Episode 28 - "Service Sells Everything in Between": Inside Oshkosh AeroTech with Joe Davis

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Joe Davis shares his journey from aviation maintenance school graduate to Sales Account Manager and interim Service Manager at Oshkosh Aerotech, revealing how his hands-on technical experience provides unique value to customers.

• Starting in de-icing operations after 9/11 affected aviation job prospects
• Training new technicians through six-month apprenticeships with senior staff
• Offering factory training programs that attract 250 customers annually
• Commissioning new equipment and providing operational training for customers
• Using IOPS telematics to remotely diagnose equipment issues
• Sharing the epic story of de-icing a C-5 Galaxy with two feet of accumulated snow
• Discussing the B80 pushback's independent suspension and agile performance
• Explaining JetDock autonomous docking technology's precision and safety features
• Outlining electric pushback capabilities from B250 to B950 models
• Emphasizing proper battery management for electric GSE longevity

Contact your Oshkosh Aerotech sales representative to learn more about factory training programs, which are free for equipment owners and include daily lunch plus a social dinner event.

Looking for reliable and flexible ground support equipment leasing solutions? Look no further than Xcēd! As your trusted partner, Xcēd specializes in tailored operating leases for ground handlers and airlines, offering top-notch equipment and flexible terms to suit your needs. Whether you're seeking the latest electric GSE or traditional equipment, Xcēd has you covered with competitive rates and exceptional customer service. Keep your operations running smoothly and efficiently with Xcēd. Visit xcedgse.com today and soar to new heights with Xcēd Ground Support Equipment Leasing!

Episode Transcript

Matt Weitzel (00:18):
We'll see you next time.
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(00:42):
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This is John Pfister, I'm BrianYoder, this is Mathias
Moulinier, this is WillyMartinez and you are listening

(01:02):
to GSE Podcast.
All right, welcome to the GSEPodcast.
I am Matt Weitzel and I am herewith Joe Davis from Oshkosh
Aerotech, and we are at theOshkosh facility in the command
center.

Joe Davis (01:19):
In the command center .

Matt Weitzel (01:21):
What is the command center?

Joe Davis (01:23):
It's the relentless, continuous improvement area of
our facility where they do a lotof their meetings to talk about
how we can improve someproducts and processes
throughout the plant.

Matt Weitzel (01:35):
So there's been a lot of important conversations
happening in this very placethat we're sitting at today.

Joe Davis (01:40):
There has been yes.

Matt Weitzel (01:41):
Man, and we're going to continue that proud
tradition here on the GSEpodcast.
So, joe Davis, what is yourtitle here at Oshkosh Aerotech?

Joe Davis (01:49):
So my current title is a sales account manager, and
I'm also holding the servicemanager's role at this time,
while we look for a new servicemanager.

Matt Weitzel (01:58):
Oh, okay, so from my understanding and I could be
incorrect but you werepreviously a service manager
here when it was JBT Aerotech,that's correct.

Joe Davis (02:08):
Yeah, I came to JBT at the time in 2018, march of
2018, as a service tech the ideaof moving into the sales
accounts positions at that timethrough some older employees
sticking around a little longerthan I had hoped for anyway, I
kind of had to sit back and waitto get my turn.

(02:28):
So I ended up as a servicemanager for a while, because I
had a void there, and spentabout five years doing that, and
then the opportunity came aboutfor me to move into the sales
role and the background fromservice to sales.
They've had some success withthat in the past and they
thought that that would be agood line to tap back into.
So it's been nice.
It's been a welcoming change.

Matt Weitzel (02:50):
So can you kind of tell me a little bit about your
history, how you got intoground support equipment?
There's always an interestingstory about how people end up in
our industry.

Joe Davis (02:57):
Yeah, there is.
So out of high school I decidedthat my father was an
automobile technician for manyyears had his own business.
I knew I didn't want to work oncars.
It wasn't something that waspleasing or satisfying at the
end of the day, so I wanted towork on something bigger and
heavier.
So I went to school foraviation maintenance, went to
the Pittsburgh Institute ofAeronautics, got my A&P license.

(03:20):
While I was there, 9-11 happened.
Not a whole lot of money comingout of school for me to make.
At the time I had got marriedat 19, started my family.
So you know, coming out gettinga job offer for about $15 an
hour to live in Washington DCwas not going to cut the mustard
right.
So during school, there was ade-icing company that had

(03:41):
started up in Pittsburgh calledIntegrated De-icing Services.
There was a de-icing companythat had started up in
Pittsburgh called IntegratedDe-icing Services.
Well, I went out there, did aninterview with them to be a
de-icer and spent about the next16 years working for them, from
starting out as a de-icer tothe first mechanic that they had
in the company and then workingmy way up to the director of
maintenance for them.

(04:01):
For a while.
In about 2016,.
I decided I wanted to dosomething a little bit
differently, but more so my wifedecided she wanted to live in
Florida.
So I came down to meet with JBT.
At the time, my wife hadalready picked out the house in
the neighborhood we were goingto live in about five years
earlier than that, so she hadthis in the works for a while,

(04:23):
five years earlier than that.
So she, she had this uh in theworks for a while and um went to
come down, met with the with uhJBT there and took a job uh,
working for them as a contractorfor a couple of years while I
kind of figured out what Iwanted to do.
Then I went to, went to workfor him there, uh, caught up to
2018 where we were at where comeuh come down work for him a
full-time as a technician forabout a year and then worked as

(04:44):
the service manager for aboutfive years, and now I'm in the
sales role.

Matt Weitzel (04:47):
Wow, so did you ever do aircraft maintenance?

Joe Davis (04:50):
I never did aircraft maintenance.
I still have the license, Istill carry it around, but at
the time it just wasn'tlucrative.
Now they're making about $80,$85 an hour to do it, so it's
worth it.
But it's sort of a dying breedthing.
You know the mechanics.
Nobody wants to go to school tobe a mechanic anymore.

Matt Weitzel (05:07):
Yeah, so you come out of aircraft maintenance
school and do you already knowhow to work on things such as
de-icers and pushbacks and allthe kinds of different equipment
that you currently work on?
Or did that kind of come fromworking with your dad in the
garage when you were?

Joe Davis (05:22):
a kid or you know that came from tankering.
No, there was no skill set.
There's no school you can go toto work on ground support
equipment, right, there'snothing out there that teaches
you how to work on a de-icetruck or a tractor or anything
like that.
The aviation school was nicebecause it had a lot of
electrical involved with it,which is a lot of what most of
the modern day equipment is.

(05:42):
It's all inputs and outputs andPLCs, and if you can understand
the flow of the electricity asit's meant to go through the
machines, that certainly helpsyou with any type of machine
that you're working on.
And then just the mechanicalability came from, you know,
constantly wrenching in thegarage with my dad's from about
nine years of age to.
You know, even now when I goback, I go back to Ohio for the

(06:04):
summer.
You know we first thing we dois we go tear something apart
together and play with it, right, so there's there's no official
schooling that happens for that, but I like to tear stuff apart
and see how it works, you know.

Matt Weitzel (06:15):
Yeah, so even though you're the service
manager, you know how to work onall, all of Oshkosh's equipment
.

