When is a red traffic light not a stop light!!!!!

[JonnyG]

"different"
I dont believe anybody said that today the job is more difficult, indeed a few post have given an impression of how much easier it is today.I would say it has different aspects,and that could be said of many things we come across in our working and indeed leisure life.
OK the driving side of things are not as physical or uncomfortable as they were,but that doesn't mean the job has become easier So called.progress brings its own problems for all concerned and workload is workload however you want to categorize it.

 

[Steve L]

Johnny.
Driving a car without a fully functioning clutch is not actually illegal. If I were to take it for a MOT it would fail but that doesn't become an issue until August 2011.
What is currently happening is that fluid is escaping past a seal and susequently letting air in which causes loss of action after about 50 cycles of the cylinder. The amount of fluid lost is about 50ml.
I don't propose to lye down in the snow for 4 hrs to strip the nearside suspension and release the gearbox sliding it into the subframe wheel well area to change the cylinder yet. We move sites in the next 7 days and as that site is nearer my mothers place, I'll put the car in her shed and do it then. Meanwhile I will continue using the bicycle pump easy bleed system I've made to go along with the lucozade bottle resevoir connected to the clutch master cylinder to bleed the air out of the system. BTW, I collect the bled brake fluid, let it stand for 24Hrs and re-use it again to top up the system.

You see, Johnny the point is , I'm an old school driver who has had to mend cars and trucks on the roadside in the middle of nowhere. Using skills and methods to overcome a difficulty instead of calling AA, RAC, or Green Flag who would only tow the car to a garage who will charge £60 an Hr for work I can do myself.

I will do the job when I'm good and ready. Needless to say, I'm using my daughter's Meganne for long journys at the mo.

 

[mcghee]

i hope you let your fluid stand in a sealed container, otherwise it'll only good for use as shampoo.

 

[seth1]

Soozeeg,i posted that,regards to not doing their own maintenance,with all respect when was the last time you or i seen a driver changing his own wheels,relining a brake,fitting a set of fanbelts,the majority of drivers cant or wont change a light bulb.Im not impliying thats their fault,but most likely down to job discription.
As for modern day HGV,s their is no such thing as a bad one,even a 15 year old vehicle is still a million miles away in terms of driver comfort from what people refer to as "proper" lorries.I have a friend who has just"hung" his heavy goods up after countless years at it,and sadly not by choice.This guy was doing middle east in the 70,s day cab ERF A series,180 gardiner,6 speed david brown,2speed eaton.4weeks away at a time,no workshops,nothing.Get on with it.As Jonny say,s the paperwork,driver cpc,Digi tachos,has tightened it up but every other aspect has got better and with it easier.How many flat trailers are seen these days,these are now classed as specialised,a flat trailer?Tautliners are seen as the norm,so your roping and sheeting,s just gone out the window. Its a pleasant job nowadays as long as you remember your getting paid.

 

[seth1]

Soozeeg,i posted that,regards to not doing their own maintenance,with all respect when was the last time you or i seen a driver changing his own wheels,relining a brake,fitting a set of fanbelts,the majority of drivers cant or wont change a light bulb.Im not impliying thats their fault,but most likely down to job discription.
As for modern day HGV,s their is no such thing as a bad one,even a 15 year old vehicle is still a million miles away in terms of driver comfort from what people refer to as "proper" lorries.I have a friend who has just"hung" his heavy goods up after countless years at it,and sadly not by choice.This guy was doing middle east in the 70,s day cab ERF A series,180 gardiner,6 speed david brown,2speed eaton.4weeks away at a time,no workshops,nothing.Get on with it.As Jonny say,s the paperwork,driver cpc,Digi tachos,has tightened it up but every other aspect has got better and with it easier.How many flat trailers are seen these days,these are now classed as specialised,a flat trailer?Tautliners are seen as the norm,so your roping and sheeting,s just gone out the window. Its a pleasant job nowadays as long as you remember your getting paid.

