The resulting design has, in fact, enabled DuroWipers to offer a three-year warranty as standard on all its systems. This is unheard of in the marine sector, and it is the only company that does this. It is this reliability that has helped DuroWipers to gain an impressive client list which includes the Royal Navy, the RNLI and ferry operators such as DFDS. Noel believes that the DFDS contract highlights an interesting trend. He said: “We find that it is the vessel operators that want our products rather than the builders of the ships. While our DuroWipers are not particularly expensive, shipbuilders are always looking for the lowest cost option with less relevance being given to longer term benefits. The operators, however, place much more importance on the impact of maintenance.” For DFDS the advantages were clear. Its ferries serving the Dover to Dunkirk route work around the clock with only 45 minutes in port between sailings. So the only time that maintenance on wipers could be carried out is during a vessel’s scheduled annual maintenance. For the Royal Navy, the reduced maintenance requirements helped with its need to carry enough spares to be able to operate for extended periods of time without returning to a home port. Indeed, DuroWipers is so confident in the quality of its product that it has given the Royal Navy
It took three years of testing for the RNLI to satisfy itself about of the performance and reliability something no other company in the industry is able to—a lifetime warranty. The warranty has also been extended for the RNLI, on a contract that was not at all easy to win. It took three years of testing for the RNLI to satisfy itself about of the performance and reliability of the DuroWipers product, and now the wipers are specified on the new Shannon class lifeboat, of which 57 are planned to be built in the coming years. Hearing the DuroWipers story makes you stop and think about how many other products are underperforming, but are tolerated because ‘that’s the way it’s always been’. All it takes is a fresh perspective and the desire to improve on what has become the accepted norm.
DuroWipers durowipers.co.uk
breakthrough, Summer 2017
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