Joe Davis (06:26):
Yeah, I still do.
Just last week I was in Torontoworking on some equipment up
there and you know it's hard tonot get my hands dirty.
I enjoy fixing it.
I enjoy watching the customersthe look on their face that you
know I'm able to fix it for them.
It's a bit of sense of pridethat not only can I sell it to
you but I can fix it, make itwork for you, and I can
understand why it's not workingfor you.

Matt Weitzel (06:48):
That's awesome and it's got to be helpful to you
being the old service managerNow you're kind of like the
interim service manager to beable to have these techs all
across the country and I guess,the world right.

Joe Davis (07:00):
Yeah, yeah, there's 16 of them across the United
States that they service Out ofthis building.

(07:27):
We service as far north as youcan go Canada and as far south
as you can go in South America,and everything east and west,
right the United States, most ofthem, typically become
centralized around the Midwestarea.
We find that farm kids areabout the best niche that fits
our build for what we're lookingfor service technicians as far
as providing customers with thatculture that we have and that
presence to their ability to fixthe equipment right.

Matt Weitzel (07:41):
So yeah, so you're a Midwest kid and you believe
in the Midwest mentality yeah,I'm definitely a Midwest guy.

Joe Davis (07:50):
I like the small town feel, and I always tell my wife
I was meant to be a farmer.
I don't know how this happened.
Yeah.

Matt Weitzel (07:59):
But what I was going to say was that it's got
to help just those technicians.
Knowing that you also know howto do their job, yeah Right,
makes life a lot easier.
They can trust you a little bitmore, stuff like that.
So where are all thesetechnicians located?
Then you said you have how manyin North America?

Joe Davis (08:16):
There's 16 total in North America.
So you've got one in Seattle orI mean, I'm sorry one in Oregon
, you've got one in Phoenix, onein Texas, you've got four or
five in Ohio and West Virginia.
There total in that littlecul-de-sac that I like to call
the Midwest, two in Georgia, onein South Carolina.
So they are pretty spread out.

(08:36):
We try and do that so that wecan deliver the fastest response
to our customers.
You know, if we have to moveone of those guys in or out and
they spend a lot of time intheir suitcase you know those
guys are on the road every dayof the month.

Matt Weitzel (08:49):
Yeah, and so what are they doing?
So I'm guessing they're doingcommissioning of units and
they're doing any kind of likeunit down type of situation.

Joe Davis (08:59):
Yeah, so as a service manager, from the moment that
the piece of equipment leavesour factory, that equipment is
responsibility for the lifecycleof it of the service manager.
So the service technicians thatalso falls under them, right?
So they do everything fromcommissioning that piece of
equipment to, 30 years from now,working on that piece of
equipment, whether it'sbreakdown, maintenance while

(09:21):
it's under warranty or ifthere's a problem.
That's systematic throughoutthe industry as far as our
equipment goes like a rash ofbad pumps or something like that
, then we go out and we try andget ahead of those things and
service those things, becauseyou're learning it off of one
customer, you try and stay aheadof it on the next customer and
then they'll go out and they'lldo service revenue where you

(09:43):
know, we have regular customersthat pay us to go out and do
routine maintenance PMs on theirequipment to make sure that
they have that stamp of approvalfrom the factory on it.
And then what about training?
So training, there's noofficial training that we have
internally just yet.
We're working on buildingsomething like that.

(10:16):
That's been something that'sbeen on my radar since I came to
JBT.
Was you know, day one, when youhire a technician, what happens
with them, right?
So what I liked doing wasbecause I came in as a
technician, I'm going, okay,what director and I got together
and said, hey, we got to comeup with a training department.
And we've got to come up withnot only a training department
for external, for our customers,but internal, for our own
people.
And so now what happens?
Whenever we hire a servicetechnician, the first six months

(10:37):
of that technician's life withus is spent tied to a senior
service technician and or otherpeople that are within that
department or departments toteach that person how to do
their job.
So they'll get hired.
Then they come in first monthand we have our online training
Oshkosh Aerotech training thatthey go through all of the

(10:57):
different videos, the how-tos,like setting up pumps, setting
up blowers, setting up all thesedifferent systems on the trucks
or tractors or pieces ofequipment, and then, once we get
through kind of all that andall the HR paperwork, then we
tie that technician to the hipof a senior technician where
they go out and they spend thenext four or five months on

(11:17):
whatever jobs that senior tech'sworking on.
They also experience those samethings before we just cut them
loose and let them go out ontheir own.

Matt Weitzel (11:24):
Okay, yeah, and then what about just training
for customers?
I know that we have sometechnicians at XSEED that have
been a part of your trainingprograms down here.
Do you have anything to do withthe training for the customer?

Joe Davis (11:36):
side.
Yeah, the service manager in thepast would work all the
trainings in every year.
There's some trainings that wehold at the factory, that we
usually start those in May andthey run until September,
sometimes October even, andthose would be what we consider
our in-house classroom trainingswhere we bring the customers in
.
You know, depending on the classskill set of who's attending

(11:58):
that class or who's signed upfor our customers, we'll drill
down pretty deep into that pieceof equipment specifically.
So you know, one week it mightbe tractors, the next week it
might be de-icers, and thoseclasses are given by our service
technicians, usually our mostsenior technicians that can
understand and read the room andhave an ability to train while
also kind of understanding.

(12:19):
How deep do we go with thisthing?
Do we go all the way down intothe engineering specifications
and breaking down pumps andsolenoids and valves, or do we
kind of keep it higher levelbecause this is an entry level
skill set of a room and so we dothat with our customers?
And then we also do on-sitetraining with our customers
where we'll either send out aservice technician and do that

(12:39):
same classroom type thing intheir own environment or we will
do more of a hands-on type oftraining for like an operations
group and a train-the-trainertype of thing, using those same
service technicians, and or nowwe'll use our training
department that's headed up byDerek.

Matt Weitzel (12:55):
Okay.
So let's say that out of yourtop 50 customers for Oshkosh
Equipment, how many of thosecustomers would send somebody to
one of your training classesthose May through September?

Joe Davis (13:06):
Well, so you always have your same ones, right?
So there's a lot of greatcustomers that take really good
advantage of that training andthere's customers that should
take a lot better advantage ofthat training, right?
Hey, we buy this piece ofequipment.
We're going to make sure ourguys come down and learn,
whether it's they've been buyingthat piece of equipment for a

(13:27):
year or they've been buying itfor the last 30 years, and they
religiously send theirtechnicians and they'll even do
refresher courses with you know,if a guy was here five years
ago, they might send them downand you know next year and say,
hey, all right, your turn backin the rotation.
So of the top 50, I would sayyou're getting 50% of that.
60% of that that's coming, butyou're probably talking about

(13:47):
250 people per year that comethrough that training.

Matt Weitzel (13:49):
That's a lot.
Yeah, yeah.
So do you notice like acorrelation between the
customers who send their peoplehere to do the training and then
less service calls from those?

Joe Davis (14:01):
Absolutely, and you know what it is, Drew is a lot
of.
It is the policy, like internal, our procedures and policy we
highlight hey, look, when you'rehaving a problem with the piece
of equipment, this is the pathyou want to take, because it's
the fastest path to get you thebest resolution.
And a lot of times put my saleshat on for a moment I sell a
piece of equipment to you, right?
I may not tell you that, hey,when you're having a piece of a

(14:22):
problem with that piece ofequipment, here's what you want
to do with it, Right?
So, as the service side of me,I'm going hey, listen before I
sell it to you, should you havesome problems, here's the best
path to go to so we can getresolution quickly for you.
Because downtime, you know itkills everybody's pocket, Right,
If you're not pushing aircraft,you're not de-icing aircraft
with that Oshkosh piece ofequipment, you're losing money.

