Just like Industry 4.0 is all about optimizing technology to boost a company’s process efficiency and effectiveness, Carwash 4.0 aims to maximize uptime by improving your daily wash processes. If you’re a carwash owner or investor thinking about buying a car wash, this is critical to know.
What is Carwash 4.0?
Industry 4.0 is a modern manufacturing methodology that revolutionizes how companies produce, improve, and deliver their goods. Manufacturers are incorporating technologies like connected systems, remote monitoring with sophisticated sensors, Internet of Things (IoT), advanced data analytics, AI and machine learning into production operations.
In the carwash industry, this concept is called Carwash 4.0™. This revolutionary approach brings together several advanced technological domains, including:
These types of car wash solutions represent some of the most advanced offerings of car wash equipment suppliers today. Commercial car wash systems like these improve business uptime and are becoming essential elements of any successful car wash business plan.
The Power of Carwash 4.0 in Maximizing Uptime
Let’s start with the obvious: uptime is the opposite of downtime. Carwash downtime for any reason is a real drain on profitability. So every carwash owner is highly interested in how to improve uptime. Carwash 4.0 maximizes uptime, improving your car wash management in all of the following ways.
1. Predictive Maintenance for Uninterrupted Operations
This is the big one. Car wash equipment failure is a significant contributor to business downtime. If major car wash equipment components, including conveyor systems or pressure washers, malfunction or break down, the resulting downtime can be lengthy and cause your business to lose money. And if you operate in competitive locations where customers can easily drive to other car washes, a prolonged downtime will cost you your customers – who may not come back.
Predictive maintenance helps you avoid this. Carwash 4.0 leverages artificial intelligence (AI) to forecast when equipment is likely to fail. This is not based on maintenance calendars, but on actual real-time readings in sound, vibration, noise, power usage, heat and other indicators. An automatic alert is sent to you on the app, where you can schedule maintenance at the tap of a button. On the chosen day, the service person arrives in your tunnel car wash and replaces the part. No hassle, no downtime. And you didn’t even have to be onsite. Owning a car wash takes enough of your time!
As another example, you can monitor the total runtime of your high-pressure pumps and the prevailing pressure rates. Real-time alerts notify you when any parameters fall below the expected levels. This gives you ample time to swiftly arrange preventive maintenance and avoid extended downtime in your car wash services.
2. Remote Diagnostics and Troubleshooting
Carwash 4.0 technology lets you connect your car wash equipment to the internet thanks to the rise and integration of Internet of Things (IoT) technology. This lets you remotely monitor and diagnose many different types of issues, including the following:
- Chemical levels of your car wash operations
- Hydraulic temperature and pressure of your pumps
- Car wash vacuum system issues
- Chemical dosing levels
- Bay and water temperature
The NCS Lens System and App make remote monitoring and diagnostics effortless. The system will send alerts through your mobile phone when any component isn’t working optimally. Troubleshooting becomes easy since the system points you to the problem. You and your staff don’t have to run trial and error troubleshooting and risk aggravating damage.
3. Streamlined Maintenance Scheduling and Management
Without a connected car wash, essentially a modern system to manage your car wash equipment, determining when to do maintenance becomes a wait-and-see affair. This means you wait until your equipment shows signs it needs repair or you follow the manufacturer’s servicing frequency recommendation.
There’s a significant downside to this. You may have prolonged downtime, especially if technicians unearth more severe problems during the maintenance process. But a modern Carwash 4.0 system will alert you early so you can schedule maintenance on time.
Better yet, you can prepare ahead of time with a spare parts cabinet. This avoids downtime when commercial car wash equipment or parts are not available or cannot be shipped promptly.
4. Data-Driven Performance Optimization
To enjoy enhanced uptime for your car wash, you must identify which equipment is underperforming and work out the best way to optimize performance. This calls for a proper analysis of the uptime data of each equipment type to pinpoint performance gaps.
Besides doing a performance analysis of your in-house equipment, you should also compare your business’s performance with your competitors. This data-driven analysis involves dissecting real-time insights, trends, and market factors and conducting competitor strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analysis.
