Darb:
I hope I get an invite to their Xmas party as I’ve just put £100 into the kittyLoad not strapped
Let the bashing begin !! Professional blah blah blah, children blah blah blah
Unless I’ve missedsomething did you.
1, have internal straps, was you using them.
2, Even if u had internals did mr vosa man want you to use rachet and straps aswell
Truckulent:
http://ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/vehicles/doc/cargo_securing_guidelines_en.pdfWait 'till we have to learn the above as part of our dCPC!!
I think VOSA should have a read of it, because it seems to contradict what VOSA is supposed to be saying re. load security.
It also seems to be easier to follow than that stupid securing matrix that they have!
Also, if VOSA decided to do you for an insecure load, which actually met the best practices in that document, would it get thrown out of court??
The internals are not rated high enough to “secure” a heavy pallet. You would need straps rated to the load. Every pallet strapped down. 13 2tonne straps would probably do. Personally I don’t bother and revert to the old “load bearing curtains” argument. If I got done I would probably try my luck at court.
If the load has not shifted, How is it insecure?
Dieseldoforme:
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I’m going to invent trailers with 13 roof supports down each side.
No more pallet lashing required.
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Please don’t… They are bad enough to release just one of these, let alone 26!
trubster:
Please don’t… They are bad enough to release just one of these, let alone 26!
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Yes - Roof supports are only OK when brand new I suppose !
Thank God I mainly use box vans and rarely use curtainsiders these days.
I wonder how the hell they would strap down delicate stuff like palletised toilet rolls,
kitchen rolls and Easter eggs etc - it would all be damaged by the ratchet straps. It
would cost a fortune to put them all into plastic trays and then palletise them.
I’ve never strapped down pallets when I have carried them in the past - I’ve always
relied on the “load bearing” curtains. I’ve then gone round roundabouts knowing this.
I’ve not thrown it around corners either. I’ve driven it accordingly.
No doubt the industry boffins will come up with an answer. I can see something like
13 industrial seat belt mechanisms underneath one side of the trailer with a facility
to tighten and lock.
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Darb:
I hope I get an invite to their Xmas party as I’ve just put £100 into the kittyLoad not strapped
Let the bashing begin !! Professional blah blah blah, children blah blah blah
Common sense should’ve dictated to you that anything loaded by the monkeys at a pallet hub will need strapping as they love to put all the pallets of bricks and full IBCs on the top deck and the tall pallets of bog rolls on the bottom. 
Not bothering to strap it up is just laziness and you deserved the fine. If you do up the internal straps tight enough they are plenty adequate to hold the load on the decks if you go round a roundabout a bit sharpish or have to swerve. I know this because the chump who often does Palletforce with me doesn’t bother slowing down for any of the roundabouts through Burton and despite the trailer getting a good lean on he’s not lost one yet. Palletforce are dishing out warnings to the drivers and hauliers if anyone turns up there without the load being strapped now, much to the annoyance of Hand Transport from Chesterfield, H Youngs, EVTS and White Logistics to name a few that don’t even know what straps are. 
The problem really is that ‘we’ don’t have any drivers anymore, they are all steering wheel attendants who “drive” the combination like an F1 car and then look puzzled when the load comes through the curtain. Back in the old days of the sheds at Fradley Park no-one used to bother strapping as we were all professional pallet balancers 
and for the most part everything got from A to B and back to A again without any dramas.