(14:43):
If you're losing money, you'renot happy, Right?
So it's um, I like that pieceof it again, cause it goes back
to the service side of me whereyou know I'm I've always got a
service heart.
I was used to joke with thesales guys that they would sell
the first piece of equipment andthe last piece of equipment,
and I'm going to sell everythingin between as a service manager
.

Matt Weitzel (14:59):
Yep, that's a%.
I think that's a completelyaccurate statement and I still
believe that today.

Joe Davis (15:04):
You know I can still sell this first one and the last
one as a sales guy, buteverything else in between is
going to be sold by.
You know how we service thatpiece of equipment after.

Matt Weitzel (15:12):
So let's say that I'm listening to this podcast
right now and I'm one of these50, you know 25 customers out of
your 50 that I don't go to anyof your trainings.
How do I get involved in those?

Joe Davis (15:22):
Yeah, so we send out an email blast to all of our
customers.
It usually comes from ourmarketing team that tells when
these trainings are.
And right now, if you buyOshkosh equipment, the training
is free for you to attend, theclassroom fee is waived and it's
a really good training.
That happens Usually Monday isa travel day.
You travel down on Monday.

(15:43):
You got Tuesday, wednesday,thursday.
We're just going to drill intoyou, we're going to take you
through, you're going to see onthe line how the equipment's
being put together.
And that's a big advantage fora mechanically minded individual
is to see, hey, this thing'sbeing put together in these
different stations and thesedifferent pieces.
It helps them kind of put those, connect those dots in their
mind right, and so thosecustomers can look for that

(16:05):
email blast or reach out totheir sales account manager and
say, hey, look, I want to signup for this training, you know?
And what are the training datesand what are you offering this
year?

Matt Weitzel (16:13):
Yeah, I heard about it on the GSE podcast and
I wanted to come and check outthe training right.
Now I'm going to really helpyou sell this because and
correct me if I'm wrong, but doyou all provide lunch?
We?

Joe Davis (16:25):
do we provide lunch there you go, sold.
Yeah, we provide breakfast, andon Wednesday evening we take
you out and we have a sort of asocial hour at a local
restaurant and we get to knowyou a little bit and spend some
time with you.

Matt Weitzel (16:38):
See, there you go Now.
I mean, your classes are goingto be packed.
You're probably gonna have toadd extra classes now, and I
apologize for that right now.

Joe Davis (16:46):
That's a problem, we welcome.

Matt Weitzel (16:48):
Okay, so you've got 16 people around the globe
service technicians.
They're out there commissioningunits.
Now if I buy a brand new C-15from Oshkosh and it gets
delivered to JFK, am Iresponsible for that
commissioning, or is thatsomething Oshkosh can help me
out with?
How does that look?

Joe Davis (17:07):
No, no, that's definitely our responsibility.
The service department is thelast set of hands to touch that
piece of equipment before it'syours, right?
So, yeah, you've bought it,we've delivered it to you.
Now you're going to get ourservice technician on site.
They're going to commission it,put it all together for you and
they're going to spend sometime with your user group to say
, hey, this is how, this is,what button does this, this is
what button does that.

(17:27):
They're going to work with yourservice technicians if you've
got them available for them,saying, hey look, these are some
of the commonly known problemswe see throughout the industry
with these pieces of equipmentfrom you know a misunderstanding
of how it's supposed tofunction to.
This is your key areas you want, excuse me, they move on to the

(17:49):
next location, next job.

Matt Weitzel (17:51):
Yeah, that's amazing.
Well, good, yeah, I know thatXSEED, we buy a lot of Oshkosh
equipment.
You all have commissioned a lotof units for us, so what unit
does it start and end kind ofwith commissioning?

Joe Davis (18:04):
Does that make sense?

Matt Weitzel (18:05):
So in other words like so you know, I think you
commission a B1200, right, butyou don't commission a B250.

Joe Davis (18:11):
Correct.
Unless the customer asks for usto commission a B250, then we
would.
So that's on the accountmanager.
They would put that on the iPodwhenever they sold it, saying
hey look, this is maybe theirfirst piece of equipment in this
location.
We're going to go ahead andsend a technician with it to
commission it.
While there's nothing tophysically assemble, there might
be that training piece of itthat you can make sure that the
customer is welcome to.

Matt Weitzel (18:30):
Oh, okay, so let's say that I was really tired of
my manufacturer X piece ofequipment and I decided to get
myself a really high qualityOshkosh pushback.
But my guys have never seenthat before.
You're going to come in thereand schedule them out to train
them and show them.
You know, do the regular PMsall that kind of stuff?
Like I don't do all that.

Joe Davis (18:50):
Absolutely, and I think that sets the difference
between us and the brand X right.
We want to make sure that youunderstand how to use that piece
of equipment to 100% of itscapability, while making sure
that you're following your ownsafety procedures and practices
so that you're not puttingyourself in any harm's way.

Matt Weitzel (19:07):
That's awesome, all right.
So and then what about?
Let's talk a little bit abouttelematics and how that's kind
of changed the landscape ofservice.

Joe Davis (19:15):
Yeah, so, as you know , our equipment comes with IOPS.

Matt Weitzel (19:37):
Real quick.
I didn't mean to interrupt you,but can you tell me where IOPS
also like starts and begins asfar as it being standardized
onto your pieces of equipment?
Yeah, yeah, so IOPS is standardon our equipment for the term
of the warranty.
Basically is what we do.
So if you buy a two-yearwarranty, you get it for two
years for standard.
If it's three, a B250 atadditional cost.
That is correct, Okay?

Joe Davis (19:53):
Awesome.
And then I'm guessing all theCommander series the Rangers,
that's all standard.

Patrick McDowell (19:59):
And the De-ICers, that's all standard.

Matt Weitzel (20:00):
And De-ICers Yep, okay, that's correct, awesome.
And the B80 and the B80E those.
You could have that, I'mguessing, integrated into those
as well, but it's not going tobe standard.

Joe Davis (20:09):
That is correct.

Matt Weitzel (20:09):
Okay, and then can you remote diagnose some issues
that customers are having withlike a C15, c30 type of thing.

Joe Davis (20:18):
Yeah, so, interestingly enough, we've
spent man what last two, three,four years now sort of just
developing the IOPS right andunderstanding what's going to be
our best utilization of it.
Is it a data collection pointfor the customer and for us?
Is it a troubleshooting tool inthe field for us and our

(20:38):
customers?
And I think the answer to allof that is going to be, at the
end of the day, a conglomerationof all of it.
Just last week we did utilizeIOPS to fix a unit in Chicago.
My technical supervisor, a unitin Chicago.
My technical supervisor and Idid with our service technician.

