Mobile equipment
Mobile plant that keeps its history as it moves.
An excavator can work for three projects, two crews and a hire company in a year. Its pre-starts, defects, stand-downs and repairs should go with it. Mainte keeps them on the machine, and stops a stood-down machine being sent to the next job.
Published 7 min read10 sources
Written for equipment owners and fleet managers · maintenance managers · plant hire businesses · construction project and site managers
The problem: the machine moves, the information doesn't
A machine leaves one project and arrives at the next. Its last pre-start is on a sheet at the old site. The defect the operator reported went to the site office, not to the owner who maintains it. The service history is with the workshop, the hire company, or a fitter who has since moved on. Every handover between site, owner, workshop and the next site is a place where what was known about the machine can stop.
For mobile plant those handovers happen constantly, and the people on each side are usually different organisations.
What regulators keep finding
A hired truck, and a defect that never reached its owner
NSW mine · articulated dump truck · 2022- The record
- A loaded hired truck ran out of fuel on a ramp, and when its service brakes did not apply it rolled back 48.8 metres. Four months earlier the operator's pre-start had found the fuel gauge inaccurate. It was reported to the mine operator, 'however there was no record of it being passed onto the equipment owner (contractor) for repair and it was not repaired'. The truck's data showed 53 low brake-pump pressure alarms in the previous 829 hours, none actioned.[1]
- Our reading
- The pre-start worked. The defect simply had three parties to reach, and it reached one. The regulator asked for a documented system for communicating 'prestart checks, defects and maintenance activities between mine operators, vehicle owners and the organisation that maintain vehicles'.
Second-hand, with no history
NSW mines · loaders and mobile plant · 2024- The record
- Investigating wheel assemblies coming off mobile plant, the regulator found, in one case, 'a lack of machine history due to the LHD being second-hand plant', and a remanufactured differential that 'appears to have no quality assurance paperwork'. Poor pre-use inspection and missing quality documentation were among the contributing factors it listed.[2]
- Our reading
- A change of owner is the moment a machine's history is most likely to be lost, and the moment the new owner needs it most.
The same fault, reset and sent back to work
Queensland coal mine · rear dump truck · 2021- The record
- A truck lost all power on a ramp and rolled back about 200 metres after the operator climbed down to reset its battery isolator. The isolator was known to be hard to engage, and the truck had lost power the same way before, been reset and returned to service. The regulator listed 'deviation from reporting and rectifying defects' among the key issues, noted that pre-starts had not identified the fault, and found similar defects on the other trucks of the same model in the fleet.[6]
- Our reading
- A known condition that is only ever reset never becomes a defect, so nobody counts it and nobody checks the rest of the fleet. Recorded against the machine, the second occurrence shows as a repeat, and the same component can be looked up across every machine that has it.
Back from overhaul
NSW mines · steering failures · 2024- The record
- One vehicle that lost its steering had 'recently returned from overhaul', with a fitting not tightened to specification. The regulator recommended 'recommissioning checks with supervisor sign-off to verify the plant is safe to return to service', and that maintenance records for safety-critical systems be kept in the plant safety file.[3]
- Our reading
- Its earlier review of fires on mobile plant at coal mines found nine of 18 occurred in the first shift after the machine returned to service.[4] The return to service is a decision, and it deserves a record.
Caught at the pre-start, and stood down
Queensland underground coal mine · roof bolter · 2026- The record
- During a pre-start, an operator found a zip-tie holding a bolter's dead-man lever in the 'on' position. The machine was stood down and moved for investigation. The regulator asked that pre-starts include a functional test of safety-critical controls, that a defeated control be treated as a serious defect with the plant stood down, and that sites 'review recent pre-start, defect and maintenance records for evidence of repeated defects, unauthorised alterations or ineffective functional checks'.[5]
- Our reading
- This is the system working. What a connected record adds is that the stand-down is visible to everyone at once, and the records the regulator asks sites to review are already in one place, on the machine.
What the codes of practice expect
The SafeWork NSW code of practice for moving plant on construction sites, in force since December 2025, says pre-operational inspection results 'should be entered into a logbook or equivalent digital system', that maintenance records should 'be kept for the life of the plant', and adds:
“Records should be transferred with ownership of the moving plant.”
It also asks that, before moving plant is accepted onto site, the site ensures 'that the plant has been suitably maintained'.[8] The national model code on plant asks a hirer who maintains plant during the lease to 'provide all information and records about the maintenance to the hirer at the end of the lease'.[9] For plant that must be registered, such as concrete placing booms and mobile cranes rated over 10 tonnes, the model WHS Regulations go further: a record of tests, inspections, maintenance and alterations must be kept for as long as the plant is used, and handed to whoever takes control of it next.[10]
How Mainte handles it
EXC-014 · 22 t tracked excavator
One record, wherever it works
- Hallett Creek embankmentFeb to May
- 3 FebDispatchedDispatch inspection passed. Placed on the project by S. Lindqvist.
- 14 MarPre-startCritical item failed: wet patch at the boom foot. Defect raised with photo; next pre-start refused.
- 15 MarWork orderWO-1187: boom hose replaced and sleeved. Defect resolved, gate lifted.
