Decode the 70/8 rule if you please...
 

If someone could please help and clarify a the "70 in 8" rule, I would surely appreciate it!

If a driver accumulates 61 hours between 10/3 and 10/10 and has a delivery to complete appx 2 hours on 10/11, he would have 7 hours remaining on his 70 (there was breakdown hours in between for some "short" days). Can he then drop his on-duty hours from 10/3 to keep his 70 going (for next drop)?

My husband's trainer never addressed this as he went home every week. He wants to run legal, but also doesn't want to turn down loads he can legally take! :?

My thoughts on this: It sure seems like drivers don't get much of a break out there - do you feel this is true!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!???????? ???

You have to have a 34 hr. consecutive break to reset hrs.
As long as he can legally drive there,unload,and drive to his break point,he's fine.

Yes his hours will fall off for the 3rd so on that 8th day he can drive what ever falls off + whatever is remaining on the 70. And so on every day something will fall off if you worked for that day and you are after your 8th day. Like me I try not to do any restarts while im out here I try to keep my work to 8 or so hours a day when possible. Can't always but try.

Re: Decode the 70/8 rule if you please...
 

Heres the basic rule: 11 hours driving in a 14 hour day. He has 70 hours to use in 8 days.

On the right side of his logbook there is a recap of the past 7 days. As he uses his hours he posts his used hours every day in the "yesterday" block. At each midnight he picks up the hours at the top of the recap, and his hours from the previous day go under "yesterday".

From the 3rd to the 10th is actually 8 days... so on the morning of the 10th he would have picked up the hours expended on the 3rd, then on the 11th he would have picked up the hours from the 4th. So....if he had expended 10 hours on the 3rd, and 10 hours of the 4th, he would have picked up 20 hours between the two days. So...actually for the 11th he would have already picked up the hours from the 3rd and 4th. BUT, he has to be very careful figuring his recap to make sure that he does have hours to run.

Sounds like he had what can only be called a "half-assed" trainer. I say this because before he cut your husband loose....he, if he was a professional driver and trainer, he would have made certain that your husband knew how to log all activities and how to maintain a log book.

He needs to talk to someone in safety, about how to proerly run his logs, or get with someone who knows how so that he doesn't end up catching the shaft in a DOT inspection.

No, we get lots of breaks. 70 hours to work in 8 days is plenty enough, and if he knows how to properly run his log book...he will have enough hours to make a good living, and do it without cheating on his logs.

No you DO NOT need to take a 34 hour break. It is ONE option but it is not REQUIRED.
-------------------------------------------------------------
The 70 in 8 rule means simply that you can not work more than 70 hours in the last 8 days including today. If you have had a 34 hour reset then you do not count any of the hours from before that. Think of the 34 hour reset counting like a week off and cleaning the slate of hours.

The complete rules are here: http://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/rules-regul.../fmcsr/395.htm

To summarize the rules that apply to most drivers (there are exceptions):
After taking ten (10) hours off duty a driver may log eleven (11) hours of driving time during the following fourteen (14) hours.
A driver may not drive after the fourteenth (14th) hour of duty. A driver may work loading/unloading as "on duty not driving" outside of this limit.
A driver may only work both "driving" and "on duty not driving" for only seventy (70) hours in any eight ( 8 ) days period.
If a driver logs thirty-four (34) consecutive hours off duty then this ends one eight ( 8 ) day period and starts a fresh eight ( 8 ) day period with a complete seventy (70) duty hours available again.

There is not a limit on how much you can drive in a 24 hour period, only a limit of how long you can drive after having a 10 hour break.

Check out the tracking HOS thread where we explored managing the 70 hours at length at:
http://classadrivers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=15704
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
61 hours over 8 days averages 7.5 hours per day
October 3 = 7.5 hours
oct 4th = 7.5 hours, 15 hours in last 7 (including today), 55 hours available for tomorrow(you see that tomorrow will be the 8th day).
oct 5th = 7.5 hours, 22.5 hours in last 7 days, 47.5 hours available tomorrow.
oct 6th = 7.5 hours, 30 hours in last 7 days, 40 hours available tomorrow.
oct 7th = 7.5 hours, 37.5 hours in last 7 days, 32.5 hours available tomorrow.
oct 8th = 7.5 hours, 45 hours in last 7 days, 25 hours available tomorrow.
oct 9th = 7.5 hours, 52.5 hours in last 7 days, 17.5 hours available tomorrow.
oct 10th = 7.5 hours, 52.5 hours in last 7 days, 17.5 hours available tomorrow.
oct 11th = 7.5 hours, 52.5 hours in last 7 days, 17.5 hours available tomorrow.
You see that you only count the last 7/8 days OR time since the last 34 hour break. Once enough time has gone by you don't quite get to the 70 hour mark as long as you never work more than an average of 8.75 hours per day.

Did that help?