(21:02):
So he was working on a B650tractor in Chicago and he kept
telling us that the value he wasseeing didn't make sense to the
value that we wanted to see.
And so it's our own guy right,and we're kind of having trust
issues with them, and so weremote into the unit through
IOPS and we're looking at thevalue that we know we should be
seeing, and so we're using itsort of as a training exercise,

(21:22):
saying hey, no, you're takingthe measurement in an incorrect
place, we're asking you to takeit here and that's why you're
not seeing what we should beseeing.
At the end of the day it endedup being of all things, a wire
was pushed in too far to theterminal where the destination
is, and so we weren't gettingthe full voltage on the circuit
that we needed, but we were ableto track that down using IOPS

(21:44):
with our own team.
So there is going to be somegood advantages and values to
that as we continue to developit and also making sure that the
customers understand how toutilize it right.
That's the big part of it is.
We've always said that if wejust had a good set of hands on
the other end of the phone, wecould fix anything.
We could walk somebody throughit.
In this case, we had a good setof hands, but he just wasn't

(22:07):
giving us the number that weknew we should see, and so we
were able to utilize IOPS tokind of verify that and check
our own homework right.

Matt Weitzel (22:14):
Yeah, it's really interesting.
So with software updates, cansoftware updates be downloaded
from the cloud now that we haveIOPS, or are those still kind of
a thing where you got to bethere physically to update
software?

Joe Davis (22:26):
Current day we still need to be on site.
The goal is to get to that.
The goal is to do remote intothem and software updates and
uploads.
The hard part is aroundairports.
It's difficult with Wi-Fi andso there's just everybody has
their Wi-Fi, everybody has theirown Wi-Fi, and so it's like a
vacuum.
You take a cup, it startstaking straws in it Before you

(22:49):
know it.
You put a straw in foreverybody that has Wi-Fi and you
can't fit any more straws inthe cup.
That's the problem withuploading remotely on equipment
around an airport is it's hardto get that connection and the
bandwidth and it's hard to keepthat bandwidth for the time that
it may take to upload thatsoftware.
But our goal is to get thereand I have no doubt we will.

Matt Weitzel (23:11):
Okay, so that's in the future.
It's a future state type ofthing.
What are you thinking on that?
We're thinking a couple ofyears.

Joe Davis (23:16):
I would think a couple of years or less.
Okay, I really do.
I think that it's just a matterof how much money do you want
to put in it to get it donequicker?

Matt Weitzel (23:25):
Yeah, how's electric equipment?
Because you all are doingelectric C-15, you're doing some
electric pushbacks.
How's that kind of changedservice?

Joe Davis (23:40):
It's changed a lot.
Obviously, you introduced apiece of equipment into a field
where not only are thetechnicians having to
re-understand how to work on it,but, from an operator
standpoint, you got to trainthem.
And so we find ourselvestraining more bad habits than we
find ourselves fixing deadequipment.
And what I mean by that is, youknow, you might get an operator
toward the end of their shift,right, and they take that piece

(24:03):
of equipment and it's hey, throwit on a charger, or do I hurry
up and beat the traffic?
That's going to happen in thenext 10 minutes.
And so they leave it sit there,and then the next guy comes in
on their shift and now they'redriving it and then it dies
right.
So it's okay, well, it died.
But why did it die so well?
It died because it wasn'tcharged right.
And so we find ourselves.
I would say, of the 25 callsthat I get a day from a customer

(24:27):
related to electric equipment,20 of them are either a
misunderstanding of how theelectric equipment is supposed
to work or it's a dead battery.

Matt Weitzel (24:38):
Yeah, and dead batteries, from my understanding
, are not great.

Joe Davis (24:42):
No.

Matt Weitzel (24:43):
Like very bad.
So now with IOPS, can you allcheck levels and send
notifications to the customerssaying you know this is so far
away from the charger and you'reat 5% battery, or anything like
that.
I mean, is there anything thatyou all can do to help out on
those kind of?

Joe Davis (24:58):
situations.
Yeah, in fact, that's what Iwas meeting with some customers
in Canada last week around.
That specifically was hey, look, you know we need to start
setting up alerts that says,look, you're asking for an
operator to plug it in, that'sprobably not going to happen.
Look, you're asking for anoperator to plug it in, that's
probably not going to happen.
But if you start sending alertsto ops managers and general
managers and leads orsupervisors, you're going to

(25:21):
start seeing those problemsdisappear.
And here we can do it for you.
It's already there.
It's a data point that wealready collect.
I remember a few years ago thebig thing was DEF fluid.
Right, everybody's running outof DEF fluid.
Because EPA said, hey, you gotto regulate and you got to put
DEF fluid anything on unitslarger than 75 horsepower.
Well, it was the same issuethen as it is now with

(25:44):
electricity.
Everybody was running the unitsout of DEF fluid.
And then what happens is itsets a code and Cummins has to
come out and they have to scanthe engine in order to put it
back into service.
So we started tracking at thattime, quantities of quarter of a
tank of death fluid is almost ano-go and you'd send an alert
out to the customer saying, hey,listen, we're going to send you
an alert saying, hey, you're at25%.

(26:05):
We need you to take thatvehicle and add fluid to it.
That's what we're doing withelectricity for these customers
saying, hey, listen, you tell uswhere you're comfortable with
and we'll tell you where wewould be comfortable with you.
Saying, hey, 25% is you'regoing to get an alarm At 20%.
We're going to say, hey, here'sanother alarm and you're just
going to keep getting itrepeatedly until you satisfy

(26:25):
that alarm.

Matt Weitzel (26:26):
Yeah, I think that's a great idea and it's
only going to help the customer.
I mean, because you sittinghere today, it's not going to
affect your operation, right?
It's for them and thetechnologies out there to be
able to provide that to them.

Joe Davis (26:37):
Absolutely.

Matt Weitzel (26:38):
So all right.
Well, we've gotten to the pointof the podcast where now I have
to ask you about a great GSEstory.
And I'm sure you're an avidlistener and you already knew
this was coming, so you'vealready kind of got something
prepared.
So what is your best GSE story?
My best GSE story and itdoesn't even it can be from IDS,
or it can be Oshkosh.
It's just got to be solid GSEstory.

Joe Davis (27:01):
Man, I tell you that I've been around a little while.
You know people don't realizethat I'm not that old, but I
think my over half of myadulthood has been spent in GSE.
So I would say one of thecoolest things I've ever got to
do for GSE.
I was working for IDS at thetime Integrated De-icing
Services and the Turkishmilitary was in Pittsburgh and

(27:26):
also there was.
I don't know what the event wasthat was going on, but the
Russian Antonov was there, therewas a C-5 there and there was a
Turkish plane there, a militaryaircraft.
I've been working for IDS formaybe like two years, right, and
at the time the founder wasalso there in the buildings.
His name was Larry Hopkins andit was a very competitive thing

(27:47):
de-icing airplanes amongst uscollege guys at the time.
We all kind of went to schooltogether.
They hired probably 30 of us atthe time and then we ended up
becoming like leads and managersof this company eventually, and
even the vice president isstill there.
He and I were college roommates, so these aircraft had sat on

(28:07):
the tarmac for about two weekscollecting accumulation and
every day it was hey, the planesare going to be dispatched
today so they can leave.
But everybody wanted to de-icethese planes, to say, hey, I've
de-iced a C-5 or hey, I de-icedthe Antonov.
So we would travel to school,which was about an hour and 15
minutes from the airport, pastthe airport from.

