I very rarely use a 10hr drive, even running down to the bottom of Spain, that extra hour costs you 1hr 45, I do a 9hr drive with 9 off, I get there quicker, on the subject of 4 10s in a row, check out the hours of service in America and Canada
Carryfast:
Rjan:
The problem is that there are always exceptional circumstances. A crash, a detour, a delay putting you in rush hour traffic. The 10 hours is there to provide some flexibility for those whose working day would normally be under 9 hours driving.I’m sure that the idea of ‘exceptional circumstances’ could be factored into the rules regardless.While the 10 hour driving allowance is already there in the case of no seperate driving/duty limits as part of an 11 hour working day.
Any concept of “exceptional circumstances” becomes something vague and arguable.
Obviously I agree with you that the rules are virtually useless as they are in imposing any sort of reasonable working pattern, but it’s also not necessarily the purpose of these rules. They are there more to define situations that must never happen, than to define what should usually happen.
That is, a driver should never drive more than 10 hours in a day, but it does not necessarily mean that all drivers should usually drive 9.75 hours in a day. So too, a driver should never have less than 9 hours off, but it does not mean that a driver should usually have only 9 hours off.
Rjan:
What probably wasn’t intended by those who first sat down to draft the rules decades ago, was that the bosses in this country - in connivance with some drivers, weak unions, lax enforcement agencies, and the government itself - would constantly be trying to exploit every single extreme as a matter of routine, nor that there would be such a surplus of drivers that bosses could get away with organising most of the industry along Victorian sweatshop working hours without any effective pushback to keep hours within reasonable bounds.Given that driving time itself is limited to 9 hours as a norm, and driving is what drivers are supposed to do, it also probably wasn’t foreseen that the industry would become so inefficient with drivers’ labour as to often drag the working day out by up to 6 hours more of non-driving time (usually waiting time), or that hauliers would be paying only plain time for those overtime hours as opposed to time-and-half or double time.
Not to forget the most ironic, laughable and unbelievable factor of all this ridiculous working hours thing, (that prompted my first question to the o/p on this thread)…
The bit where many drivers misniterpret the rules by either their own stupidity and/or naivety, thinking (or being brainwashed into thinking) that the 15 hour days/10 hour drives/9 hour rests are actual targets that they NEED to, or are required to, hit every week, …rather than them being maximum and minimum limits 
Therefore prolonging the old adage of ‘‘Drivers being their own worst enemy’’ 
That is the unbelievable bit of it that you could not make up 
…which goes a long way to prolong all this absolute cluster ■■■■ of rules and crap working hours and conditions.
4 ten hour drives on the bounce.
Christ on a bike, are there any morons on here who actually do that? 
ROG:
Returning to the issue of the 10 hour drives …How daft can it be that a driver can do 4 in a row on sat sun mon tue but cannot do mon tue wed thu
Because the rules were written before it became the norm to ignore Sunday as a day of rest. As I understand it there’s still no Sunday running in France apart from perishable goods.
eagerbeaver:
4 ten hour drives on the bounce.Christ on a bike, are there any morons on here who actually do that?
After what I was saying in my last post mate, if there wasn’t before they found out on here, there sure as hell will be now.
robroy:
Rjan:
What probably wasn’t intended by those who first sat down to draft the rules decades ago, was that the bosses in this country - in connivance with some drivers, weak unions, lax enforcement agencies, and the government itself - would constantly be trying to exploit every single extreme as a matter of routine, nor that there would be such a surplus of drivers that bosses could get away with organising most of the industry along Victorian sweatshop working hours without any effective pushback to keep hours within reasonable bounds.Given that driving time itself is limited to 9 hours as a norm, and driving is what drivers are supposed to do, it also probably wasn’t foreseen that the industry would become so inefficient with drivers’ labour as to often drag the working day out by up to 6 hours more of non-driving time (usually waiting time), or that hauliers would be paying only plain time for those overtime hours as opposed to time-and-half or double time.
Not to forget the most ironic, laughable and unbelievable factor of all this ridiculous working hours thing, (that prompted my first question to the o/p on this thread)…
The bit where many drivers misniterpret the rules by either their own stupidity and/or naivety, thinking (or being brainwashed into thinking) that the 15 hour days/10 hour drives/9 hour rests are actual targets that they NEED to, or are required to, hit every week, …rather than them being maximum and minimum limits
Therefore prolonging the old adage of ‘‘Drivers being their own worst enemy’’
That is the unbelievable bit of it that you could not make up
Agreed. I’ve had the argument myself before that the normal full-time working day is 8 hours, and if I do up to 11 then that is working long hours.
Simply because the law permits 12, 13, 14, 15 hours each day doesn’t mean that those are the appropriate targets when planning the work.
eagerbeaver:
4 ten hour drives on the bounce.Christ on a bike, are there any morons on here who actually do that?
Me I’ll do it ,doing Inverness from here just doesn’t feel like I’ve done enough ,I could do with 11/12 hours so I could get back to the motor grill
Punchy Dan:
eagerbeaver:
4 ten hour drives on the bounce.Christ on a bike, are there any morons on here who actually do that?
Me I’ll do it ,doing Inverness from here just doesn’t feel like I’ve done enough ,I could do with 11/12 hours so I could get back to the motor grill
Ah Ballinluig. Many a lost night in the pub there! 
Punchy Dan:
eagerbeaver:
4 ten hour drives on the bounce.Christ on a bike, are there any morons on here who actually do that?
Me I’ll do it ,doing Inverness from here just doesn’t feel like I’ve done enough ,I could do with 11/12 hours so I could get back to the motor grill
There is a difference though Dan in fairness to an owner driver wanting to do it, rather than a beaten down RDC knobber who gets it basically forced upon them.
Being as you are clearly wealthy (and Maoster speaks well of you 
), I reckon you should get on the newly created Greggs bacon roll rota. Robroy played his part last week & treated me to a full brekkie 
I’d not eat that Greggs [zb] ,strictly pan o chocolate for me ,I’ll get my m8 to chop one of his pigs up and we’ll burn an old super single to cook on at Lymm ( well bring a Doris to do the cooking bit actually)
Punchy Dan:
:shock: I’d not eat that Greggs [zb] ,strictly pan o chocolate for me ,I’ll get my m8 to chop one of his pigs up and we’ll burn an old super single to cook on at Lymm
Paul Gavan:
on the subject of 4 10s in a row, check out the hours of service in America and Canada
Indeed, Australia too, I’m an OD & will push hrs on occasion esp in a van & a euro run & a long couple of days to get back for wk end etc, but to do some of their hrs continuously, I don’t think I’d be very well.
Couldn’t think of anything worse personally, 7-8 hours a day is enough for me thanks.