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May we hear what prompts your advice? Are you a BR-Unit owner? Why should someone RUN AS FAST AS YOU CAN!!!!!!?

Glad you enjoyed it, Joe. I would have been surprised if you had not. Folks, when Diane and I visited Joe and Jen at their home a couple months ago, he told me he would rather hunt than eat. That was more than a figure of speech. I believe him.

It is not necessarily true that teams will be placed on the longer runs because of the new rule. It would only be true if teams can be found, and that is not as easy as it once was. Carriers are deeply concerned about the recruiting and retention difficulties CSA 2010 is already having. If it...

Diane and I were on the road for over seven years before we found ourselves in a spot where tire chains were required for the truck to legally proceed. Like most anything else I have never done before, a bit of apprehension preceeded the event. It is not hard to chain up a truck, but there is...

That is news to me. I recently chained up for the first time ever in California. Checking this CALTRANS document, I saw no requirement to chain the steer tires ever. Checking further into this, to make sure Diane and I are carrying all chains on the truck that we may ever need, I saw no...

Ditto! We did just six runs in October and it was one of the most lucrative months we had all year. While I can look it up, I cannot say off the top of my head how many miles we ran because that number does not matter as much as the other numbers we consider when accepting and declining loads.

Diane and I have crossed the imfamous Banning scales many times with our 94 chicken lights, and most recently even with two only partially operational. One light has two of four LEDs working, the other has one of four. I intend to fix them, of course, but since they are not a required lamp, I...

Also a very good point. And, in fact, driving a car for eight hours a day IS exhausting. Four-wheelers do not understand how much easier it is to drive a truck for eight hours than a car. In fairness, there is no way they could since most of them have no idea what it is like to be in a truck...

That is true with an important exception; teams who do security loads where the customer is paying to have one team member awake with the freight at all times. Diane and I do not often run out of hours in a week but it does happen from time to time when we are on security loads. Time logged as...

Safety advocates would suggest that a restart time extended to 44 hours would benefit everybody by providing a better rested driver pool. A cynical observer might suggest that it would benefit union advocates who have a voice in the current administration and Congress (before the election) by...

These are all good questions but the FMCSA is staying mum until the official announcement is made. The announcement is expected soon but the date is unknown. What will be announced is a proposed new rule, not a new rule. The proposal will be kicked around in public discussion for months before...

The talk I hear is of cutting drive time to 10 hours per day from the currently allowed 11, and of extending the reset time to 44 hours from the currently allowed 34. This is scuttlebutt, not a known fact, but these numbers seem to be filling in the blank that the facts will replace when FMCSA...

Give TeamCaffee credit. She was the one who posted the reg itself. That is one interpretation, the advantage of which is you can run the multi-diode (or multi-bulb) lamp a while longer until all the diodes fail. However, on a required lamp, I would not force the issue. An officer could just as...

The talk is not of a cut to the restart time. It is of extending the restart time by cutting driving hours.

Deborah Lockridge (Editor, Heavy Duty Trucking), recently quoted a freight transportation forecaster who said that the expected changes in HOS would create overnight the need for an additional 150,000 trucks and drivers. I don't know if the HOS changes would have that effect or not. I do...

The regulation is quoted below. Note that there is a difference between chicken lights (auxilary lamps, additional lamps, lamps not required by the regulation) and "all lamps required by this subpart." In other words, chicken lights do not have to work. I am open to correction on this since we...

Complaints are common here in the Open Forum about fleet owners that harmed drivers by failing to maintain equipment, holding back pay, improperly keeping escrow money, violating contract provisions, etc. Yet no one ever names a fleet owner publicly to warn off other potential victims. The...

I believe the new CSA 2010 point system for scoring violations will improve the quality of enforcement over time. Because it is no longer a good idea to accept a ticket for a minor violation and move on (actually, it never was a good idea), many more tickets will be fought after they are written...

Leo, your page-turning point is a good one and a feature I have come to fully appreciate as I read my Kindle. It really is easier to hold and read a Kindle than a book. But note the somewhat different purposes readers have. Many have voiced objections about the Kindle precisely because it is...

It is amazing how willing people are to stay stuck in a bad situation because they are unwilling to take a loss. "Cut my losses and move on" are some of the most powerful words in business.