 

[colin-yorkshire1]

The transport manager who does 2 hr debriefs needs just one thing. To get off his arse and spend a week with the driver to see what goes on out there. As a driver incharge of the firm's truck all you have to do is get the loads delivered within the law and on time.
As I've already said, you do get transport managers who drive nothing but desks and computers. But they can be brought down to reality by using their tools against them. All it takes is old fashioned comaradery. Stick together and you win together.

hi all
I never said there was 2hr briefings i said it was 2hrs in the yard on return including briefings unloading returns ect ect. and as for sticking together forget it your on your own. (or on the dole)
to be fair I never did long distance or overnighters but did multi drop deliveries as a day job so never had fancy cabs or autoboxes and no never had to rope or sheet but that is not the point. it was all hassle that went on without all the nutters out there on the roads.
the job was all about delivery times having to be in the right place at the right time all the time with a big spy in the form of a 50in screen 50miles away plotting every move all day every day with the mobile contantly ringing every time you stopped or got behind
being out of the house 14hrs a day with no free time
every day a different route with a different truck having to take date and time stamped photos of any damage anywhere before signing it out (just in case) the constant pressure vacuum of the job day in day out "like I said thank god I dont have to it anymore"
wether trucking is harder or easier than it used to to be may be open to question one thing though there is no doubt "as my transport manager told me once your never alone in your cab if you fart I will smell it" that is something that the older truckers did not have to contend with thats for sure.

 

[Steve L]

I understand your point Colin but I will stand by what I said. Desk driving transport managers need to get off their arse and do the job under the same pressures that they exert to appriciate the job.
I was a supervisor in a car chassis manufacturer and when we had exhausted the shopfloor workforce, I went to the MD and asked to borrow non essential office staf to run machines in the week. He rolled up his sleeves and joined us on the shop floor. To this day i can still see the look on my managers face when he came to ask Derek for more cash for temps to do the job Derek was doing. I had 65 office staff all running cnc machines and power presses. They never looked down on the shopfloor from their pedestal of the office after that.
My manager was also enlightened on just how unreliable some of the cnc fixtures were and soon got the design engineer down to sample the joys of making scrap parts. A lot happened over the month to reduce scrapage and increase right first time, including training my two fellow supervisors on CMM measuring and test rig checking of BMW mini bumpers etc etc. I'd worked from the shopfloor up and had made it my business to be able to do all the quality checking and be able to run every machine on the floor.

Life on the coal face is hard and un-rewarded at times but never let them drag you down. I saw a post card once that say's it all.

"Never try to keep up with the Jones's, drag them down to your level, it's cheaper"

 

[JonnyG]

Johnny.
Driving a car without a fully functioning clutch is not actually illegal. If I were to take it for a MOT it would fail but that doesn't become an issue until August 2011.
What is currently happening is that fluid is escaping past a seal and susequently letting air in which causes loss of action after about 50 cycles of the cylinder. The amount of fluid lost is about 50ml.
I don't propose to lye down in the snow for 4 hrs to strip the nearside suspension and release the gearbox sliding it into the subframe wheel well area to change the cylinder yet. We move sites in the next 7 days and as that site is nearer my mothers place, I'll put the car in her shed and do it then. Meanwhile I will continue using the bicycle pump easy bleed system I've made to go along with the lucozade bottle resevoir connected to the clutch master cylinder to bleed the air out of the system. BTW, I collect the bled brake fluid, let it stand for 24Hrs and re-use it again to top up the system.

You see, Johnny the point is , I'm an old school driver who has had to mend cars and trucks on the roadside in the middle of nowhere. Using skills and methods to overcome a difficulty instead of calling AA, RAC, or Green Flag who would only tow the car to a garage who will charge £60 an Hr for work I can do myself.

I will do the job when I'm good and ready. Needless to say, I'm using my daughter's Meganne for long journys at the mo.

I am a little stumped by this response, you either have a system that is not working,as you claimed earlier, or you don't! Which is it?
You are actually "wrong" to claim your car is MOT compliant, You have been driving with a car in a non roadworthy condition, and a piece of paper does not protect you from prosecution,it also only proves the car was roadworthy on the day it was issued, so to claim driving the car with this know defect is not illegal is hog wash.
besides which you are missing a serious point, here,you seem to be more concerned with boasting how good your driving ability is rather then the serious effect you could have on other road uses!with a car that could become a knowingly danger to other road uses,regardless of how good you think you are at controlling it!
I made this observation due to you posting how you were still using the car, ie giving lifts and how smooth you gear changes were, now it seems the story has changed somewhat, so i am glad to hear you are actually not really driving said vehicle.although as you seem to be re bleeding the system, surely one could assume that this is not actually the case, so really you were still using an unroadworthy car.Hopefully this is not the car you intend to move your caravan with?