- 30 MayReturnedReturned — inspection due. Return inspection notes a weeping final drive seal.
- YardJune
- 2 JunStood downFinal drive seal leaking. Stood down by M. Barrow.
- 4 JunDispatch refused“This asset is stood down and cannot be dispatched (Final drive seal leaking). Reinstate the asset before deploying it.”
- 9 JunReinstatedSeal replaced under WO-1240. Reinstated by S. Lindqvist, with the reason recorded.
- Ridgeway Road upgradefrom 10 Jun
- 10 JunDispatchedDispatch inspection passed. First pre-start on site: 18 of 18, hour meter 4,812 h.
- The history is the machine's
- Pre-starts, defects, repairs, stand-downs and every move between jobs sit on one timeline per machine, wherever it worked. When it arrives at a new project, its history arrives with it.
- Placements, not spreadsheets
- Reserve, dispatch, return and close each machine's placement on a project, or transfer it to another job on an effective date. Each move records who made it and when, and a machine can only be on one placement at a time.
- A stood-down machine stays home
- A machine that has been stood down cannot be reserved, dispatched or transferred, and there is no override: it has to be reinstated first, by someone your rules allow.
- Dispatch and return checks
- A placement can require a dispatch inspection within a set window before the machine goes out, and a return inspection before the placement closes. An admin or engineer can override either only with a reason, which stays in the history.
- The pre-start, at the machine
- Scan the label and the pre-start opens on the phone, offline if it has to be, with photos and a signature. A failed critical or major item raises a defect with the note and photos, tells the people responsible, and refuses the next pre-start until it is dealt with. The templates are your own, so a function test of a fail-safe brake interlock or a dead-man control, which regulators keep asking for, is an item like any other.[7]
- Hours that can be trusted
- Hour-meter readings taken at the pre-start build the machine's meter history. A reading lower than the last is rejected and never drives a service, and services fall due by hours.
- The label tells the truth
- Before anyone signs in, a scanned label shows what the machine is and, if it is stood down, 'Do not operate it — see a supervisor', without exposing the reason or anyone's name.
- Papers on the machine
- Registration, insurance, permits and certificates sit on the machine with their expiry dates, show as expiring 30 days out, and appear on Today when they lapse. Major components are recorded with serial numbers and can be searched across the fleet.
- Costs where they belongCost and hire modules
- Receipts are photographed against the job, the machine or the placement and confirmed by a person. A placement shows its hire days, estimated revenue, direct costs and contribution to the people allowed to see money.
What it changes
- A machine arrives with its history. The site, the owner and the workshop look at the same record, so a defect found on one project is still there on the next.
- An unfit machine is stopped at the gate, not on site. A stood-down machine cannot be dispatched, and a dispatch inspection can be required before it leaves.
- Returns are checked, not assumed. A placement can be held open until its return inspection is done, and what that inspection finds goes on the machine.
- Availability is a board, not a ring-around. Fleet managers see what is available, out, overdue, coming back or stood down, and every number opens the machine.
- Repair or replace has a basis. Repeat faults are counted against the machine and its components, which is where the repair-or-replace conversation starts.
Mainte Mobile is in daily operational use on working mobile plant. How a failed pre-start becomes a repair and an authorised return to service is set out in From a failed check to a safe return to service, and the incident reports behind it in Found, reported, and still in service.
Sources
- [1]Safety Alert SA22-05: Service brakes fail on moving articulated dump truck · Resources Regulator, NSW · October 2022 · Regulator safety alert
- [2]Safety Bulletin SB24-05: Wheel assemblies detaching from mobile plant · Resources Regulator, NSW · August 2024 · Regulator safety bulletin
- [3]Safety Bulletin SB24-09: Safety-critical system failures — steering · Resources Regulator, NSW · November 2024 · Regulator safety bulletin
- [4]Safety Bulletin SB21-11: Fires occur after servicing mobile plant · Resources Regulator, NSW · December 2021 · Regulator safety bulletin
- [5]Dead-man control defeated on QDS bolter (Coal Inspectorate Alert No. 481) · Resources Safety & Health Queensland · 13 July 2026 · Regulator safety alertRead from the Internet Archive copy captured 2 August 2026; the RSHQ site does not admit automated access.
- [6]Unplanned vehicle movement: failure of battery isolator and braking system (Alert No. 386) · Resources Safety & Health Queensland · 19 February 2021 · Regulator safety alert
- [7]Light vehicle fail-safe brake interlocks (Alert No. 409) · Resources Safety & Health Queensland · 26 May 2022 · Regulator safety alertThe worker was injured when the vehicle rolled; pre-starts had not included testing the interlock functions.
- [8]Code of practice: Moving plant on construction sites · SafeWork NSW · December 2025 · Approved code of practice (NSW)Approved under section 274 of the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (NSW). Quoted from section 4.2 and Appendix B.
- [9]Model Code of Practice: Managing the risks of plant in the workplace · Safe Work Australia · November 2024 · Model code of practiceSection 3.1, hiring plant. Model codes apply where a state or territory has adopted them.
- [10]Model Work Health and Safety Regulations · Safe Work Australia · As at 5 December 2025 · Model regulationsRegulation 237 (records of registered plant) and Schedule 5, Part 2 (plant requiring registration).