Repowering a 1998 Kenworth T900 with a Cummins Inc. X15 Euro 3 engine was a “no brainer” for Aaron Millikin after he weighed up the options.

The T900 Classic, one of 11 Kenworths operated by the Millikin family business, Greenlands Garden Centre, was originally equipped with a Cummins N14 Red Head and had started life in a logging operation in Coffs Harbour, NSW.

The Millikin business is based in Moruya on the NSW south coast and incorporates the Blue Ridge Quarry which produces up to 150,000 tonnes of material a year.

Around half of the Millikins’ haulage work is for their quarry and garden supply and landscaping business while the other half is carried out on a sub-contract basis, transporting bulk products like aggregate, sand, fertiliser and grain.

Jeff Millikin started the Greenlands business in 2007 after a career as a professional driver and today has sons Aaron and Andrew and daughter Sarah in the business in key roles. Aaron manages the truck fleet, Andrew is responsible for fleet maintenance and Sarah is office manager.

“We’ve owned the T900 for around four years and started to have a few dramas with the N14,” says Aaron.

“We looked at the options – rebuild or repower – and decided that repowering with the X15 Euro 3 engine was a no brainer with the benefits it offered.”

Repower perfection

So impressed is Aaron with the T900 repower – a project carried out by Cummins Newcastle – that it may not be the last truck the company subjects to a heart transplant.

"We're actually talking now about buying older trucks and repowering them with the X15 Euro 3 engine," he confides. "The economics make sense in our operation and it also gives us parts commonality with the 10 other X15 engines in the fleet.

I’m over the moon with the repower installation,”

he adds. "I can't speak highly enough of Dan Stoneman and the team at Cummins Newcastle. The passion they put into the project was unbelievable."

The Euro 3 engine has become a popular repower option. It has the same base engine hardware as the X15 Euro 6 powerhouse but without the SCR aftertreatment; it can only be installed in pre-2008 registered on-highway trucks.  

The Millikin T900, now with 2.6 million kilometres on its odometer, is coupled to a three-axle dog and operates at a gross weight of 50.5 tonnes, doing five to six loads a day carrying 32-tonne payloads.

“Totally different truck”

Aaron says the T900 is now a “totally different truck” and that the performance improvement was expected with the X15 which is rated at 550 hp with peak torque of 1850 lb compared with the N14’s 525hp and 1650 lb ft.

"We're now doing much faster trip times," he says. "We've gained a gear uphill and a gear-and-a-half downhill due to the X15 engine brake."

This kind of performance is important in the Millikin operation which often sees the T900 on the steep Clyde Mountain climb in the Great Dividing Range, hauling sand to the Snowy Hydro Scheme and returning with maximum weight bulk product.

“The N14 was good on fuel but the X15 is edging it in this area too, while delivering far better performance,” says Aaron.

Callie Sandilands, who shares the driving with Aaron, didn’t really want to pilot the T900 at first because she was “wrapped up in the N14”.

"However, I'm stoked with the X15," she says. "It's heaps better in every way - faster uphill and faster downhill with the engine brake. Trip times are so much quicker."

Another major milestone will be achieved early in 2025 in Victoria’s VLocity rail project when Cummins Inc. delivers the 400^th QSK19 engine for the world-recognised trains which operate on the state’s regional network.

When the project is completed late in 2025, a total of 426 QSK19 engines will have been delivered for the current generation VLocity.

Cummins has worked closely with the railcar manufacturer - originally Bombardier and now Alstom - to ensure high availability and on-time performance of the VLocity fleet. In fact, VLocity is one of the most reliable passenger railcars in the world today.

When the 200^th QSK19 was delivered in 2017, it was pointed out that the key measurement of the reliability of a rail fleet was the MDBF, or mean distance between failures. The MDBF is based on any delay in station arrival time of five minutes or greater.

‘Unheard of’ reliability

“The original expectation for VLocity was an MDBF of 100,000 kilometres, but the actual long-term MDBF average exceeded 150,000 kilometres which was unheard of in the diesel railcar industry,” says Mark Pellington, who heads up the VLocity business for Cummins.

Pellington has been involved in the VLocity project from the outset and before that performed a similar role for Cummins in the UK where there were 350 Cummins QSK19 powerpacks in Virgin Voyager trains.

The first VLocity trains went into service in Victoria in late 2005 and move more than one million passengers a month.

Operating at speeds of up to 160 km/h, they are powered by 750 hp horizontal Cummins QSK19 diesel engines. Each car in the latest three-car VLocity trains has 19-litre Cummins power as well as a 182 kWe load-sharing Cummins generator set powered by the QSB6.7 engine.

When the VLocity project was mooted in 2002, Cummins was considered the only diesel engine manufacturer capable of providing the engineering expertise to ensure its success.

The VLocity railcars are manufactured by Alstom at its Dandenong facility, while production and assembly of the propulsion, cooling and electrical power generation modules is carried out at Cummins’ South Pacific headquarters in Scoresby (Melbourne).

Innovative concept

The innovative module concept was developed by an engineering team at Cummins to significantly reduce maintenance downtime. Each module is designed for quick replacement with a standby unit, meaning fast turnaround during scheduled servicing and maintenance.