(28:28):
I would travel from Ohio pastthe airport in Pittsburgh, go to
school all day, come back fromschool, stop at the airport,
work four, five, six hours, youknow, till 11 o'clock at night,
drive back home and do it allagain the next day.
But every day where it's like,okay, when's the plane going to
leave, because I want to eitherskip class or I want to make
sure I stay here so that I don'tmiss this opportunity.

(28:48):
And I tell you what we spenttwo weeks sleeping on the floor
at the ice house.
It got to the point where theowner went and bought bunk beds
and put them in the back in thisFBO and that was how they
started the hot bunks, becauseus four or five guys were saying
, hey, we're not leaving,because we want to be the ones
that get to de-ice that.

(29:09):
And I can't remember the exactdate that it was that it left,
but it was an evening flightthat they decided to go ahead
and dispatch it and that thinghad two feet of snow and
accumulation and ice build up onthese wings and we went through
.
I was using a Tempest de-icer atthe time, older Tempest II
de-icer, like a 2005, 2006.
I had to refill my truck and Idid the aft side, uh, the the,

(29:34):
the co-pilot tail.
I did just that section in theback half of the wing.
I had to refill my truck fourtimes and it held 1800 gallons
of type one and I refilled fourtimes to de-ice that quadrant of
that plane.
And, um, it was so cool becausewhen we got almost done
de-icing it, this little guypopped out of the back at the

(29:56):
tail section and that was how hedid the visual to see if the
tail was clean, to know if theycould take off.
So I got to de-ice the C-5.
The next day the Antonov got toleave and we got to de-ice it
as well.
So we spent two weeks living onthe floor but we got to de-ice
the C-5 and the Antonov and theTurkish airline didn't go off
for a couple more days, but thatwas probably one of the coolest
things I got to do.

Matt Weitzel (30:15):
Yeah, that's a pretty awesome story.
Two feet of snow is crazy.
I can't even believe that theylet it sit for that long.
I'm guessing that is notsomething that happens very
often.

Joe Davis (30:27):
No, that's typically not.
I'm not sure if it wasmaintenance there or what was
going on, but it was weird justto see two of those planes in
the same location.
Yeah, you know, at the sametime.

Matt Weitzel (30:37):
Yeah, that's, that's pretty cool.
Well, I think we're going tobring in.
We're going to bring in Patrickfor a minute here.
Patrick, if you want to, youwant to sit down and join us.
This is Patrick McDowell and hewas on, I think, episode three
of the GSE podcast, if I'm not,Am I correct in saying that
you're episode three?

Patrick McDowell (30:59):
Yeah, I'm pretty sure it was episode three
.
So, gosh, was that a year and ahalf ago?
I'm trying to remember just howlong ago that was, but I was
only probably six months into mycareer here Back then it was
JBT.
Maybe nine months into that JBTcareer.

Matt Weitzel (31:16):
Yeah, yeah, it was pretty early on, it was just a
baby.

Patrick McDowell (31:19):
I don't know why you had me on the podcast
early, because, compared toeverybody else that you've had
on the podcast from JBT now,oshkosh has got way more
experience than I did at thattime.

Matt Weitzel (31:30):
I think what ended up happening?
There was and I don't know ifthis story will be interesting
or not, but at that time nobodyreally knew what the GSE podcast
was.
I wanted to get three episodesdone before I even launched,
because I didn't want somebodyto discover the GSE podcast and
go oh I really love this and seethat there's only one episode.

(31:51):
They listened to one episodeand then that was it for another
month or whatever.
So I wanted to launch withthree, because if you ended up
liking it, then you'd have somecontent to listen to.
So I launched with threeepisodes.
That was the third option.
No, we're not there.
We're not there yet.
So when I asked at that time,jvt, leadership, you know who do
you want to be on it?

(32:12):
Because JVT, oshkosh, whateveryou want to say, it is, right
now it's obviously Oshkosh, butback then it was JVT, who do you
want to be on this podcast?
They didn't even know what thepodcast was, because it wasn't
even in existence yet.
So they said, well, youraccount manager for XSEED is
Patrick McDowell, and so heshould be on it.
And I was like okay.

(32:33):
I mean you know yeah, he's atour, he's our account manager,
but is that who you want to berepresenting?
You know Oshkosh, and they werelike, I guess.
So that's how you got chosenand and and listen.
Thank God, because it ended upbeing a fantastic episode.
People it is.
It's in the top five of listens.

(32:54):
I mean, I don't think it'sbecause you're just a third
podcast.
I think it's a reallyinteresting podcast.
You have a good radio voice andyeah so it all ended up working
out great.

Patrick McDowell (33:03):
Hold on.
You said I got a good radiovoice.
Why am I not a TV personality,matt?
What are you trying to say?

Matt Weitzel (33:08):
I don't know your dad was and he seems to have had
a good career.
I don't know why you didn'tmake it.
Maybe that's something youshould talk to him about, but
anyway.
So thanks about the amp cart.
So we're all good on that.
But we've introduced the B80and the BADE and then also

(33:38):
JetDock, so I don't know whowants to handle the B80.
Currently, right now.
But XSEED really likes the B80.
We came and we test drove ithere.
We've seen it in action.
We loved it.
So we went ahead and purchasedsome.
So we have some gas units aswell as some B80 electric units
in stock at the time of thisrecording.
So we've invested in them.

(34:00):
I think they're the firstcouple off the line.
Yeah, and the new line likeofficial Oshkosh logo on them
and everything else.
So who wants to tackle that one?

Joe Davis (34:11):
Yeah, I'll take it.
I think you're going to see theB80 out there in the market
pretty quickly.
There's a lot of well, there'stwo large customers right now
that are looking to do a fleetreplacement of their tractors,
right, and I think that that'sgoing to lead to some real good
opportunities for the B80.
And the B80, when we got thatpiece of equipment, when we
bought the intellectualproperties for it, it was ours,

(34:33):
but it wasn't ours, right, andnow it's ours.
We've been able to make somechanges, some modifications to
it.
You got a 5,000 pound tractorthat's got independent
suspension on the front, You'vegot leaf springs on the back,
you got disc brakes all the wayaround it, powered by electric,
powered by a little Ford enginegas, if you want it.
It's a really neat piece ofequipment and it's very I want

(34:56):
to say agile, right.
It is yeah, and it gets from Ato B quick.
I mean, we find customers saying, hey, that's a little bit too
fast, we need to turn that thingdown.
And we're expecting our firstshipment here from we're
building those over in Chennaias well as here.
We're expecting our firstshipment from Chennai in the

(35:17):
next week or two.
That's going to have someopportunities on there for some
demos that we've kind of, assales account managers, we've
plotted those out to see wherewe want to get those into the
hands of some of our othercustomers and say, hey, look,
tell us what you think about it.
I think that's one of thebiggest things for Oshkosh is
we're constantly looking for ourcustomers' feedback as to how
to improve the product and weheard everybody kind of loud and
clear whenever we bought thatproduct and we've made some

(35:40):
really quick and expensivechanges to it that improve the
reliability and quality of thatproduct and I'm pretty excited
to see where it goes, especiallywhen you talk about customers
looking to buy 100 or 200 ofthem, right.
So that's a big win for us ifwe can get them in their hands.

Matt Weitzel (35:56):
How is it, from a service perspective, working on
the B80?

