Hos. Rules?

[JimT]

Last I heard they were still in government limbo. We had that proposed rule back around end of summer, but as far as I know we are still waiting on a final rule. Then, if we ever get there, we get to wait for it to go into effect! I remember hearing that the ELD companies wanted a year to make software updates. That's just ridiculous.

Oh, and we're in an election year, so the odds of seeing something are getting lower by the day...

[Waterloo]

New rules may be out this summer, some are speculating around the end of this year. Personally, I think it will not be until 2021, and then we have to wait for implementation.

This was a huge factor in parking my truck, I was speeding, playing beat the clock... So were many others around me, especially around the 1600 to 1800 hours as we all raced to find parking. Getting too dangerous, and just down right stupid out here. Me and clocks do not work well together. The reason I stayed in trucking all of these years, the freedom to do the job at my pace. Cannot do that anymore.

[Chamberpains]

Last I read a month ago or so, they were starting a listening session on breaking up the the day, expanding the total hrs to 16 possible under adverse conditions, dropping the 30 minute break to after 8 hrs of driving not after the day starts and proposed split sleeper birth again but it has something to do with 7/3...

https://www.chrobinson.com/blog/transpor...ng-market/

I don't see them actually doing anything until they get there new analysis back from the NTSB about whether ELDs are the cause of crash increases. The last article I read about this stated that the FMCSA admitted the crash rate is rising rapidly but they don't want to blame the ELDs because they didn't go in to full effect till last December. Now they want to see what happens after so time goes by post December. Just kick the can... and kick the can... hoping they can get a reduction to show up to justify their rules.

[JimT]

(01-24-2020 )Chamberpains Wrote:  Last I read a month ago or so, they were starting a listening session on breaking up the the day, expanding the total hrs to 16 possible under adverse conditions, dropping the 30 minute break to after 8 hrs of driving not after the day starts and proposed split sleeper birth again but it has something to do with 7/3...

https://www.chrobinson.com/blog/transpor...ng-market/

I don't see them actually doing anything until they get there new analysis back from the NTSB about whether ELDs are the cause of crash increases. The last article I read about this stated that the FMCSA admitted the crash rate is rising rapidly but they don't want to blame the ELDs because they didn't go in to full effect till last December. Now they want to see what happens after so time goes by post December. Just kick the can... and kick the can... hoping they can get a reduction to show up to justify their rules.

Well, it's government. Nothing happens fast in government (at least nothing good).

We all know what the outcome of the study will be: Inconclusive, do a another study!

Personally, I think the increase in crashes is only partly due to ELD's. Yes, it forces you to race the clock sometimes, especially when working around urban areas or if you're not good at trip planning. But I see three other big factors here:

Distractions (whether it be talking on the phone, texting, eating, personal grooming, digital bill boards, whatever)

Poorly built and/or maintained roads.

Bad Drivers (both car and truck).

The last one is very noticable in and around urban areas. While it's nothing new, the total number of drivers keeps increasing and that in turn increases the percentage of bad drivers.

I think the new proposal will help, a little, with the ticking clock. Although they need a better way to deal with unexpected and unavoidable delays in the HOS.

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I have an idea to help fix the HOS:

Do away with the 30 mi break.

Allow any split to the sleeper berth as long as it's 2+ hours, adds up to 10 and doesn't count toward the 14 hour clock.

Borrow:

Allow drivers to exceed the 14 hour daily limit, if needed. Any time past the 14th hour must then be deducted from the following day's On-Duty total. Time spent driving past the daily maximum must be documented in the log. Multiple days can be strung together, such as:

Day 1: Started with 14 On Duty hours available. Drove 30 minutes past the 14th hour.
Day 2: Started with 13.5 On Duty hours available. Drove 30 minutes past the 13.5th hour.
Day 3: Started with 13 On Duty hours available. Drove 1 hour past the 13th hour.
Day 4: Started with 12 On Duty hours available. Did not exceed the 12th hour On Duty.
Day 5: Starts with 14 On Duty hours available.

There should be some limits in place to help prevent outright abuse, such as maybe a 2 hour maximum extension per day. There should be no need to limit the number of consecutive days since each day the available hours decreases resulting in shorter maximum shifts.

