Left hand down!:
According to a DCPC trainer just recently, a break won’t record if a period of driving has taken place beforehand. Eg. if you start your shift, put your card in, do 30 mins other work loading your truck then have a 15 min break before setting off, the break won’t physically record. Now I’m always willing to learn new things and be corrected if I’m wrong, but this one is news to me and I can’t find anything in regulations about it 
. What do the experts say (ie. NOT DCPC trainers 
) ?
Either the trainer was talking rubbish or you misunderstood him, a tachograph, be it digital or analogue, will record any activity you put into it at any time of the shift, in fact if it doesn’t it should be defected and not used until it’s in legal working order.
I’ve recorded breaks before doing any driving lots of times, it’s perfectly legal for the RT(WT)R and definitely gets recorded by the tachograph.
In this scenario the break wouldn’t count as a driving break because the driver hasn’t done any driving and you cannot have a driving break before you’ve done any driving, but it’s not at the immediate start of the shift so it would count as a break for the RT(WT)R.
tachograph:
Left hand down!:
According to a DCPC trainer just recently, a break won’t record if a period of driving has taken place beforehand. Eg. if you start your shift, put your card in, do 30 mins other work loading your truck then have a 15 min break before setting off, the break won’t physically record. Now I’m always willing to learn new things and be corrected if I’m wrong, but this one is news to me and I can’t find anything in regulations about it . What do the experts say (ie. NOT DCPC trainers ) ?
Either the trainer was talking rubbish or you misunderstood him, a tachograph, be it digital or analogue, will record any activity you put into it at any time of the shift, in fact if it doesn’t it should be defected and not used until it’s in legal working order.
I’ve recorded breaks before doing any driving lots of times, it’s perfectly legal for the RT(WT)R and definitely gets recorded by the tachograph.
In this scenario the break wouldn’t count as a driving break because the driver hasn’t done any driving and you cannot have a driving break before you’ve done any driving, but it’s not at the immediate start of the shift so it would count as a break for the RT(WT)R.
Thanks. Yes, I was just reading an old thread on this subject (viewtopic.php?t=52018) and the DCPC guy was correct about the break not counting towards the 45 min. Just looking at GV262 again and the key part of the wording seems to be “After a driving period of no more than 4.5 hours” which wouldn’t apply because as you say, I’ve not done any driving yet.