Joe Davis (36:00):
Well, you know, and that's the thing, See, I have a
technician out working on acouple of them now this week in
Chicago, and that's the firstthat we've really had to work on
them in a long time, becausefor the most part we were buying
them.
They were still being producedin Indiana, right, and then we
would service them as needed.
Now it's our product, we'rebuying, we're building and we're

(36:21):
servicing and all that, andthey just aside from you know
your user group smashing into acurb or you know they become
bumper cars out there, right?
Yeah, Aside from those things,they're very reliable pieces of
equipment that get the job doneand we don't have a lot of high
call volume on them from aservice standpoint.

Matt Weitzel (36:38):
Yeah, and the ride is incredible.

Patrick McDowell (36:40):
Yeah, I will say that that's the biggest
selling point, right?
If you're an operator, yeah,the full suspension of the B80
is what makes you love it.
Suspension of the B80 is whatmakes you love it.
One of the biggest things thatI did when I put it out on demo
with a certain customer wasfirst, off, we put it on a lift,
got them up underneath it, takea look and see and get feedback
from them on what they'd liketo see from a maintenance and
technical perspective Ease ofuse for a technician to get

(37:03):
their hands in and get dirty anddo some PM type stuff.
But also we set up an obstaclecourse.
We threw like wheel chocks outthere everywhere and we said
look, one concern was groundclearance.
We threw wheel chocks out thereand ran them over left and
right and they just popped outthe back with no problems
instead of dragging or anythinglike that.
And where there's other productsin the market where it's just

(37:24):
going to drag, wheel chock, it'sgoing to get caught in
something.
It's going to get caught insomething.
It's going to you know, soforth.
So we've put it through itspaces enough at this point to
figure out.
It is a good quality product,like Joe said, and now that we
have it in house fully, we cansupport it as one of our
products and you'll see thequality uptick in that as well,
because when we were contractingthat out, when we bought the
rights to it, we were stillpartnering with that person or

(37:46):
that company to build it for us,so we didn't have our grasp on
it fully at that point.
Now we do so.
The controls are there, thequality is there and, like Joe
said, we're starting to see anuptick in demand for that
product as well.

Matt Weitzel (37:59):
So yeah, so well, thanks for going over that with
me.
You want to talk a little bitabout JetDock and what that is?
Yeah, absolutely.

Patrick McDowell (38:06):
So over the past five years and if you
listen to episode three, you'llknow which company I'm talking
about.
I'll plug that, so you have togo back and listen.

Matt Weitzel (38:15):
There you go, I like it.
Now you're thinking.

Patrick McDowell (38:17):
Yeah.
So for the past five years wepartnered with a strategic
customer of ours to developJetDock, which is autonomous
docking of commander loaders andsoon to be ranger loaders and
other products to the aircraft.
A lot of the requirements thatwe had with that customer was
you're not putting any stickersor decals on the aircrafts,
you're not putting RFIDs or anykind of insignia on the aircraft

(38:39):
.
It's got to be truly autonomous.
And over the past four or fiveyears we've been developing that
technology and we're at a pointnow as Oshkosh Aerotech to
where we can actively sellJetDock and we're getting it off
the ground.
For that strategic partner.
We've got all the feedback weneed to get in terms of the
usability of it as an operator.

(39:01):
From a technician maintenancestandpoint, it's very simple If
a LIDAR stops working, you gotto replace the LIDAR.
There's not a whole lot to thatstandpoint.
But as an operator and I canspeak for myself as someone who
is in the industry but neverworked in the industry as an
operator I had never docked aloader to an aircraft in my life
before.
The first time I ever did itwas using JetDock and I did it

(39:24):
10 times over perfectly.
You literally just had to standthere and hold a couple buttons
and the loader does it all foryou.
And that sounds scary, right,especially for someone who's
never docked a loader to anaircraft before and you kind of
start squinting your eyes andhoping for the best but
expecting the worst.
But that loader stops withininches of the aircraft and never

(39:45):
touches it.
And with that we also haveground level object detection
from a safety perspective.
So if someone comes walking upnext to a loader, the loader is
going to recognize someoneentering that zone and it's
going to stop before that persongets to the loader.
So there's no potential forsomeone getting run over because
you don't see them, or if someobject just happens to blow with

(40:06):
the wind we know ramps arepretty active places you know
the loader is not going to hitanything.
So you have object detection onthe ground level.
You got object detection andautonomous docking at the top of
the bridge as well.
And it's a dream man, it reallyis.
It's a technology that I'vetold my leadership internally
that I think this will be astandard on loaders one day.

(40:27):
It's not for me, it's notsomething that's going to be an
option in the future of GSC,it's just going to be something
you buy with a loader becausefrom a training perspective, for
ground handlers and airlines,airlines alike it makes things
so much easier.
And let's say, for whateverreason jet dock and that you
know disables itself while inthe process of docking to that

(40:48):
aircraft it automatically goesinto.
I call it old school mode,right, you're just going back
into your normal traditionalloader operations.
At that standpoint you don'thave to back up from the
aircraft, you don't have to doanything special.
It's not going to stop youroperation.
It's not going to stop youroperation.
So if JetDock were to fail ordetect somebody at the ground
level or whatever the situationmight be, you or detect somebody

(41:08):
at the ground level or whateverthe situation might be you can
go straight back into manualoperations without even blinking
.
That's nice, so, yeah, so it'sjust one of those things that
we're really pushing in 2025,now that we're in a comfortable
place with it.
We have validated a number ofaircrafts in the industry.
The technology based on thedoor size and height off the

(41:30):
ground, it recognizes whataircraft and what door of that
aircraft it is, so you don'thave to manually input anything.
It's going to take you througha checklist of settings in terms
of are you in drive, Is theparking brake on and are you in
all these modes correctly beforeit allows you to process and
move forward with docking tothat aircraft, and it's one of

(41:51):
those things that, talking aboutit, you kind of understand it.
Seeing it is another wholeballgame.
It's truly impressivetechnology, especially when
you're talking about the size ofa Commander 30 approaching a
777, right, and so I think we'regoing to have some marketing
materials come out here prettysoon.
We just had Oshkosh CorporateMarketing down here doing some

(42:12):
video shoots and whatnot of someof the technology.
So we're hoping to broaden thatunderstanding with the industry
right, and we have a lot ofcustomers and airlines alike
coming in and asking questionsabout it now and it's really
drawing some serious interestbecause they see the value.
Yeah, I mean, is it aninvestment?
100% is an investment andthere's no question about it.

(42:32):
But it's also an insurancepolicy because it will
drastically decrease aircraftstrikes and it takes some of the
human decision-making out of it.
Sure, but some of that's forthe better and some of that's
for.
You know, it all depends howyou look at it.
But it's definitely technologythat works.
It's technology that's going tobe around for a long time and
we are very happy with where itis today.

Joe Davis (42:53):
Talk about that.
Uh, the return to home featurewith the Patrick as well.

