INDUSTRIES

19 Million Reasons to Believe in Cat® Technology

It took almost a year to convince one Turkish contractor to try Cat® TECHNOLOGIES. But now, after racking up cost savings of nearly $19 million USD, Eren Insaat is a believer.

The company had been awarded a contract from the government of Turkey to build a 63-kilometer section of an irrigation canal designed to transport water from the Ataturk reservoir to agricultural land in the region.

Unfortunately, the project got off to a rough start, with losses mounting every month. Rocky terrain reduced grading speed and accuracy. Work was limited to daylight hours because continuous grade checking was required. Five grade checkers were assigned to each machine, driving labor costs up. The fine grading process was costly and inefficient too. And fuel consumption skyrocketed—a problem anywhere, but especially in Turkey where diesel prices are among the most expensive in the world.

Company leaders had been exposed to automated grade control systems, but many in the organization resisted change. The machine chief wasn’t sure operators could handle the sophisticated technology. Surveyors were skeptical about accuracy. And the project coordinator was concerned about cost—$1.4 million USD.

Ultimately, though, Eren Insaat chose to move forward, installing grade control systems on 15 excavators, one motor grader and a dozer. The impact was immediate.

“Previously the grading process was holding up the paving work, but this is no longer the case,” says Yasar Eren, Eren Insaat’s chairman. “The efficiency is about 400 percent greater with GPS control. Our people not only work faster, but also more accurately. And you have increased my productivity by 100 percent because I’ve seen the possibility of working 24 hours.”

With productivity and efficiency gains like these—and big reductions in the number of machines and workers on site—the company expects to finish the job about 30 percent faster than originally scheduled. That should save nearly $12 million USD in fuel costs and close to $7 million USD in salaries and other costs—great reasons to believe in the power of Cat technology.