I made the comment concerning "hoping it is the master cylinder" as a slave cylinder leak, which now by your account seems to be the case,is not something that should be left unfixed,although no doubt in your case it will be different to every other reported similar defect. 50ml or not is irrelevant,besides leaks don't normally fix themselves and sooner or later the leak will get very much worse and the fluid will indeed damage the clutch shortening its life dramatically, but worse than that it normally does also contaminate the DMF again shortening its life too.add to these two items the concentric slave cylinder too is obviously gone
And whilst I am sure you will be doing the work yourself, the cost of these parts are huge, although no doubt neither of these parts will actually be damaged in your case!

 

[seth1]

I find it a bit harsh how people slag off the transport managers,most of these guys have gained the title by either going to college and studying for a cpc(certificate of professional compatence) or actually driven HGV,s and come up,most have actually done the job themselves earlier in their lives.These guys answer to someone as well.The job is available to everyone if prepared to put the time in to do the studying.

 

[JonnyG]

"I understand your point Colin but I will stand by what I said. Desk driving transport managers need to get off their arse and do the job under the same pressures that they exert to appreciate the job."

I recall a driver saying something similar to this a few months back. He is an idiot though "old school" has no idea about bussinesss practices wouldnt know how to do anything else than drive from A to B, frankly why should he, but the why should he start sprouting on about things he has no idea about too! We do also have very capable drivers too.
I recall a few years back working in another field having a customer out in the sticks, every time we had to call on him it was a night mere, in effect we only passed by his area early in the morning, he knew this and frankly couldnt get his brain around the fact that we as a company could not and would not change the route so that we could fit him in later in the day!
To him it was a case of "we don't know what we are doing" There was no point in trying to explain to this dim wit the round could not be changed solely for an irregular customer, that then effected every other regular customer on that round.
All he could see was from his limited point of view and frankly nothing else, he knew nothing of how the business worked or the time and extra costs that would make it frankly impracticably.but that was his view and nothing would change it.
I do enjoy reading stuff, i find most of it informative and useful, but some stuff makes me laugh, "generalisation " make me cringe, and this topic boarder on that.
Plenty of transport office workers have experience of hgv driving, but this seems to be missed by some posters! Plenty of transport office types are on the ball to helping out their drivers in anyway they can, plenty of transport managers put their drivers first and keep a kean eye on their welfare and legal aspect of the job.
Plenty of transport managers go on what their drivers give in feedback to help make the job that bit better, but what do you read in topics like this?
ill-informed remarks, that frankly remind me of the industry 2 or more decades ago, the funny thing is back in those days most transport bosses where indeed EX drivers "old school"types, kind of makes some of the responses on this topic, not only extremely funny to me, but shows how out of touch some are when making their views known!

 

[colin-yorkshire1]

hi all.
I take onboard what jonnyG wrote regarding customers it was a daily headache as well as just getting to their premises on time to find there was no one to unload or to sign the sheet. however the support from the transport team at times could be lets say less than more supportive its approach was your the driver do your job get on with it.
regular readers of this forum will know that I'm no shrinking violet and can't remember the number of ups and down I have had in that office they will also know from previous threads that I was a quality control manager at one time and know the pressures that go with the title. I have on other occasions wrote that the majority of managers now come straight in from outside and are not raised from the ranks. "ie ex drivers".
going back to the opening post I would suggest it was the pressure of the job that makes drivers throw away good sense and drive aggressively being 50mtrs further up the road can be important.

All that being said at the end of the day it does not matter who you are or have been in the past or even what you know to be right and wrong it is only a matter of the here and now you could have run a transport business but to your new boss your just one of the drivers and your views are meanigless afterall its just a job.

when you stop doing it someone comes in to replace you and the world continues to revolve.
colin

 

[Philspadders]

I had 65 office staff all running cnc machines and power presses. They never looked down on the shopfloor from their pedestal of the office after that.
Nice to see the them and us attitude being propagated.
Mmmm , HSE would have had a field day., Untrained, un qualified personel operating machinery.... thats is in direct breach of all HS rules and laws. Your company would nto have been insured. Who carried out the risk assesment?