When the modules are removed they are taken to the Cummins Laverton branch for refurbishment in readiness for the next train scheduled for a major service. The proven durability of the Cummins QSK19 engine is highlighted in the 18,000-hour life-to-overhaul being achieved.

VLocity is a great success story with the trains providing outstanding service reliability and passenger comfort,” says Pellington.

"Local employment has also benefitted. We have a team of employees dedicated to production and assembly of the modules at our Scoresby facility, as well as a team of business managers, technicians and apprentices at our Laverton branch who liaise with Alstom and manage scheduled and unscheduled maintenance," he adds.

Cummins also has more than 50 local suppliers specifically for the VLocity project. Close to 600 components are used in local assembly of the modules.

Water crisis

Sixty Cummins Inc. CustomPaks are in service in Thailand as part of a critical water management plan aimed at easing the country’s water crisis – a crisis that has caused enormous economic and social damage and stirred conflict among communities.

En las últimas décadas, Tailandia ha enfrentado continuamente problemas de agua causados por una grave sequía. Water reserves in dams and reservoirs are insufficient while water resources are often contaminated with toxins caused by urban communities and the industrial and agricultural sectors.

Severe flooding is a threat, too, at a time when the realities of climate change are hanging over the country.

As a result, the allocation of precious water resources, which must be shared among various stakeholders including new and existing industry, large and small agriculture, and cities and villages has become a flashpoint.

Kittithanapat Engineering Co. (KTP), has been involved in the water management system since 1996, working closely with authorities such as the Royal Irrigation Department, Department of Water Resources, Bangkok Metropolitan Authority and others.

600 hp CustomPaks

To help KTP meet its often urgent requirements, Cummins DKSH (Thailand) has recently supplied 60 Australian-built CustomPaks - 45 powered by Cummins' X15 engine rated at 600 hp, and 15 powered by the QSL9 rated at 325 hp. These fully self-contained powerpacks are emissions certified to Tier 3.

The CustomPaks are coupled to hydraulically-driven, large-volume submersible water pumps sourced by KTP from US company Moving Water Industries (MWI); KTP is the exclusive distributor in Thailand for these MWI Hydroflo pumps.

Prior to Cummins’ involvement, KTP was using another diesel engine brand but service support wasn’t up to the standard required.

Long-serving KTP engineer Kittisak Thanasoot says Cummins DKSH’s reputation for technical and aftersales support along with the reliability of the Cummins product were a key reason behind KTP’s decision to specify the CustomPaks for the Royal Irrigation Department.

The ability of Cummins DKSH to respond to short delivery times was also important.

“Supplying large quantities of high horsepower diesel engines for emergency situations such as flash flooding can be a challenge for KTP,” says Kittisak Thanasoot.

“Responding to the needs of the government agencies to manage such problems in a timely manner and with least impact on communities, KTP has found the answer in our partnership with Cummins DKSH.”

Water crisis

Sixty Cummins Inc. CustomPaks are in service in Thailand as part of a critical water management plan aimed at easing the country’s water crisis – a crisis that has caused enormous economic and social damage and stirred conflict among communities.

En las últimas décadas, Tailandia ha enfrentado continuamente problemas de agua causados por una grave sequía. Water reserves in dams and reservoirs are insufficient while water resources are often contaminated with toxins caused by urban communities and the industrial and agricultural sectors.

Severe flooding is a threat, too, at a time when the realities of climate change are hanging over the country.

As a result, the allocation of precious water resources, which must be shared among various stakeholders including new and existing industry, large and small agriculture, and cities and villages has become a flashpoint.

Kittithanapat Engineering Co. (KTP), has been involved in the water management system since 1996, working closely with authorities such as the Royal Irrigation Department, Department of Water Resources, Bangkok Metropolitan Authority and others.

600 hp CustomPaks

To help KTP meet its often urgent requirements, Cummins DKSH (Thailand) has recently supplied 60 Australian-built CustomPaks - 45 powered by Cummins' X15 engine rated at 600 hp, and 15 powered by the QSL9 rated at 325 hp. These fully self-contained powerpacks are emissions certified to Tier 3.

The CustomPaks are coupled to hydraulically-driven, large-volume submersible water pumps sourced by KTP from US company Moving Water Industries (MWI); KTP is the exclusive distributor in Thailand for these MWI Hydroflo pumps.

Prior to Cummins’ involvement, KTP was using another diesel engine brand but service support wasn’t up to the standard required.

Long-serving KTP engineer Kittisak Thanasoot says Cummins DKSH’s reputation for technical and aftersales support along with the reliability of the Cummins product were a key reason behind KTP’s decision to specify the CustomPaks for the Royal Irrigation Department.

The ability of Cummins DKSH to respond to short delivery times was also important.

“Supplying large quantities of high horsepower diesel engines for emergency situations such as flash flooding can be a challenge for KTP,” says Kittisak Thanasoot.

“Responding to the needs of the government agencies to manage such problems in a timely manner and with least impact on communities, KTP has found the answer in our partnership with Cummins DKSH.”