bigmiler:
While i can see why the loads need to be strapped to try and keep them nice and secure there seems to be a few points missing from some of the post’s most of the internal straps are only rated to 5 ton breaking strain most trailers have 24 straps in them some 26 that is one for each pallet so that makes a total of using 24 straps a a load 5 x 24 = 120 tons your load weighs roughly 28 tons so plenty of lee way or so you think you travel at 56 MPH on motorway your load ( not counting the weight of your truck ) now weighs 1568 tons that means your straps are now well below any breaking strain for the load and once it has been strapped down it now makes one block weighing 28 tons when you break there is over 1000 tons on your brakes that what it comes to as in pressure needed to stop your truck ( but you can’t drive at 10 MPH all day ) so the straps theory is floored as the straps are only held by a roller and ball bearing in a light allot track and it is the track that takes the strain these tracks have been ripped of trailers in sharp breaking and even sharp corneringAlso the other point which i am sure that as proffessional drivers you will have your hard hat complete with chin strap to keep it on and goggles gloves safety boots and hi-viz vest all of theses will not help you one little bit with those double decker trailers you should also have under health and safety rules a harness which is attacheted to a pully system so if you fall from that height instead of falling to the ground at the speed of sound and smashing like an egg the system lowers you slowly to the ground there is a minimum height that the harness has to be worn but cannot remember what it is ( i think it is 3 or 4 feet of the ground ) your health and safety officer should be able to tell you and there should also be a at risk assessment on the wall where you load. Also you posted the ticket they gave you did they take pictures as well if not then there is no evidence that the load was not secure only there word for it i am not telling anyone how to do there job well all cut corners and i am no exception but if we are going to enforce the rules i feel it is to your advantage if you know a little of the science that goes with the job we do next time V.O.S.A. pull you up tell them all the information that i have put here have done it a few times and all V.O.S.A. said was not everyone is as well educated as you i am not i just read a lot hope some of this information helps you out there doing a thankless job for the totally ungreatfull squad.
Could tell you how i only got a 25 pound fine for being 41 tons when it was 38 max on a ministrey weighbridge it went to court and that was all they could fine me all comes down to reading the C.P.C. ( the transport manager has to know ).
You probably make a good point there, but owing to a lack of punctuation and use of paragraphs I gave up reading it. Shame really as what I could decipher make a good deal of sense
Bale Bandit:
You probably make a good point there, but owing to a lack of punctuation and use of paragraphs I gave up reading it. Shame really as what I could decipher make a good deal of sense
I got to the part where the trailer weighed 1568 tonnes then gave up.
I hope VOSA and the Transport Police never join forces, at the moment they rely on two loose steel chocks to hold 40 tonnes on the Tunnel and the Rollende Landstrasse, Hupac etc 
RobK:
Not bothering to strap it up is just laziness and you deserved the fine. If you do up the internal straps tight enough they are plenty adequate to hold the load on the decks
The guy that did the run regularly had removed all the internal straps, I defected the problem and my company ordered new straps that were due to arrive the next day (which they did ), I can assure you I’m far from lazy, just unlucky 
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VOSA prefer box vans.
“You’ll have to use a pump truck driver, we don’t have a loading ramp”
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I don’t do punctuation but basically when V.O.S.A. fine you they are doing so through use and construction not design and construction hope that helps which ever way you will get nicked.
Trucks are easy meat for traffic police and V.O.S.A. 
A lot don’t seem to get what I am saying about weight to ratio when you are pulled by VOSA soon to VDSA so here goes, 26 straps with 2 ton breaking strain= 52 tons breaking strain.
Load weighs 28 tons so 28 tons times by 56 MPH makes a breaking strain on straps of 1568 tons a short fall of 1516 tons.
Ratchet straps usually are 5 ton breaking strain so 13 straps ( as they go straight over 2 pallets ) 5x13= 65 tons breaking strain a short fall of 1503 tons.
What you do is time the weight of your load by your maximum speed, this gives you the tonnage put on to the straps, As once you are moving the load if you have to break will move as one block not as individual pallets, So you times the weight of the load by your maximum speed that is the weight the straps are trying to hold back.
This floors the must be strapped rule even if all your pallets are strapped and you jacknife chances are the load will still fall off the straps are put on as a gesture not a remedy.
Tell that to VOSA next time they start on about no straps the word they are looking for is velocity
most of it comes under pie in maths.
Way beyond any VOSA inspector.
