Northern Exposure

Northern Exposure

In the 17 years Shop Supervisor Mike Cullen has worked at Centranz, never before did he get a request quite like this one. “They told me they’d pay for me to rebuild the transmissions on site to save on shipping and freight,” Mike says. “Usually, I’d convince them that it actually makes better financial sense to ship them. But this was different.” This was Alaska.

A local company had attempted to rebuild one of the ZF transmissions, 6wg310 from a Terex TA-30 articulated haul truck themselves. They didn’t get too far. First, they contacted Terex’s corporate office, who directed them to someone who deals specifically in TA-30s. As it happened, the gentleman knew just the thing to resolve their transmission woes: Call Mike at Centranz.

We have been rebuilding 6wg310 ZF transmissions in the TA Series Terex Trucks for 13 of the 15 years they’ve been in existence,” Mike says. “Even though many parts have been changed since the first ones, they still work with the same principal.”

Centranz regularly repairs transmissions in the field. Never before has he rebuilt one. Mike stayed in Alaska for two weeks.

He rebuilt two transmissions while there. Following the first rebuild, the company installed the transmission into the TA-30 while Mike rebuilt the second one. “Once the second transmission was installed, I tested them both rigorously to make sure they worked and away I went,” Mike says. “Not much time for sightseeing.”