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Work more, rest more:

Another option would be to increase the required time off after exceeding the 14th hour. So, for example, every minute you drive past the 14th hour gets added on to your required 10 hour off duty period. Drive until the 15th hour? Fine, now you need 11 hours off duty. This approach allows for flexibility but also imposes a penalty to discourage abuse.

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EDIT: In all the examples above the same flexibility would apply to the 11 hour drive time as well. In the first example an overage in drive time results in a reduction of available drive time the following day. In the second example an overage in drive time would result in a longer off-duty period.

Those are just my opinions based on logical and practical application. Which of course means that the government will never consider them.

[DVT873]

Commercial drivers and pilots, train engineers, nuclear power plant operator's and I'm guessing several other industries all have HOS rules and regs in one form or another. Guess what industry/profession has none? Zip nada, nothing and in fact its members are proud of how long they can function without sleep. 18,24,36 hour shifts are common. It is a rite of passage for higher level members and is part of their training cycle when they first go live. A cycle that can be more than a year. NO mandatory stops, no resets, no 36 hours off. Know what it is? The medical profession. From doctors and surgeons down to LPN's. ER's are heavily staffed with residents, supervised by ER doctors and surgeons that are often equally sleep deprived. Of course their accidents and mistakes aren't as photogenic as a 60 vehicle pileup. Just think about doing an overhead after 30 hours of no sleep, with the engine running. Before I sound like to much of a jerk, my fathers life was saved by an extremely skilled surgeon who caught the case after literally stepping out of an operating room at the end of an 18 hour procedure. In less than an hour he was deep in my dads abdomen for the next 7 hours. I just find the extremes interesting.

[Magard]

I have a doctor buddy and you are absolutely right. Also look at the life expectancy of a doctor. They die young. To much stress and no sleep. Retire and die a lot of them. My grandpa was a doctor and that was his story.

[DVT873]

I sympathize with your grandpa. But I wonder about the impact on us as patients. I have another concern/observation. As more and more of us go into Medicare we are going to get caught up in a system similar to the OEM/stealership model. Everything in medicine has to be coded to be submitted for payment. And that coding is every bit as fucked up as warranty coding is for truck repairs. In this case the government will be the OEM. And they are the sole determining factor on how much they will pay to fix you. Medical industry is maybe 10 years behind the vehicle industry in this area. Myself and many techs my age actively try to talk any young person out of going into this as a profession. Did this successfully myself a year ago. The young man is apprenticed as a commercial electrician and loving it.
GM currently pays .3 hrs diag on an electrical problem. They recently cut the time for putting a set of injectors and an injection pump into a Duramax by over half. And it was tight to start with. Almost all dealer automotive techs and about half of the HD techs are on flat rate. The dealers don't care because they pay the techs a percentage of what the manufacturer pays them. If it takes me three and a half hours to diag the electrical problem I get paid my .3. Whoopee.
Same thing is happening in medicine. The government sets the rates. Your doctor is allocated 15 minutes for an office call face-to-face with you and he has to fill out a form on that visit to get paid. Ever notice that he's usually pecking away at his computer and is only half focused on his conversation with you? There's plenty of money for the salesman, for the executives, and for the big shots at the OE's but when it comes time to pay somebody to actually fix the truck all of the sudden the cupboard is bare. So they throw money and parts at it and duct tape the CAC hoses on call it good and ship it. Anybody with even half the skill set that Rawze has is not going to be anywhere near a motor vehicle in a dealer setting unless they really really love it and really really like getting kicked in the nuts on a regular basis.
A C level tech doing fluid changes, brakes, shocks and struts will out earn the smartest guy in the shop because the smartest guy is going to get stuck with all the warranty nightmares. Is it any wonder there are fewer and fewer people who know what the f$%k they're doing? Every time techs start to regularly beat the flat rate, usually by taking shortcuts in the cleaning, inspection, and torquing steps the OE cuts the rate. It's a race to the bottom. Actually kind of like freight rates. The problem of technicians, mechanics hacks or whatever you want to call us is going to solve itself. There won't be any that know what their doing. We are about there now.

[Waterloo]

The medical coding and mechanic scenario is already playing it self out. Heal they self, and learn how to wrench.