■■■■■■■ just out to get money as is usual in this ■■■■■■ hell hole we ALL need to stand up and not leave until strapped and ■■■■ what companies say as it will soon have an effect on the economy im already looking to get out of the ■■■■ industry all follow then it will change otherwise stop slagging the likes of darb
Bale Bandit:
bigmiler:
While i can see why the loads need to be strapped to try and keep them nice and secure there seems to be a few points missing from some of the post’s most of the internal straps are only rated to 5 ton breaking strain most trailers have 24 straps in them some 26 that is one for each pallet so that makes a total of using 24 straps a a load 5 x 24 = 120 tons your load weighs roughly 28 tons so plenty of lee way or so you think you travel at 56 MPH on motorway your load ( not counting the weight of your truck ) now weighs 1568 tons that means your straps are now well below any breaking strain for the load and once it has been strapped down it now makes one block weighing 28 tons when you break there is over 1000 tons on your brakes that what it comes to as in pressure needed to stop your truck ( but you can’t drive at 10 MPH all day ) so the straps theory is floored as the straps are only held by a roller and ball bearing in a light allot track and it is the track that takes the strain these tracks have been ripped of trailers in sharp breaking and even sharp corneringCould tell you how i only got a 25 pound fine for being 41 tons when it was 38 max on a ministrey weighbridge it went to court and that was all they could fine me all comes down to reading the C.P.C. ( the transport manager has to know ).
You probably make a good point there, but owing to a lack of punctuation and use of paragraphs I gave up reading it. Shame really as what I could decipher make a good deal of sense
Didn’t realise I’d signed up to an English lesson forum.
Saw a Label on some curtains last week that said load bearing curtain, does this stand up as straps
bigmiler:
While i can see why the loads need to be strapped to try and keep them nice and secure there seems to be a few points missing from some of the post’s most of the internal straps are only rated to 5 ton breaking strain most trailers have 24 straps in them some 26 that is one for each pallet so that makes a total of using 24 straps a a load 5 x 24 = 120 tons your load weighs roughly 28 tons so plenty of lee way or so you think you travel at 56 MPH on motorway your load ( not counting the weight of your truck ) now weighs 1568 tons that means your straps are now well below any breaking strain for the load and once it has been strapped down it now makes one block weighing 28 tons when you break there is over 1000 tons on your brakes that what it comes to as in pressure needed to stop your truck ( but you can’t drive at 10 MPH all day ) so the straps theory is floored as the straps are only held by a roller and ball bearing in a light allot track and it is the track that takes the strain these tracks have been ripped of trailers in sharp breaking and even sharp cornering
That’s the longest sentence I’ve ever read but we’re none of us English teachers. 
I know what you’re saying but not sure your maths is right.
Disregarding flooring it uphill and everything sliding out the back (rare) and a head-on come-to-a-full-stop event (it’s all over anyway), the most common situation is losing loads during cornering. The equation for g-force in cornering is speed in mph squared / radius of corner in feet / 14.957 Let’s say a roundabout is 200’ radius and you’re doing 30mph round it; that’s 30^2/200/14.957 = 0.3g. So that’s a force of 0.3 times the force of gravity acting sideways on the load. Let’s take each pallet, or rather pair of pallets, since each row will be acting on one strap. From Newton’s Second Law of Motion (F = ma), the force acting on the strap , F , is the mass of both pallets x the g-force due to cornering. So if each pallet is 1t, then F = 2 x 0.3 = 0.6t. So a 5t rated strap is enough. Even if you can generate 1g cornering (say in evasive action), then the load on the strap is still only 2 x 1 = 2t. If the pallets are 2t, then the load will be 4 x 1 = 4t. Now we’re getting close but this doesn’t take into account frictional forces between the floor and the pallet (if they’re cages you can forget this).
Happy to be corrected on this - it’s been a while. 
escortg3:
Saw a Label on some curtains last week that said load bearing curtain, does this stand up as straps
Its got to help.
I think i’ll get a batch of labels done.
Vosa love straps, watched a guy yesterday get his load of wallpaper rejected because of damage caused by the edge protectors and straps had cut into the rolls.
I always love the “gravity will hold it” " if I drive to the conditions it wont move" “the curtains are load bearing” attitude. I wonder if they just sit their toddler on the back seat and hope for the best as well, after all if they drive with a bit of care it’ll be alright and it cant fall out cos the doors will hold it in