The attitude towards customers b y some posters sums up everything that wrong with this country. Those customers paid your wages.
The most important asset the company had was not the drivers but the customers.
As for berating office staff, i suspect that instead of leaving school and going out getting drunk , they carried on studying perhaps combining work and night school, trying to better them selves and create a more prosperous future and better working conditions for themslves and their future famllies.
From your posts i suspect you have little knowlwdge of management and the responsibilty that comes with the job. Amongst all the complaining thay you have done , did you once get of your backsides, go to night school, take up some form of further education, try to better yourselves so that perhaps you too could work in cosy office.After all , if you know so much already about how a business operates, and with hands on driving experience you would be a valuable company rescourse. You probably already know about ROI caculations, P&L management , Health & Safety, Cost/Efficiency,Credit managemrnt, Accounting law,SPC , KPI.s , the list goes on and on.
During 2008/2009 as a Sales Manager for and engineering company i was accused by the shopfloor of not understanding what they did, how they did it,of bringing in the "wrong kind of work".
I spewnt 18months wondering and not sleeping about how could i ensure that 50 plus people would actually have a job for 2010. How many would be paying their mortgage and having food on the table. As a manager that was my responsibilty, and it caused me many sleepless nights. I also had to find ways of saving money, spending less., controlling costs and still try to keep the workforce fully employed.I was at work everyday for 7.30am and left after 6.30pm at night. I never got a lunch. Weekends were spent developing various business models , all in an attempt to keep the business in business and those guys employed.
All they could do was complain that they "had to do more little job".
Half way through 2010 i got so fed up with the complaining that a brought the 3 main moaners in to the offices for 2 weeks. After the 2 weeks i asked them where they would like to work, offices or shop floor. The all went back to the shop floor, and the feedback we got was they had a new appreciation of office work. It was not all drinking coffee and chating on the telephone. They were mentally exhausted and later admitted thatn the shop floor was easy.

PS, i started as an apprenctice tool,maker in 1978. I worked full time, i attended day realease and organised 2 extra nights per week at my expense. I did this for 5 years and got mY HND in engineering. I movend into the drg office . A few years later i took my self off to college again and polytechic at my cost to study for a degree. It took me 5 more years.
5 years ago i started a BA course , this took 2 years of my own time and money.
I am now on an Msc, again my money my time and with 2 young kids its not easy.
Rather that sitting on my arse and berating everyone i am doing something about it. What are you doing ?

They still have job, they still pay their mortgage

 

[Parksy]

The answer appears to be when it's snowing!
I was in Hereford Hospital yesterday afternoon and when we left there there had been 5 cm or 2" of snow fall. You guessed it! Total gridlock.
But why?
Quite simply because at every set of traffic lights car,van and bus drivers would cross the point at ahich the traffic lights stood with blatently nowhere to go as the other side of the junction was full of vehicles already, because further up the street the same had been done by other inconsiderate drivers. Result, total gridlock.
Unless you are totally thick which I'm sure 75% of drivers are not. Every set of traffic lights has a white solid line about 3 metres before the pole holding the traffic lights up.
The highway code states that you should not enter a traffic light controlled junction without room for you to enter the flow of traffic in the road you are driving into be it straight ahead or a left/right turn.
Of cause there were no sign of a policeman on foot who could of stepped in to bring back normal comliance with traffic lights.
The best bit though is, the very same people who commit these offences are actually local people with full knowledge of the roads in the city. but when a drop of snow comes down they leave common sense and consideration behind and resort to "neadothol man (fred flintstone) attitude" instead of behaving as if there was no snow and complying with the traffic signals.
It took 4 hours to do a 25 min journey just because of the attitude of drivers and one articulated lorry driver who had near bald tyres causing him to loose grip on Dimore hill, because he skewed across the hill while going uphill.

So I guess it's SSDD all this week with a flake or two of snow forcast!

