Hi guys,as I`m fairly new here,forgive me if this has been mentioned before!
We have just recenly got a fleet ob brand new Scania with digital tachos.When I put my card in I also zero the trip computer on the truck. So with this done,off I go find the trailer in the yard,drive under,couple of tugs etc then back round and park up and go into office and get paperwork,coffee,etc…
Now this is the point,Truck computer shows 7 mins driving and the tacho displays shows 12!
Does anybody know why the difference?
With the old charts,we could hook up and then pop the chart in and still have 4.5 hours of driving.Now before I get a lecture,I know this is bending the law a wee bit but its literally 100 yards inside the depot to the trailers.
Got a feeling this’ll be moved soon, haven’t had it happen not used my digi yet, but heard they can be a bit different to the actual timings of things due to how they record, stupid I think, sure someone can tell us why it does it though, one of the tachobods!!
joemaxi:
Hi guys,as I`m fairly new here,forgive me if this has been mentioned before!
We have just recenly got a fleet ob brand new Scania with digital tachos.When I put my card in I also zero the trip computer on the truck. So with this done,off I go find the trailer in the yard,drive under,couple of tugs etc then back round and park up and go into office and get paperwork,coffee,etc…
Now this is the point,Truck computer shows 7 mins driving and the tacho displays shows 12!
Does anybody know why the difference?
With the old charts,we could hook up and then pop the chart in and still have 4.5 hours of driving.Now before I get a lecture,I know this is bending the law a wee bit but its literally 100 yards inside the depot to the trailers.
Have any of you guys experienced this?
digital tachos round up to the next minute that is why so in you drove for 4mins and 6 sec once you have stopped the tacho would jump to 5 mins
Be carefull as well with what is considered multidrop work.
Worked doing supermarket and they had a email from VOSA on the wall, even though at times ive done 6 or 7 stores deliveries in a shift, that wouldn’t be considered multidrop, even though some of the drivers thought it was and were going over by 15mins if they needed to.
Not sure exactly how they describe multidrop work, think more along the lines of class 2 work, delivering the likes of 15+ drops a day.
my digi tacho adds minutes as well.recently queuing on a slip road in heavy stop/start traffic,i immediatley clocked the driven time in the digi display,and the real time on the dash clock.when i had negotiated the roundabout,the display had added 7 minutes,yet it only took four minutes"real time".
this leads me to two questions:
1)how does this stand in a court of law if you are prosecuted for exceeding driving time,when it can be proven that the digi display time is innacurate?
2)the technology does exist to measure in real time,so why has it not being used on digi tachos?,ie my old "03"plate volvo with dynafleet,did just that.
As has already been said the digital tacho records activity; driving, work, availability or rest in whole minutes. The storage rules say that if a vehicle moves in a minute (00:00 to 00:59 seconds) then that ‘minute’ will be recorded as driving. The rule also says that if the tacho does not receive impulses from the gearbox at the rate of at least one impulses per second for more than five seconds, the vehicle will be considered stationary. In theory you could make a number of five second movements in ‘a minute’ and the vehicle would be considered to be stationary by the tacho. However, if the vehicle moves for 6 seconds in a row, then the whole of that minute will be counted as driving. To say that digitals ‘add a minute each time you stop and start’ is simply not true.
The Court will go with the tacho record, that is the legally accepted and approved Recording Equipment - nothing else. You also have to consider that ‘driving’ is not just the period the vehicle moves, it is the period during which you are in control of the vehicle, which is probably better represented by the digital record than the analogue ever did.
geebee45:
As has already been said the digital tacho records activity; driving, work, availability or rest in whole minutes. The storage rules say that if a vehicle moves in a minute (00:00 to 00:59 seconds) then that ‘minute’ will be recorded as driving. The rule also says that if the tacho does not receive impulses from the gearbox at the rate of at least one impulses per second for more than five seconds, the vehicle will be considered stationary. In theory you could make a number of five second movements in ‘a minute’ and the vehicle would be considered to be stationary by the tacho. However, if the vehicle moves for 6 seconds in a row, then the whole of that minute will be counted as driving. To say that digitals ‘add a minute each time you stop and start’ is simply not true.
