Juddian:
Indeed Robert, couldn’t agree more about the old school from the east.
And yes, these select D press the loud pedal (or select cruise) and just attend the steering wheel lorries have not helped the skill nor aptitude requirements of the job.
I read a lot of your comments juddian and a few I will admit I dismiss ,especially when people go on about twin splits etc …and I will add when I did my class 2 it was in a 40 or 50s AEC with a crash box ,fair enough only 6 gears with a dogleg 1st ,but the chaos I must have caused when learning ,as everytime I missed a gear ,it was stop hand brake on ,I will point out it was the ratchet on handbrake it must have been a four foot lever with another lever on it to release it ,and I have driven the others with varying degrees of success,but get there …And I do love repairing them…May be a bit too much
But you are correct 100% here ,the select D brigade and go has not helped ,but unfortunately it WILL only get worse…Some of the defects we get in nowdays are ridiculous ,but unfortunately this is the here and now ,they don’t know what it was like in years gone by ,and no doubt in years to come they will have a go at the newbies about how easy they have it as in their day they had to turn a rotary switch to D THEN PRESS PEDALS TO MOVE AND THEN TO STOP…And not forgetting they also had to steer it ,unlike these young pups who just play on their laptops or whatever there is in the future ,whilst the vehicle takes care of itself …As if it has an issue it will automatically drive itself to the nearest dealer
Nowdays with vehicles requiring laptops and with tome constraints , tachos ,and drivers not allowed to change a bulb etc it is more difficult to be helpful to fellow truckers …
You are one of a dying breed ,much as I am with being an Mechanic .long gone are the days of changing springs roadside
newmercman:
It’s the same all over, the biggest firms have more accidents than smaller firms, it’s the law of averages.
In the US if you see a pile up on an interstate, there will be a FedEx truck in the middle of it, yet if you key their DOT number into the national crash database you can see that as a fleet, they have a very low number of accidents per million miles travelled.
On a slightly more disturbing note, I just arrived back in Britain today after a 5yr absence and there wasn’t many UK registered lorries on the M25 between Heathrow and the A2, I popped into the new services at Cobham and OMG, after almost 9yrs of North American crap food, I could move into that place and stay there forever, all it needs is a pub and it would be nirvana. Things have changed since I last went in a UK service station.
To keep the post on track, I nearly got wiped out on the way in by an EE lorry that came out of a filter lane and straight across the front of me without a glance in his mirrors and again on the way out, an EE just changed lanes into the wrong lane, then went back into his original lane before stopping and backing up to avoid hitting the big high kerb with his trailer wheels.
I kept at least a lane between them and us when I got back out on the M25 as they seem a little unpredictable.
Are you trying to avoid the bad Winter out there NMM wee trip for our nice mild one!!![emoji6]
See on FB bit hairy about North Dakota (Boise/Bismark) -60wind chill,
bloody hell !!![emoji52]
Sent from my SM-J500FN using Tapatalk
I’m rather enjoying the fact that I can breathe through my nose outside, at home I can’t as my snot is frozen within a few breaths.
Always wondered:
How does it work taking a ■■■■ into the dyke when so cold??
Freezes in mid-air so to speak!!!
muckles:
You don’t have a vignette for Austria for trucks its a toll box, and most have a toll box for Italy
The problem is what Warberers and the rest of the EE transport represents.
Transport done far cheaper than companies in Western Europe can do it, because of cheap labour.
and plenty of companies have jumped on that bandwagon of setting up in Eastern Europe to pull trailers round Western Europe, (even some Spanish ones, using Romanian registered units to pull Spanish registered trailer, despite the unemployment rate in Spain being around 20%) this has virtually wiped out Western European based companies doing long distance European haulage.
.
Re vignettes, just my old term for tolls but in Austria/Switz/Italy it is weight dependent and yes there is the via card/ Telepass system in Italy and its all much the same as The DKV syatem i use in Spain on Autopistas.
Ref Romanian registered trucks, its actually quite rare for Spanish hauliers to do this. The big clearing house/consortium i sub for has around 120 units of its own and did actually look into doing this at one point but the complicated red tape was just too prohibitive…
norb:
You are one of a dying breed ,much as I am with being an Mechanic .long gone are the days of changing springs roadside
No…theyre very much still here… the co. i sub for swears by them
Not springs but air bag/ brake chamber/ wiring bodges ect, the very reason i keep disposable gloves and set of overalls with me…
To be fair, its not their fault, i know what theyre up against. They used to do repairs on other hauliers trailers years ago to get them mobile and legal but payment wasnt always forthcoming, most others shirked responsibility for damage being dumped from one country to another…
muckles:
They are basically posted to Western Europe and moving goods around for for a period of time before returning home, many aren’t even pulling trailers from their own country but for Western European transport operations
.
Strangely enough i/we do the opposite, we pull trailers for Hungarian hauliers as well as the odd Croatian one. These trailers are loaded for groupage around Spain or agg (polished stone) for Calais/ Reims depot (from Malaga)…
muckles:
You don’t have a vignette for Austria for trucks its a toll box, and most have a toll box for Italy
The problem is what Warberers and the rest of the EE transport represents.
Transport done far cheaper than companies in Western Europe can do it, because of cheap labour.
and plenty of companies have jumped on that bandwagon of setting up in Eastern Europe to pull trailers round Western Europe, (even some Spanish ones, using Romanian registered units to pull Spanish registered trailer, despite the unemployment rate in Spain being around 20%) this has virtually wiped out Western European based companies doing long distance European haulage.
.
Re vignettes, just my old term for tolls but in Austria/Switz/Italy it is weight dependent and yes there is the via card/ Telepass system in Italy and its all much the same as The DKV syatem i use in Spain on Autopistas.
