A Couple Questions
 

I've been at this for a little more than a year now and there are a few questions I have about the truck I'm in that bugs the crap out of me. I'm sure there is a logical reason for these that I'm missing, so let me hear it.

I'm in a 2002 Freightliner Columbia. Why is there an electronic control for the passenger side window on the drivers side and a traditional hand crank for the window on the drivers side. The passenger door has both. Is it a safety thing or is my company really that cheap? To me, its more dangerous to lean down and roll the window down rather than just using a button. Why would they put one window control in?

Also, on some of our company trucks (all freightliner columbias) the release for the 5th wheel is on the passenger side. Now Im not lazy, but I drop and hook 5 or 6 times a day and it just gets annoying when everything else involved with a drop n hook is on the drivers side and I have to walk around to release the 5th wheel.

This winter my company is cutting back on costs. Especially on fuel. They require everyone to leave their trucks plugged in at the shop so nobody is running the trucks over the weekend. They say that anyone caught letting the truck idol over the weekend will be charged for the fuel. This doesn't bother me, I live one mile from the shop, but how can they or can they tell that you left the truck running? I know they can get info from the onboard computer about you idol time, speed, hard braking and all that, but can they actually tell exactly when the truck is on, moving or exactly where it is? Can they check that in real time? And we do have qualcomm.

Thanks for any info guys

Something else I wondered about. Can the DOT look at your qualcomm to compare your logs? I usually only work 12 hours a day, but I was just curious about that. Somebody told me no, but I always thought if your involved in a serious accident, they are gonna look at everything.

Yes, they are that cheap.


You had better believe that if you are ever in a serious accident your logbook will be gone through with a fine tooth comb. They will compare your logbook to every electronic bit of information that they can get, like qualcomm records, credit card records, cell phone records, and toll receipts. If they don't match you are in a world of trouble.

TMC got fined big time last year (So I hear) when the DOT auditors found several cases of drivers logs not matching qualcomm records.

The reason you only have a power window control for the passenger window is so you can control the passenger window from the driver's seat. You can control the manual driver's window fine from your side, but to lower or raise the passenger window when you are by yourself would require you to pull over if you didn't have the power control. I agree it's kind of cheap to only have it on one side (how much more could it cost for power to the driver's side?), but I guess if you multiply the cost of the additional power window on the driver's side by the number of trucks, it would add up to quite a sum. Consider yourself lucky that they at least put the power window on the passenger side.

As far as the 5th wheel release being on the passenger side, many trailers have the crank handle for the trailer landing gear on the passenger side and they may have put the release there to 'make it easier'. A pain when your crank is on the driver's side, but not bad when it's on the passenger side. Just one of those things I guess.

I don't know if DOT can check your Qualcomm to compare your logs during a normal inspection -- I imagine if they ask you should let them. However, when you are involved in an accident -- especially if there is any serious injury or fatality -- they will not only look at Qualcomm but they will check weigh stations along your route, any fuel receipts, and your company's satellite tracking to make sure you were where you said you were on your logs. If anything doesn't check out, you will be found to be falsifying your logs and may be looking at jail time since if you had been running legal, you would not have been there to be involved in the accident and the person would not have been injured or killed -- even if you were not at fault in the accident.

As far as running your truck over the weekend, I'm sure they would be able to tell by your fuel consumption as well as checking the idle hours on the truck, if you were idling your truck over the weekend.

Well the window thing is just a matter of specs. The passenger side power window might even be standard equipment, I don't know. Our fleet has them both ways, but I notice that the ones with power windows on both sides also have extra gauges. Maybe it all comes toghther as an extra-cost package.

The 5th wheel release on the right side is a safety feature. It's not uncommon to have trailers with their landing gear cranks over there also. The idea is to put these things on the curb-side so if you drop your trailer at the side of the road your butt isn't hanging out in traffic. If you're thinking "How often does that happen", the answer is as long as tractors conk out and need to be repowered en route. I know you've already seen a truck broken down on a narrow shoulder and here's the driver out there wrestling with some emergency repair while trucks pass 2 feet from him at 65mph. No company wants their driver placed in that kind of danger even once if it can be avoided.

Idling- on the columbia you can see your total idling hours on that display on the dash. These companys can look at that data, and from their experience, get a pretty good idea what you're doing. If you're way out of bounds once, they might shrug and not say anything, but if it's week after week, they'll know something's up.

Depending on how the Qualcomm is hooked up, the office can tell where the truck is and what it is doing at any given time, which includes sitting and idling.

At this time the QC unit in the truck is not a reliable source of cross checking log books (unless like Werner you are using paperless logs via the QC) and the DOT know it and therefore will not bother with it. The only thing on the QC that could place you any certain place would be your loaded/MT etc messages and those can be easily erased from the truck unit.

your company is just cheap and yes they can look at your qualcomm

It's like the black box on a plane.

all i know is i watched the mechanic download my qualcomm when i was a company driver for Werner and it is scary what is tells

the qualcomm can be both good and bad. if you send a message saying you only have a few hours left to run for the day and you send your dispatcher a message saying I can only make it to xyz city, xyz state and you will be out of hours and cant make a delivery that protects you in the event they say you never informed them and it gives them something to look at if the load is hot and needs to be relayed. my company looks at my overspeed and over idle every month but our safety bonus is based off of that which i can get cause my truck only runs 64-65 mph on the cruise or on the floor but in turn my truck will average anywhere from 6.8 - 8 mpg except for when im pulling a loaded van then its down to anywhere from 5.5 to 7 with a freightliner midroof no air dam on top