The Court will go with the tacho record, that is the legally accepted and approved Recording Equipment - nothing else. You also have to consider that ‘driving’ is not just the period the vehicle moves, it is the period during which you are in control of the vehicle, which is probably better represented by the digital record than the analogue ever did.
i know you didnt write the rules geebee45,but digi tachos still,no matter how it is written “in law” misrepresent driving time.how can you move for “six” seconds,yet be “charged” 1 minute,each time.i know you say it is measured in whole minutes,and that is the problem,they shouldnt be.
i always thought that that the period i am in control of the vehicle and not driving was “other work”,or “duty time”.i could be,and sometimes are wrong however.
Case Law says that you are ‘driving’ a vehicle when you are seated behind the wheel in order to ‘control the movement’ of the vehicle. The Judge went on to make some comments regarding that the ruling had to be carefully applied by the enforcement authorities.
To give you an example;
you are driving towards traffic lights when they change from green to red. Your vehicle becomes stationary at 20 seconds into minute one.
you remain stationary at the lights for the whole of minute two.
at 40 seconds in to minute three the lights change to green and you set off.
In the three minute period your vehicle has moved for 40 seconds, however, the driving time will be recorded as three minutes. Yet in reality, for the whole of those three minutes you were sitting behind the wheel of the vehicle in order to control its’ movement - the definition of driving. Things are slightly different if you are stationary in minutes two and three and move in minute four. In this instance you will record two minutes of driving and two minutes of other work (provided you don’t change the mode). You could argue that in this instance the digital is not recording your time correctly as it should be four minutes driving. You would be correct, but not very popular, if you go back to the original storage rules I feel they probably got them about right.
A major problem with comparing digital and analogue records is that you are comparing apples with pears. Even if you send two vehicles on the same journey at the same time, traffic conditions will ensure that they have different driving times recorded. Analogue charts under normal analysis are only accurate to +/- one time graduation, which is usually two minutes, so any time recorded is accurate to +/- 4 minutes. This gets interpreted even more liberally in the case of ‘stop / start’ conditions. As I said earlier, the digital record is probably a better representation of driving time than the analogue. Although many will not like the thought, the driving time limits are just that, limits, they are not ‘targets’ to be achieved at all costs. Planning RDC’s or whatever at 4:30 hrs apart is asking for problems when there is some kind of delay. It is the operators responsibility to plan a job that may be performed legally and that includes factoring in potential delays for; congestion, weather, roadworks etc, something many seem to forget.
I agree with some of it, that sitting behind a wheel in traffic is technically driving.
Using analogues, driving through a city in stop start traffic i dont stop and start my egg timer all the time, just let it keep counting down unless gonna be stoped for awhile. If anything gives me slight leaway if i run tight to 4hrs 30mins.
But on the other hand the biggest problem ive found with the digi tachograph is yard movements ive had it add on two minutes of time for say a 15 sec movement, when the clock musta been sitting at somthing like 00:00:55secs and stoped driving 00:01:10secs. This can really screw you up and add on to your time espec if your sitting in a line waiting to get on a bay not even on a public road. Ive had 12mins added on for about 3mins actual movements on a stopwatch.
The laws were brought in for a reason, which i agree with to stop people doing insane hours, but on the other hand its now gone far to far, the digital tachograph rounding up to the nearest minute is prove of that. Seen an easy 4hrs 10mins night trunk turn into a 4hrs 25mins rush due to trying to get out the yard and trying to get into another yard somewhere else.
When your struggling to do a simple Glasgow to North West of England trunk in the middle of the night there is some type of problem and i dont think its great for safety or business.
its ok saying well shouldnt plan it like that but people been doing it fine and legally for years, so now meant to move the depots, or have double man shifts to do something which was legal before.
Its getting to the point of insanity and more about nitpicking than safety, bueracracy gone mad.
This aint a go at you geebee its a go at the system.
BTW Geebee what is classed as multidrop, since as i said before myself doing 6 or 7 drops is supposedly not considered multidrop, so what would be ?
don"t get me wrong chaps,i do not drive to “the limit”,we are given our work on a “how ever long it takes basis”,we ring in for our next job,when the previous one is complete.it is left to the driver to work within the law and rules,and complete relevant paperwork to that affect,which is then closely monitored,and are not put under any pressure to do anything"underhanded".
however,the points you make about being in charge behind the wheel are valid,but it still doesnt take away the fact that the digi tacho adds on minutes not in real time.
scenario-you put your card in at 12:00 and take it out at 13:00.exactly one hour duty,and between these time periods you drive constantly in stop/start traffic repeatedley.the digi display then says you have been driving for 1:06 mins.
how?,you have only been on duty for 1 hour.