And all pretty straight forward to use, especially if your boss has done the leg work and got the boxes.
AndrewG:
Ref Romanian registered trucks, its actually quite rare for Spanish hauliers to do this. The big clearing house/consortium i sub for has around 120 units of its own and did actually look into doing this at one point but the complicated red tape was just too prohibitive…
So it’s rare because Spanish red tape might make it difficult at the moment, but I’ve seen more and more Spanish trailers pulled by East European Units in the last couple of years, so they are moving in, I’ve rarely seen a Carrion trailer pulled by a Spanish unit outside Spain for a couple of years now.
muckles:
You don’t have a vignette for Austria for trucks its a toll box, and most have a toll box for Italy
The problem is what Warberers and the rest of the EE transport represents.
Transport done far cheaper than companies in Western Europe can do it, because of cheap labour.
and plenty of companies have jumped on that bandwagon of setting up in Eastern Europe to pull trailers round Western Europe, (even some Spanish ones, using Romanian registered units to pull Spanish registered trailer, despite the unemployment rate in Spain being around 20%) this has virtually wiped out Western European based companies doing long distance European haulage.
.
Re vignettes, just my old term for tolls but in Austria/Switz/Italy it is weight dependent and yes there is the via card/ Telepass system in Italy and its all much the same as The DKV syatem i use in Spain on Autopistas.
And all pretty straight forward to use, especially if your boss has done the leg work and got the boxes.
AndrewG:
Ref Romanian registered trucks, its actually quite rare for Spanish hauliers to do this. The big clearing house/consortium i sub for has around 120 units of its own and did actually look into doing this at one point but the complicated red tape was just too prohibitive…
So it’s rare because Spanish red tape might make it difficult at the moment, but I’ve seen more and more Spanish trailers pulled by East European Units in the last couple of years, so they are moving in, I’ve rarely seen a Carrion trailer pulled by a Spanish unit outside Spain for a couple of years now.
Pretty much my experience too, Muckles. Many Spanish trailers running with Polish and Romanian units on the front, and a few Portuguese hanging in there still (some with Brazilian drivers). As you say getting an Austrian GoBox is as simple as going to the first service area with a DKV card and reg docs and 5minutes later youre away. No need to speak a word even. As everywhere, the service station staff will always swipe a card for you. . .Not even the challenge of squeezing thro a peage in Austria, the authorities will happily take money from your account at 90kph as you go under their gantries. I only wish Germany were as easy.
As a comment how many of you have noticed the “Blue River” units pulling for Laurent Pellier for the past months? They seem to be working UK and France, but I wouldn`d know where else.
robert1952:
It’s a shame really because their fathers and grandfathers who drove Hungarocamion wagons were proper gentlemen of the road - careful, competent and would help anybody. I don’t think its just the Wabberer lot, there seems to be a new trucking culture that is partly the result of steering-wheel-attendant syndrome resulting from trucks being so much easier to drive. It has to be said, though, that driver training standards appear to be as diverse across Europe as they have ever been - no level playing field there, then! Robert
muckles:
So it’s rare because Spanish red tape might make it difficult at the moment, but I’ve seen more and more Spanish trailers pulled by East European Units in the last couple of years, so they are moving in, I’ve rarely seen a Carrion trailer pulled by a Spanish unit outside Spain for a couple of years now.
I dont disagree Muckles re Spanish trailers being pulled by EE’s but as i say we do quite the opposite, we pull Hungarian trailers out of the CDS to Calais/ Reims where theyre tipped and reloaded for elsewhere. As an owner driver ive subbed for this same Spanish co. for a number of years now and they seem to make this particular contract work well as the pay is pretty good. This is only a small part of it though as we also pull for Portugese and Greek outfits…
> robert1952: > It’s a shame really because their fathers and grandfathers who drove Hungarocamion wagons were proper gentlemen of the road - careful, competent and would help anybody. 0
+1 Robert
At one time Hungerocamion were amongst ‘The Best of the Best’ you could ever come across on the road, very highly trained, good kit & helped anyone out who was in trouble wherever it was - but being on Commy wages they still appreciated a carton of Marlboro if they did stop to help you
whisperingsmith: > robert1952: > It’s a shame really because their fathers and grandfathers who drove Hungarocamion wagons were proper gentlemen of the road - careful, competent and would help anybody. 0
+1 Robert
At one time Hungerocamion were amongst ‘The Best of the Best’ you could ever come across on the road, very highly trained, good kit & helped anyone out who was in trouble wherever it was - but being on Commy wages they still appreciated a carton of Marlboro if they did stop to help you
Absolutely! They’d also help you out if you visited their Budapest depot with a problem. robert
whisperingsmith:
At one time Hungerocamion were amongst ‘The Best of the Best’ you could ever come across on the road, very highly trained, good kit & helped anyone out who was in trouble wherever it was - but being on Commy wages they still appreciated a carton of Marlboro if they did stop to help you
They used to have extra training on their own circuit before being allowed driving on UK roads, on the left, roundabouts and road signs ect…
I have to say, AndrewG and Mark are spot on.
There’s no doubt that in general the driving standards of some of those eastern European guys are not as good as ours. But ateotd those guys are just like us, they want to earn a living.
Their wages and conditions are legendary for being pretty basic. And yeah it is true that most of these guys are putting big tours and milage, milage the average brit driver has no concept of (European drivers will tell you how different it is over here).
One thing I will say about those eastern drivers is that they certainly don’t complain as much as brit drivers.
I think may be I am picking up a little racial mischief here, do not forget were all friends ,all friends together in europe so do not be to hard on a few little mistakes
