2017 International Forest Industries Magazines October November 2017 | Page 30

Joseph, Jeff and 234B operator, Leslie
Collins (Rookie) had dinner with Tigercat
CEO Ken MacDonald at the Hot Springs,
Arkansas show several years ago. At the
time Rookie did not know who Ken was.
Ken asked him what he thought of the
new loader. Rookie responded with, “I
love everything but that damn seat. Those
Canadians must be little because they
won’t hold up for me,” he stated. “If I had
have known who I was talking to I would
not have said that,” laughs Rookie. Ken
had a good laugh too and immediately
set Tigercat designers in Paris, Ontario to
improve the loader cab and seat.
234B operator, Leslie Collins talking things over with Joseph Parnell
profitability. “We are sticklers
about maintenance,” says Joseph.
“We always blamed the heat for
our breakdowns. When a group of
Brazilians came to see our job they
opened my eyes,” says Joseph.
The Brazilians explained that they
were easily getting 20,000 hours
out of their Tigercat machines
while experiencing the same high
heat all year round. Their secret?
Having a technician on site every
day conducting maintenance
checks according to the proper
maintenance schedule.
Parnell Inc. quickly switched
to daily greasing. They now have
everything on a regular schedule.
They have two mechanics whose
sole purpose is to go around to
every machine at least once a
week to do regular maintenance
checks. They do fluid changes,
filter changes, greasing and write a
Left & Right: In a company-wide study, every time a machine was idle for more than three minutes, the operator had to report why so they could really
understand their productivity loss causes
28 International Forest Industries | OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2017