Patrick McDowell (42:56):
Oh yeah.
So I mean, once you engage jetdock on the loader to approach
the aircraft, it remembers thepath that it took to get to that
door and dock with the aircraft.
Once you are done with theunload and load and you
re-engage jet dock, while dockedto that aircraft, it will
follow the exact path that ittook to get to that aircraft to

(43:16):
repark itself where it came from.
So if you have dedicatedparking spots near that gate,
whatever the situation may be,whether it's a passenger or
cargo operation, if it's closeenough and perpendicular enough
to the plane, it will dock fromthat spot and it will park
itself in that spot.
Obviously, it depends on whatyour setup is on the ramp, right

(43:38):
, but yeah, it's truly a wonderin terms of.
You know I'm nowhere near smartenough to tell you the ins and
outs and the coding and all thatfun stuff, but from an
operation standpoint and from asales account manager standpoint
, it's an easy technology andproduct to sell.
When you bring customers in toour test track here or you take

(43:59):
them out to a ramp to see it andthey're sitting there going, oh
wow, like you're within threeinches of that door perfectly,
and you can tell it.
Do you want this?
You want this loader centered.
Do you want to offset left?
Do you want to offset right?
Do you want to have a six inchgap, a four inch gap or a two
inch gap in between this loaderand the aircraft?
And it will do it.
It's impressive.

(44:19):
That's all I can say about it?

Matt Weitzel (44:20):
Yeah, it's amazing technology.
Yeah, thanks for filling me in,is it?
Can it be retrofit?

Patrick McDowell (44:27):
So, yes, it can be.
Is it an easy job for Joe andhis team to probably do that in
the field?
No, probably not.
Okay, I would definitelyrecommend it in terms of new
equipment purchases.
There's a couple of differentways that you can invest in
JetDock into your future fleet,and we have one option which is
called JetDock Ready.

(44:47):
We have another option, that'sJetDock Complete.
So if you were to come to usand say, hey, joe, patrick, we
want to buy some new Commanderloaders or even a Ranger loader,
we want to start investing inJetDock, but we're not quite
ready for it, tomorrow, let'ssay, we can go with the JetDock
Ready package, which basicallyallows us to pre-wire and
pre-harness everything, butyou're not going to have.

Matt Weitzel (45:09):
Oh, that's a good option.

Patrick McDowell (45:10):
Exactly.
But the only thing you're goingto be missing is the LiDAR
hardware which is obviouslysensing everything around the
loader and sensing the aircraftdoors and then the main control
panel.
So outside of that you'regetting all of the nuts and
bolts and the internals so thatJoe over here doesn't have to
send his guys to wire everything, and it makes it a lot simpler

(45:31):
to install in the field.
So you're investing at afraction of the price today so
that in the future you can dothe rest of that investment to
install JetDock.

Matt Weitzel (45:40):
Is this on internal combustion and electric
?

Patrick McDowell (45:44):
So currently we've only installed it on
combustion.
There is projects in the worksright now for the electric.
I don't foresee that being aproblem.
It's really not changing thebasics of the movement.
Yeah, because you're using allof the same componentry.

Joe Davis (45:58):
You know one of the biggest pieces to the puzzle is
the axles, you know.
That's why it makes it harderto retrofit an older piece of
equipment is because you've gotto change out all the drive
axles and everything.
So that's the big moneyconsuming piece of it.
And then you know, obviously,the harnesses, and this is time
to do it.
So there would be a cutoff asto when you could retrofit based

(46:19):
on, you know, just differentiterations of what was used at
the time.
So you know, if you go back to2005, you've got a Commander
loader.
You go to 2006, you've got aCommander I loader, right.
So then you know, between 2006and 2015, you've got some
different componentries andpieces and parts in there that
may not be completelyretrofittable to that jet dock.

(46:40):
So it may be a cutoff at acertain period.
I'm not sure where that cutofflies at right off the top of my
head, but I'm thinking it'ssomewhere in that 2015 and up
area.
Um, and again I just I don'tknow that the cost would be
worth, worth the payoff right inthe end to retrofit anything
beyond that yeah, but we've done.

Patrick McDowell (46:57):
We have done certain situations where we've
bought, uh, older loaders inthat are in the the I series
like to mention, into thefactory.
We've done a full rebuild onthem, just like you know, a
normal refurb, rebuild job, andthen added JetDock to them as
well.
So it doesn't always have to bea new unit, right, but doing it
in the field versus doing it inthe factory.
If it is a rebuild or aretrofit situation, there's

(47:21):
possibilities.
All you got to do is ask, right, and we'll be more than happy
to assist in any way we can.
Yeah, that's great.

Matt Weitzel (47:27):
No, I appreciate you filling me in.
I just had a secondary questionhere.
So what is electric pushback?

Patrick McDowell (47:37):
So we have a B250 electric and then how far
do you all go up at this moment?
So right now we have and Joecould probably tell you a lot
about electric pushbacks.
Right now we go everywherebetween the 250 and 950.
So this year we're currentlymanufacturing B950s as electric
units now.
So we're getting our feet wetand really getting into that
heavy, wide body space, right,I'm not sure we'll ever see a
B1200 electric.

(47:58):
That's a.

Joe Davis (47:59):
I wouldn't be so sure .
I'm sure we'll get there.

Patrick McDowell (48:02):
But that's a, that's a.
That's a lot of batteries tostack.
But yeah, we're, we'redefinitely we're excited about
where the electric pushbacks aregoing for us as a company.
I can say for myself and theaccounts that I manage we're
having a lot of success,especially for me.
I've sold more of the narrowbody pushbacks but it's a proven
product.
At this point we're not seeingissues.

(48:23):
We've had all the learningsthat we need to have in terms of
new product development andgetting them out on the ramp.
But yeah, pushbacks to me havebeen a game changer for some of
my accounts and going electricfor sure.

Joe Davis (48:36):
Yeah, One of the cool things, Matt, about the
B-series tractors and electricis if you get a B250, you're
using one motor, one controller,right?
You get a B350 using one motor,one controller, same motor,
same controller.
You get a B650, you're usingtwo motors, two controllers.
Same motor, same controllers.
B950, you're using three motors, three controllers.

(48:57):
So you're using the samecomponents.
You're just getting bigger andgetting more right, and that's a
benefit to our customers thatare buying these things and
replacing fleets where they'rebuying a small, a mid and a
large size tractor, as they liketo refer to them.
So if you're buying a 350, a650, and a 950, there's a lot of

(49:19):
cross contaminating of the samecomponents, so it's easier for
them to only have to stock onepart than to have to stock three
different parts right.
And so they're finding a bigadvantage in that with the
electric pushback tractors thatwe're building in that B series,
and so that's been a bigadvantage to them.

Patrick McDowell (49:33):
Yeah, and I would even go to say that with
the electric pushbacks, from mystandpoint and what I'm seeing
and hearing from the accountsthat I manage, is that it's an
easier way to introduce electricto the ramp Loaders, while we
can make them electric.
There's a very traditionalstance in the industry for
internal combustion on loadersand some places are adopting it

(49:55):
and some people aren't.
But from a passenger standpoint, I've had more requests for the
electric pushback, especiallyon the 250, 350 sizes, and more
people even more.
So looking at it like, ok, canwe combine this with an ampcart
in a location that doesn't havechargers yet?
Because when you're talkingabout B250s and 350s, from a
financial standpoint it's aneasier investment than going in

(50:16):
with a Commander 30, right thatcombined with electric cargo
tractors or baggage tractors andso forth.
I think we're going to see alot of those packages happen,
probably this year than maybe wehave in the past, because it
just we're having more availableproducts in the electric lineup
.

Matt Weitzel (50:32):
So are you, is your team also, joe, sorry, is
your team also managing electroproducts?
Yes, okay, so you're doing theservice for those as well.