Fortunately, high-tech car wash systems do uptime monitoring of your equipment and provide you with uptime data for analysis.
5. Rapid Response to Operational Anomalies
Given the many moving parts of wash facilities, it’s inevitable that some components will malfunction due to mechanical issues, human error, or wear and tear. Also, depending on your car wash type, you’ll experience varying operational malfunctions. For instance, your water system may at some point experience issues such as:
- Unregulated water pressure
- Hard water that causes pipe blockage
- Malfunctioning pump stations
However, a Carwash 4.0 system helps you identify issues quickly so that you can get your car wash back online as fast as possible.
6. Enhanced Staff Training and Customer Support
Achieving peak employee efficiency starts with enhancing training so your staff delivers superior customer service and support that puts your car wash on the map.
A modern car wash system allows you to assign employees tasks and track their progress and performance. After analyzing an employee’s performance by looking at their uptime metrics, you can tell where they need reskilling or upskilling. This helps you select the most appropriate staff training materials or courses.
When your staff members are sufficiently trained for the car wash tasks they’re assigned to, they deliver service with more finesse. Your staff members won’t only know how to expertly wash cars, they’ll also know how to take care of your equipment and spot equipment issues at an early stage. Ultimately, this improves your business uptime and keeps customers happy.
7. Carwash Status Awareness 24/7
Carwash 4.0 technology gives you real-time alerts and access to your car wash status wherever you are. You don’t have to wait til Monday to find out you were down all Saturday. And you can initiate tasks or schedule service immediately, even if you’re at your sister’s in Maine. The time you save by knowing about issues in a timely way, translates to faster fixes and less downtime.
You can also have access to car wash chemistry status through car wash technology called Connected Chemistry. This powerful system from NCS uses AccuDose technology to measure and adjust car wash chemicals in a completely hands-off process – no onsite visits or manual labor to change out meter tips. If reservoirs are low, you’ll get an alert. Real time awareness delivers enhanced uptime.
8. Seamless Software Updates and Upgrades
Carwash 4.0 systems update frequently to reflect new market trends and user needs. Because these systems are powered by AI and IoT, they can ensure all your automated car wash equipment that’s connected to the internet gets updated as needed. That means you’ll get the latest software updates without having to spend time searching for them.
9. Inventory Monitoring and Management
The beauty of Carwash 4.0 systems is the time it saves you by handling time-consuming tasks like inventory monitoring of car wash products. Without this type of automatic car wash system available in the car wash industry, you would have to do manual inventory counts or wait until you exhaust car wash supplies and replenish them.
Thankfully, modern professional car wash management systems help your car wash business avoid these situations by empowering you with the tools to monitor crucial supplies. For example, the NCS app displays three colors, showing you the current chemical levels in all your containers:
- Green button: Indicates ideal chemical levels between 20-100% (sweet spot)
- Yellow button: Indicates chemical levels below 20% (OK)
- Red button: Indicates chemical levels below 10% (risky, prepare to replenish)
10. Data-Backed Decision-Making for Service Uptime
Optimizing business uptime without using updated accurate data is doing your car wash a great disservice. You can’t improve your uptime ratio if you make decisions on the fly.
With a Carwash 4.0 system, you have your in-house equipment data plus car wash market data at your fingertips. Inventory awareness such as this extends to all your sites, not just one. This helps you make better-informed decisions when you’re working on improving your business’s uptime.
Elevate Your Business Uptime With Carwash 4.0
Carwash 4.0 car wash systems help you increase your uptime and deliver a win-win experience for your customers and your bottom line.
However, to successfully optimize performance, you must invest in top-quality car wash equipment and supplies. And that’s where NCS comes in. Besides providing you with the best quality automatic car wash parts and supplies, NCS offers the most innovative solutions to help you make your car wash more efficient and successful.
Contact us today, and let us help you leverage Carwash 4.0 to improve your business uptime and profitability.
Carwash 4.0™ provides operators with real-time insights into the performance of their carwash, enabling them to ensure consistent service quality across all locations. By delivering a consistently exceptional customer experience, operators can build a strong reputation, foster customer loyalty, and attract new clientele.
