Small Equipment Tracking: Which Tag Fits Each Machine

How small equipment tracking works without a data plan

Each unit carries a crowdsourced tag, and any phone that passes reports where it heard the tag. The tag broadcasts a Bluetooth signal and has no GPS receiver, wiring or data plan. These networks are large (Apple counts over a billion iPhone, iPad and Mac devices, and Google over a billion Android devices). Its battery lasts up to six years, depending on its size.

A GPS tracker needs power and a data plan. A pull-start machine has nothing to wire into, so someone charges the tracker every few weeks or months. It also sends every position itself, so each unit needs its own data plan. Public order forms price that plan per unit, as the Samsara pricing guide shows.

Each tag report gives a place and a time. That is enough to find the compactor left at the last job, or to see that a pump has left the site. Many small tool tracking systems use QR or barcode labels, which record a place only when someone scans them. A tag needs no scan, so a unit left behind still shows where it is.

Small equipment covers plate compactors and rammers, generators, pumps, saws, rotating lasers and total stations, and light towers. It sits between the hand tools on the tool tracking system page and the machines on the heavy equipment tracking page. Light towers and towable generators are heavier, but they move the same way, one job at a time behind a pickup.

Which small equipment should you tag first?

Tag by value, from the top of your list down. The National Equipment Register's 2016 equipment theft report names two factors in what thieves take: value and mobility. Value leads, except for machines too large to move on a small trailer. Every unit on this page fits in a pickup bed or behind one, so value sets the order.

The report closes by telling owners to increase risk management for easily transportable, high-value equipment. It also finds that most thefts are from work sites with little or no security. So sort your equipment list by replacement value, and start with the units that go out to jobs. The ones that stay in a locked shop can wait.

Where to mount a small equipment tracker on each machine

Mount the tag on the frame, not the engine, on the side away from the exhaust. Keep it outside any closed steel box, because a tag inside one may only be heard once the door opens. Every row in the table follows those two rules.

Seven of the eight rows take one of the two sealed sizes, Standard or Extended. The unsealed Compact goes inside an instrument case. The asset tracking tags guide covers which surfaces hold foam tape and which need screws.

Two rows track a container rather than the machine. The tag in a laser case shows where the case is. So make "laser back in its case" part of pack-out, and the same goes for the cut-off saw.

Check each frame mount again at the machine's next service.

Which tag size should you use?

Pick the size by where the tag lives and how often someone can reach it with a screwdriver. The figure draws all three sizes to one scale, with the battery, seal and spot for each.

Battery life also sets your maintenance round. Over six years at the rated life, a Compact needs five battery changes, a Standard one and an Extended none. That is why the Extended goes on the units that are hardest to reach. Write the battery due date into your equipment list on the day you fit the tag.

Tag the machine, count what rides with it

Tag each machine. The hoses, blades and cord sets that ride with it get counted at pack-out instead. An accessory that spends the day away from its machine gets its own tag.

• Pumps. Suction and discharge hoses, the strainer, couplings and the fuel can. Count hose lengths, because a pump one hose short cannot run on the next job.
• Lasers and total stations. Receiver, remote, tripod, grade rod and charger. A data collector or rover that spends the day away from the case gets its own tag.
• Saws. Blades, the water tank and hose, and the wrench. Blades get used up, so count them rather than tag them.
• Generators and light towers. Cord sets and the distribution box. A distribution box that leaves the generator during the day gets its own Standard tag.
• Compactors. The urethane paving pad and the water tank, where fitted.

How to set up small equipment tracking in your yard

Do it in the yard with every unit parked, so you can check each tag on the map before the unit goes out.

1. List every unit with its serial number, and look up its tag size and mount in the placement table above.
2. Mount each tag, then open the map and confirm that it reports.
3. Draw a geofence around the yard and each active job, and set exit alerts on both. A yard exit after hours is the one to act on first.
4. Set a reminder on the yard geofence for units that should be home each night. It fires once when a unit has been away longer than you chose.

The geofence guide shows how to draw one. For alerts set by job phase, from delivery to the last truck out, see the job-phase alert plan for construction equipment.

What to expect from the tags day to day

With tags, you get a dated location record for every tagged unit and an alert each time one leaves a site.

• Updates come from passing phones. Any phone that passes reports the tag, whoever carries it. A busy site updates all day. A pump on a remote dewatering job updates less often, and more when people are back on site. A light tower towed off an empty site is reported again once the truck passes people.
• Building-level position. The position comes from the phone that heard the tag. It gets you to the right site, yard or stretch of road.
• Location, not run hours. A tag reports where a unit is and when it came and went. Service intervals set in hours still come from the hour meter.
• Where, not who. A tag shows where a unit is. An equipment sign-out sheet records who has it.
• A hidden tag stays on. Mount each tag out of sight on the frame. The two larger tags are sealed to IP68 for units that live outside.

The stolen tool and equipment recovery guide covers the first hour after an alert, and the serial list the police need.