Joe Davis (50:41):
That's correct.
It's all under one team.
Okay, nice.

Matt Weitzel (50:44):
Yeah, and so what is a?
What is a like aro and a B250electric and a B350 electric
Like?
What does the maintenance looklike on those compared to an
internal combustion pushback?

Joe Davis (50:56):
Well, I mean obviously so.
Okay, so I was going to talkabout a little bit about the
commonality also between theB-series tractors.
You know, we tried to make itso that the operator, when they
sat down in the driver's seat,they're not really there's
nothing any different betweenthe combustion engine and the
electric engine, the electricpackage, right.
So from a functionality andoperational standpoint,

(51:18):
everything's the same.

Matt Weitzel (51:19):
So if I know how to do, you know know how to
operate a B250 combustion, I'mgoing to know how to get into a
B250 electric, no problem.

Joe Davis (51:27):
Everything's the same , correct.
So we tried to put a lot ofemphasis around keeping that
common across the differentplatforms of the tractors and
because it helps with the enduser and their training.
Right, the different thecompanies, because the turnover
that the airline industry seesis massive, right, and so today
you're training one person, thenext day you're training

(51:48):
somebody different.
Well, right, and so todayyou're training one person, the
next day you're trainingsomebody different.
Well, this allows the companiesto have a sustained training
program that it's hey, it's thistractor, it's that tractor,
it's the same tractor, but nowthat this one's electric, you're
going to charge it instead ofgoing and putting diesel in it
or gas in it.
Right, From a maintenancestandpoint, on the B-series
tractors versus the Electros,there's not a lot of electrical.

(52:10):
I mean, there's not a lot ofmoving parts when you talk about
electric versus diesel, right?
So electric-wise you're notgoing to have nearly as many
moving pieces because you don'thave all the lubricants, you
don't have all of thelabor-intensive items, right,
you still have your wear items.
But as far as the batteries go,you're going to maintain those
batteries by properly chargingthem and plugging them in on

(52:33):
routine schedules.
Don't let them get dead, Don'tlet them overcharge.

Patrick McDowell (52:37):
Yeah, we talked about that Capital.
Bold underlined letters Do notlet it go dead.

Joe Davis (52:43):
Yeah, don't deplete them so many times and don't
overcharge them.
I always think about Teslaseems to be the big one of the
world, right?
Most people don't overcharge.
I mean, I always think aboutTesla seems to be the big one of
the world, right?
Most people don't realize, butthey're only using 60% of those
batteries in their cars.
It's the same thing with mostof the electric equipment out
there.
The manufacturer of the batterydoesn't give you 100% of that
capability of that battery.
They're going to give you apercentage of it so that you

(53:04):
can't hurt that battery, right?
So you might not ever be usingthe top 10% and the bottom 10%
of that battery because if theygive it to you, you're going to
deplete it and you're going tokill the cells faster.
Yep, so from a maintenanceperspective, as long as you
maintain your moving pieces andparts, you're going to have your
front ends, your suspensions,things like that, so it's going

(53:30):
to be lubricated and greased.
And your routine maintenance onbreakdown, as far as items and
componentry breaking based offof usage or abuse or neglect
right, I think your overallmaintenance on an electric piece
of equipment goes down ascompared to a diesel and as far
as electro goes, that product'sbeen around forever.
Yeah, it's very rare for us togo work on electro unit, unless
it's some high power, fidelityor somebody that's got a private

(53:52):
jet and they want us to comeout and do a service to it, you
know.
And just so they can say, hey,it's been serviced.
It's not something that you geta lot of.
Hey, this is broken.
I don't know how to work on it,because it is so easy to work
on.
Most companies just hire localforklift companies to work on
them.
There's not a lot involved withthem.
There's not a whole lot of realmechanical pieces to it.

(54:13):
You know you got a pickupsystem, you got a battery power
that powers the pickup systemand you got a winch right and
you're going to drive it.
So there's just not a lot to itto fail.
And when it is, it's typicallysomething that you don't have to
have a master technician inorder to fix it.

Matt Weitzel (54:28):
Gotcha.
Yeah Well, anything else, guys,or anything else that I haven't
covered today, that we want totalk about Oshkosh service, or,
I guess, from my perspective,from an XC perspective, oshkosh
service is outstanding, right.

Joe Davis (54:40):
Thank you.

Matt Weitzel (54:41):
And that's the reason I wanted to come and talk
to you today about that.
And I interviewed Textron GSErecently about service and I'm
trying to do a little bit of apush to get service out there.
We've talked about all thesales aspect and we even had a
little bit today, thanks toPatrick.

Patrick McDowell (54:55):
He brought a little sales.
Well, hey, speaking of serviceand XSEED, we've got to give our
boy, javier, a shout out right,yeah, we do, we've got to make
sure Javier gets his love.

Matt Weitzel (55:04):
We all love Javier , we do, and Javier is he comes
to all the training.
Well, you know he goes to mostof the trainings.
He's Oshkosh certified and allthat kind of stuff.
So so XSEED can, can go out andwe can.
We can actually commission aunit for on behalf of you guys.

Joe Davis (55:17):
We do, we do, yeah, year over year, javier is the
number one attended person toall Oshkosh trainings.
Guaranteed, yeah, exactlythat's right.
Guaranteed, that's right, yeah,yeah.

Matt Weitzel (55:26):
And so he's here.
So if y'all want to meet thefamous Javier, all you do is
come to an Oshkosh training, soanyway.
So that's the reason I wantedto have you on today.
So if there's anything elsethat we want to talk about as
far as Oshkosh service, whatkind of separates you all out?
I think we've done a prettygood job going over that, but if
I've missed anything, pleasethis having myself, on having

(55:47):
Patrick on.

Joe Davis (55:48):
You know, I truly do believe that service will set
the difference between you andyour competitors and it will be
the piece that all yourcustomers are going to look to
you for is what type of servicecan you provide?
How do you provide it and howseriously do you take our
problems when we have problems?
And you know it's a partnership, your customers aren't just
customers, they're partners inyour business and we look to our

(56:08):
customers to provide feedbackto us to improve our product
every day.
I mean, we don't always get itright.
You know.
The engineers that aredesigning it don't always hit a
home run.
The service technician at theend of the day don't always
diagnose it properly.
They might miss it every oncein a while, but we're really
good at taking the ownership ofthat and working with our
partners to come to a bettersolution.
So there's not the sameproblems moving forward.

Matt Weitzel (56:31):
Yeah, that sums it up, man.
Yeah, how do I follow that up?

Patrick McDowell (56:34):
You can't.

Matt Weitzel (56:34):
I think we should just end it right there.

Patrick McDowell (56:36):
That was a beautiful speech.

Matt Weitzel (56:37):
I don't know how much you rehearsed that while we
were out to lunch, kind of inyour head Again.

Patrick McDowell (56:40):
why did you have me on episode three?
I don't know.

Matt Weitzel (56:45):
No, that was awesome.
Well, thank you guys so much.
Thank you, oshkosh Roy'sallowing me to use your facility
and talk to your people.
But anyway, this has been Matt,joe and Patrick for the GSE
podcast.
Thanks a lot, guys.
Thanks again.
Thanks.
Thank you for tuning in to thisepisode of the GSE podcast.

(57:06):
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