I am so pleased to be out of all this…I get a hankering for going back, even renewed my licence and my driver card last month, I have one year to run on my CPC…I come on here for a look at what is going on and it makes me realise that I did the best thing ever, getting out of an industry that is clearly not fit for imaginary purpose…The imaginations of those who sit behind a desk.
Perhaps the time has come to consider the health and safety of drivers strapping loads I used to load cardboard which was to the top of the curtains and which had to be strapped. I wasn’t allowed to start strapping until all the load was on the trailer. This meant that the strap for the front pallet had to be yanked over 13 pallets, the next over 12 and so on. This meant that on a full load you had yank the straps over nearly two hundred pallets and then you wonder why drivers have back problems, aching arms and shoulders.
Sideboards the only solution
So according to the tweet the police deem this another insure load? On whose say so? VOSA or their own? It states that it’s ‘the customer insisting on inadequate restraint’, and that a multi agency response is going to result.
So does that mean that from now, all Inbev loads must be ratchet strapped? Good luck with that.
Downton informed the drivers that strapping pallets of cans with internals was agreed upon with VOSA.
Looks like there may need to be a swift infestment in trailers with side boards.
Maybe Stobart drivers will finally get to use theirs then.
waddy640:
Perhaps the time has come to consider the health and safety of drivers .
Yeh right, best of luck with that one.
Have you not got it yet?..
There is no GENUINE H&S with drivers, it’s a mix of keeping up apperances and covering of arses, that’s why it’s deemed unsafe to strap up and do curtains on some premises, but suddenlly becomes safe when they tell you it must be done outside the gates.
Today I’ve been loading bricks on a flat, told to climb up and lay out pallets wnd spacers whilst being loaded with a grab.
It’s ■■■■■■ down solidly for 2 days, so that old flatbed was like a skating rink…H&S for drivers my arse !
(It was fine though as I was wearing full clown suit, hi viz from head to toe, glasses, boots and hard hat…(with chinstrap of course 
), so it had the same effect as wearing Superman’s suit.
…full protection. 
…Ha ■■■■ ha !
Conor:
Jesus have you seen the state of those chock rails? You could put your fist through some of those rust holes.
I know of a firm where the Boss’s son instructed the fitters to fill in the holes on the trailer cape rails with fibreglass and filler when it was in for service…I kid you not.
I’m another one that’s thankful I’m not on General anymore.
In the 80’s & 90’s we did load after load, carrying various commodities in taut’s without a rope or strap in sight but if something looked like it had a chance of moving, then it got strapped down.
Carried fertiliser out of Immingham or Ince for years on flat’s and taut’s in bulk bags and only ever put a cross with a rope on the back row of bags, never had anything move.
Same with any palletised tinned product, if it was wrapped and loaded tight, it ain’t going nowhere, the curtains were enough to keep it in place. The truck would go on it’s side before anything fell off it.
This is complete BS now.
Curtainsiders are becoming obsolete imo. The only way is for palletised goods to travel in boxes or fridges. Anything that can’t go in a box goes on a flat with ratchets and sheets
I had a load of drinks the other night and one of my internals was snapped, so I put a ratchet round the back, and tightened it as much as I could until it just about started crushing the load but without causing damage. Got to where I was going 3 hours later, opened the back doors and the ratchet was totally hanging off, every internal was still tight in place. The whole thing with this blanket rule of if it’s over 400kg it needs a ratchet is ■■■■■■■■ because clearly the internals were doing a lot more than the ratchet here.
Again, I picked up a load of 28 tons of sacks of potatoes on pallets that another driver had strapped with ratchets once. Got to where they were going and every single ratchet was loose because you can’t tighten them enough on sacks of spuds. I took the same load a year before on internals and every internal was still has tight as when I put it on when I got to where I was going.
Is this the answer■■? 
I’ve pulled trailers with loads like that. Frankly the driver has done a lot more than I ever did (just being honest). I coupled the trailer and didn’t bother with anything. My logic being - if it was going the wrap would give way, the chance of being caught was tiny - and frankly I could not be bothered.
I had not a single problem. And I am not known for my godlike ability when driving large vehicles. Or any vehicle for that matter.
DickyNick:
Again, I picked up a load of 28 tons of sacks of potatoes on pallets that another driver had strapped with ratchets once. Got to where they were going and every single ratchet was loose because you can’t tighten them enough on sacks of spuds. I took the same load a year before on internals and every internal was still has tight as when I put it on when I got to where I was going.
When I was a boy, sacks of spuds were loaded without any form of rope, and they never moved, same with sprouts, just loaded and stacked right, if it fell off, you had to load em all up again.
twitter.com/WYPMotorwayBob/stat … 8716262400
Another one, as someone new to the industry can someone tell me whats wrong with the way its strapped (both the Op and that one) ?
andyvxr:
https://twitter.com/WYPMotorwayBob/status/1067958498716262400Another one, as someone new to the industry can someone tell me whats wrong with the way its strapped (both the Op and that one) ?
From what I have seen, it’s just becoming a stupid policy being over enforced, by people’s with no knowledge of the industry, or with any common sense.
biggriffin:
andyvxr:
https://twitter.com/WYPMotorwayBob/status/1067958498716262400Another one, as someone new to the industry can someone tell me whats wrong with the way its strapped (both the Op and that one) ?
From what I have seen, it’s just becoming a stupid policy being over enforced, by people’s with no knowledge of the industry, or with any common sense.
With the second one are they tying to say the pallets weight is too much for the straps? Both look secure to me
andyvxr:
https://twitter.com/WYPMotorwayBob/status/1067958498716262400Another one, as someone new to the industry can someone tell me whats wrong with the way its strapped (both the Op and that one) ?
It looks like there might be some good news with this one. It seems that they are intending to go after the company for using an unsuitable trailer for the load.
Be us poor fridge boy’os next for not putting load lock bars every 3plts.
biggriffin:
andyvxr:
https://twitter.com/WYPMotorwayBob/status/1067958498716262400Another one, as someone new to the industry can someone tell me whats wrong with the way its strapped (both the Op and that one) ?
From what I have seen, it’s just becoming a stupid policy being over enforced, by people’s with no knowledge of the industry, or with any common sense.
Sad to say common sense takes second place to any harebrained idea. It also earns lots of money for the enforcement agencies etc.
OVLOV JAY:
Curtainsiders are becoming obsolete imo. The only way is for palletised goods to travel in boxes or fridges. Anything that can’t go in a box goes on a flat with ratchets and sheets
Curtain siders are there to do the same job as the flat in either case.It just saves all the aggro of having to sheet it.While sheets being erroneously used to ‘secure’ a load was also an issue with the ‘ministry’ regarding flats used for general haulage in the days before curtain siders became as popular.Although ironically the inference was that curtains supposedly secured the load and provided weather protection in the original Tautliner sales pitch.Surprisingly the ministry seeming not to jump on that idea for some reason at the time. 
Also there’s possibly too much reliance on difficult to secure pallets where strong timber packing cases and stillages would have been used more often in past times.
Sad to say common sense takes second place to any harebrained idea. It also earns lots of money for the enforcement agencies etc.
I think this is more to the point!