Vehicle Types

Vehicle Limits

When creating a job you may specify a preferred vehicle type. If the total weight and size of the parcels you send fall within the given vehicle restrictions then we'll assign that job to a courier with the given vehicle. If the total parcel size and weight does not fall within these restrictions, we'll allocate the job to the most appropriate vehicle available.

Below is a list of offered vehicles along with their maximum capacities (sum of all the parcels sent):

Vehicle	Length (cm)	Width (cm)	Height (cm)	Weight (kg)	Max Distance (km)
Pushbike	40	30	30	10	80.47
Cargo bike	100	100	100	100	80.47
Motorcycle	45	45	45	15	600
Car	90	60	60	100	None
Small van	150	120	90	350	None
Large van	350	200	160	900	None

How Gophr Calculates The Required Vehicle Type

Gophr uses the following factors when deciding which vehicle to assign a job to:

Consignment type - some items are not suitable for certain vehicles. e.g. we do not assign jobs that contain glass to our bike couriers.
The aggregated dimensions of all the parcels in the consignment.
The total weight of the consignment.
The distance of the job.

Parcel Dimension Aggregation

When determining the total consignment dimensions, it's difficult to write an algorithm that will compensate for every possible vehicle and parcel shape. We take a pragmatic approach to this problem by making the following assumptions:

We think of vehicles as boxes with the dimensions stated in the table above.
We think of parcels as cuboids based on the provided width, height and length measurements.

In order to determine if a consignment will fit into a vehicle, we use the following model:

Order the parcels by volume (largest first)
Stack the parcels vertically up one side of the vehicle
By default we rotate about all axis to try and make the parcel fit, unless the is_not_rotatable flag is set on the parcel.
If the is_not_rotatable flag is set, we only rotate about the width and length.
Once one side of the box is full, we begin packing the parcels side-by-side where one will fit alongside the previous. Again we rotate the parcels to achieve this if we can.

The above is an example of a Bin packing algorithm and whilst it doesn't compute every single stacking permutation possible (complete solutions are NP hard in complexity) it does a good job of imitating how the parcels might be placed in the vehicle by a real courier.