Hubometer readings

[ccbmster]

Ok folks, can one rely with any great degree of certainty on the accuracy of hubometer miles on a mid 80's bus?

Here is the situation:

Bus listed on ebay with a "Buy It Now" of something like 14K and a reserve of 12K.  Bidding only gets to a little over 3K.

Bus now relisted but with a "Buy It Now" of over 19K.......explanation for which is that a "bus guy" noticed that the hubometer only says 160,000 miles and therefore the bus is low mileage.

Mike

[bevans6]

What you can trust about a hub meter that says 160K is that the hub meter says 160K.  It doesn't mean anything more than that.  For it to be accurate in the first place it has to be configured to match the rolling radius of the tire.  It can be installed or removed in a matter of minutes, and swapped around for any number of reasons both valid and invalid.  It's very typical in service for a hub meter to be installed to track engine life - get a rebuild, get a new hub meter.  My bus has a hub meter that shows the mileage (kilometerage actually) since in was brought into Canada, since it is a Canadian import DOT rule that there be a distance measuring "thing" that reads in kilometers.  So My bus has run 44,000 odd kilometers since it came into Canada. The only thing I use it for is to tell me that my fuel gauge is working.  "Gauge shows half full, I've gone 500 Km's, gauge must be working"

Brian

[buswarrior]

Ditto.

These are all meaningless, odometer, hubdometer.

Even the one in the engine computer, if the computer has been changed out.

Depending on the region operating in, line run (higher) or charter work (lower), if a coach isn't running somewhere excess of 60 000 miles a year, someone is NOT making money.

happy coaching!
buswarrior

[bevans6]

My assumption has always been 100K a year in service (if you know nothing else), by which my bus has 2 million on her...   If it was a private bus, team, school, etc, they don't have to make money just spend it, and so the mileage could be a lot lower.

Brian

[belfert]

Do bus odometers have to be marked as replaced by law?  My dad had to get a new odometer in a 1986 Playmouth Voyager and it had a different color on the replacement to mark it as replaced.

Hubodometers are often replaced when the engine is rebuilt on a bus.  I would never depend on a hubodometer as an indicator of total coach miles.

[buswarrior]

If there is a law, it is broken all the time.

Odometer tampering has more to do with consumer protection style legislation.

Our stuff is firmly commercial in origin, purpose and use.

As for attaching any significance to the hubdometer, I would attach absolutely none.

If the fleet was mine, in the newer coaches, as soon as the hubdometer had strayed too far from the dash/electronic reading, I would swap it out to keep the drivers' morale intact, reducing one more "favorite coach" variable. Pay by distance is prevalent depending on type of work.

The arrival of GPS devices were not well regarded by some fleet owners, it gave the drivers the ability to find out the wrong hubdometers were installed on the whole fleet to keep the pay down...

If mileage shows numerically over 200K, swap it out, don't want the half-informed, loud mouth, self-important type customer getting the wrong impression if they have a look at it.

If the coach is nearing sale time, swap it out.

As a matter of preventive maintenance, there may be a mileage after which failure rate climbs for a certain model/manufacturer, swap it out.

It is not in a fleet's interest for the casual observer to know what the mileage is on a given coach.

A fleet may not want their competitors aware of the mileage on the fleet. Every scrap of info may lead to accurate assumptions about business decisions.

As much as we'd like to have some easier way to make our purchasing decisions, it just isn't happening.

happy coaching!
buswarrior

[Lin]

Wow, my hubometer has less than 3000 miles on it.  How did Greyhound manage to keep a 1965 bus at such low mileage?

[Busted Knuckle]

As said here. Hubometers can be changed in less than 2 minutes and less than $200.00!

Hmmm, 2 minutes & and a $50 (or less) used hubometer makes a bus worth $5000 more? Not a bad investment, not bad at all!
  BK 

[Ed Hackenbruch]

Wow Lin!  you have a bus that must be worth at least $600,000 !!!!   These 5A's really hold their value!

[Lin]

Thanks Ed,

You can have for half price.

[Ed Hackenbruch]

You are welcome Lin, but i have one with only "311,000" miles    on it so i am good for a while yet.

[PSmith]

I took mine off and tossed it.... See no evil