payload, distribution, body space, loading clearance or real output under varying conditions.

Caterpillar’s pass-match guide pairs actual articulated trucks with loading-machine models and calls for the application’s material and density to be considered. A generic fleet ratio cannot supply those machine capabilities. Establish the truck body, loading reach, dump clearance, material and permitted loads before treating the arithmetic as a suitable equipment combination.

Divide expressly assumed 40,000 lb truck allowance by 9,000 lb material per pass and round down to four whole passes. Their material total is 36,000 lb, with 4,000 lb unused in that model. A fifth full pass would be 45,000 lb and exceed the assumed allowance; a partial last pass is not represented by this calculation.

Enter material transferred to the truck rather than the bucket, coupler or other attachment carried by the loader. Those items matter to the loader’s own rating but do not become truck payload when only material is discharged. Use measured or defensible transferred mass, and keep variable fill, density and actual body and loading restrictions separate from the modelled total.

Deere’s 904 P-Tier reference describes a two-pass solution for standard over-the-road trucks. It is a named application, not approval for any arbitrary two-pass combination. Its existence contradicts a blanket rule rejecting all matches under three passes; the actual loader, truck and material still need their supported geometry and loading plan.

Four expressly assumed passes at 30 seconds each take 120 seconds, or two minutes. Add the example’s 0.5 minute truck-positioning allowance to obtain 2.5 minutes per truck at the loader. This spotting value is an explicit example input, not a measured time or a requirement for the form’s editable starting value.

For this example, add 0.5 minute spot, 2 minutes loading, 8 loaded haul, 1.5 dumping and 6 return, totalling 18 minutes. Use actual measured or defensible segment definitions without counting the same activity twice. A one-way haul time or a return-only observation cannot serve as the complete cycle needed by the matching equation.

The assumed complete cycle divided by loader service time is 18 ÷ 2.5 = 7.2. The calculator’s whole-count ceiling is eight, a way of representing a fractional steady ratio rather than an operating recommendation. It cannot establish the best cost, required spare capacity or actual queuing behavior, and a smaller fleet may have another acceptable cost/output tradeoff.

At expressly assumed 50 working minutes per hour and 2.5 minutes loader time per truck, the loader side serves 20 modelled loads per hour. At 36,000 lb each that is 720,000 lb, or 360 US short tons per hour. This fixed-input arithmetic is not a performance rating or a guarantee for the named Deere loader or any real fleet.

Define the data consistently rather than subtracting the same delay twice. The entered productive-minute factor and the segment measurements must describe different effects where both are used. Actual queues, random arrivals, changing loads and multiple loading points are outside this simplified model, so a more detailed operation can need different evidence and analysis.

The tool does not price purchase, labor, fuel, availability, standby or repair costs. One fewer truck may constrain output while costing less, and an additional truck can provide useful resilience or simply wait. Compare actual production requirements and costs rather than treating a ceiling function as economic optimization or a universal dispatch decision.

Keep actual machine capabilities, transferred material evidence, load and body constraints, segment definitions, timing and delay assumptions and cost requirements. Distinguish measured work from the illustrative inputs. A numerical match cannot establish safe route operation, overload prevention or the performance of a changing fleet merely because one steady example yields a whole truck count.

Resolve the actual permitted material pass and loading plan rather than allowing the form’s warning to become an instruction for an improvised partial pass. The model cannot represent a complete truck load with fewer than one full pass under those inputs. Recheck evidence and supported equipment requirements instead of changing the payload number to obtain a preferred count.