had a long day out yesterday had the standard 45 break and whilst driving back on m25 towards cranbrook im trying to do the sums with my hours, bugger i got to get another 45 in to get the lorry back, sure enough tacho flashes, had the break but it will take longer than 1 hour to return to base, gets on the phone to depot to arrange some one to meet me to keep things legal , at the depot transport guy says lets check your card, after down loading it showed i actually had 54 minutes left on my 10 hour driving limit. now i cant work out why the head told me to have the break/s but my print out and down load showed other wise 
Sounds like you did 3hr 36 driving in the first leg, then your 45 reset the clock. Another 4.5hr session needs would then get you the unused back from the first leg.
If you have a driving break after, say, 3.5 hours, it doesn’t mean that you lose an hour of driving from the day - you can still drive up to a total of 9/10 hours subject to a 45 (or 15/30) before you reach 4.5 hours. So you could for example do 3/break/3/break/3/break/1. You probably still had time allowing from before the first and second breaks.
Gary
heliguy10:
had a long day out yesterday had the standard 45 break and whilst driving back on m25 towards cranbrook im trying to do the sums with my hours, bugger i got to get another 45 in to get the lorry back, sure enough tacho flashes, had the break but it will take longer than 1 hour to return to base, gets on the phone to depot to arrange some one to meet me to keep things legal , at the depot transport guy says lets check your card, after down loading it showed i actually had 54 minutes left on my 10 hour driving limit. now i cant work out why the head told me to have the break/s but my print out and down load showed other wise
The tachograph would have flashed you to have a break when you reached 4¼ hours driving.
The reason you still had 54 minutes driving left was presumably because you’d only done a total of 9 hours 6 minutes driving.
Forgive me if I’m wrong but are you under the impression that once you’ve had the second 45 minute driving break you can only drive for one hour ?
If you drive for, say 4 hours then have a 45 minute break you don’t lose the other 30 minutes driving time.
If you drive for 4 hours then have a 45 minute break, then drive another 4 hours then have another 45 minute break, you still have 2 hours driving time left on an extended driving day.
thanks for your replies fellas, yes i assumed i would lose driving hours once i reset with a break 
we all learn as we go along, so i guess the sure way to be certain would be a print out then 
thanks again i think that cleared that up 
If I’m likely to be anywhere near my max driving hours, when I have a 45 minute break I make a note of what driving time I’ve used, do this before the tachograph resets the driving time to 4½ hours and it saves you having to waste time and paper doing a printout or scrolling through the tachograph display.
heliguy10’s knowledge of the driver’s hours regulations is outstanding.
This is a quote from that thread.
tachograph:
I would strongly recommend that you have a read/study of the Rules on Drivers’ Hours and Tachographs
That was a year and two days ago, heliguy10… and you still haven’t got a clue. 
I write down on my run sheet how many hours I’ve driven whenever I have a break
heliguy10:
thanks for your replies fellas, yes i assumed i would lose driving hours once i reset with a break
After looking at the link that Contra has put up, you really need to read the rules mate.
No offence, but your mistake just now could be justified (kinda - maybe…) if you were a newbie (although you should still know the rules IMHO) but you’ve been driving AT LEAST a year, so should bloody well know the basics by now.
It’s embarrassing! Have you got no pride at all in your profession? Why did you choose to drive HGV’s for a living? 
scaniason:
So you could for example do 3/break/3/break/3/break/1.
Take out the third break and that would still be legal 3/break/3/break/4 - Assuming breaks are all 45s
Kitchen timer.I set it to a 9 or 10 hour drive as a guide on driving time and check the digi to make sure.
Truckstops sell them and cooking shops.
I use a TS02 Hour guard, it really is a good bit of kit and keeps track of driving hours and warns when a break is due, etc.
Not cheap but I reckon it pays for itself by helping me to avoid any infringments.
If you are lost in respect of not knowing where you are with remaining driving hours, as a generalisation, I would suggest that you ignore what the display on the tacho says. I would suggest pulling over (not always possible), waiting one minute for the head to record other work and then take a print out. When you examine the print out, take a look at the last activity to ensure that it has recorded other work, then if it has you can see on the print out how much driving time you have remaining.
the rule books