Once again a fairly normal run of the mill topic appears to be heading for the waste bin.
The original post is quoted above and if there are on topic comments that's fine, feel free to add them. Personal off topic points scoring comments will be deleted with no further warning from here on in.

 

[ProfAlGoogle]

Reading this post has certainly brought back some fond memories for me. I started my HGV driving way back in 1971 with an old Albion chieftain, an old Sedon with a park royal cab, numerous ERF`s, Atkinson's etc, and suffer with the old common syndrome of the Day Lorry drivers left ear, cased by the racket the engine kicked up with only it`s metal cover between you and the engine!
Yes life was very hard then with very basic tools to work with, bloody freezing in the winter, and boiling in the summer months, mirrors that could have quite easily come out of a budgies cage, no power steering, and a left leg that was numb after driving through London traffic, due to the amount of force required to depress the clutch, and no sleeper cabs.
The lorry drivers "Hitch" as Steve in Leo was referring to must be a modern term for it as we always referred to it as a "Dolly" and ho what joy trying to undo one of those of a frosty morning when they were froze solid. Pigs ears, envelopes in the rear of your sheet, Sylvester's, and to see a forklift was an absolute joy, as in those days most of the stuff you carried was put on and taken off by hand.
But it had it`s benefits and perks like all jobs, and what would I choose yesteryears or today's Trucker? well having been out of the game for a few years I am now a warehouse manager and I see both sides of the coin, back in my day no mobile phones, trackers etc, once you left the yard you was your own man no one chasing your butt, if they wanted you they would leave a message at your next drop, and you swore blind that they never passed it on! then there was the good old log book that only recorded what you put in it! Then there's Today's trucker, all mod cons, trucks to die for compared to what I had to drive, but all that hassle with mobile phones, trackers, endless traffic jams, 15hr Days......................................................................................... the jury's out lol

Wishing you all a very happy new year....................................................Allan.

 

[mcghee]

the problem is colin, that for every office worker or manager who, like yourself, has started at the bottom there are half a dozen who went from school to college to an office where they attempt to preside over workers whose work they don't understand, having never done it.

there are few things worse than being told how to do a job by someone who has never held the tools in their hands. especially when they insist on it being done their way.

 

[emmerson]

cookieones, have you tried "Trucknet UK"?

 

[Dustydog]

the problem is colin, that for every office worker or manager who, like yourself, has started at the bottom there are half a dozen who went from school to college to an office where they attempt to preside over workers whose work they don't understand, having never done it.

there are few things worse than being told how to do a job by someone who has never held the tools in their hands. especially when they insist on it being done their way.

Fully agree McGhee.
Many years ago my old firm introduced a CPD scheme, Continuing Professional Development, to ensure that all employees at all levels did do some extra studying, even reading trade magazines to enhance their knowledge. And yes night school to study for your Fellowship was mandatory. So all this is nothing new really.
We were taught to respect all levels of employees at clients. In fact the real skill was being able to communicate intelligently at all levels leaving the other party feeling good that they had contributed to resolution of the given problem.
If there is still this "us and them " attitude today then something has gone seriously wrong.

Steve on the red light thing I share your frustration. It seems every inch counts for reasons totally beyond my comprehension. There again I think the actress and bishop understood .

 

[Parksy]

It seems every inch counts for reasons totally beyond my comprehension. There again I think the actress and bishop understood .

It wouldn't be anything to do with the cold weather would it DD?

 

[Steve L]

We had snow again yesterday and Dinmore hill closed again because of 2" of snow.
The Herefordshire council just have no concept of keeping roads open and yet again people had no regard for road signs or traffic lights. We did get over the hill at mid day as by then there were all 3 lane open again.
Fortunately or otherwise, I had borrowed my brother-in-law's 4x4 pickup to tow the caravan, as my rover is in bits while I sort out the clutch slave cylinder. I got given a brand new cylinder that had done 40 miles saving me a good £100. The task of dropping out the gearbox though is massive for me with my limited state of health, but gradually I'm getting there.

Over all my years of both lorry driving and leisure driving it never ceases to amaze me how the standard of driving and consideration depleats.

 

[Dustydog]

Steve
You have my sympathies. Fancy having to take out the gearbox just to change the clutch slave cylinder. My Laguna was the same . This must be "engineering progress" Just like some of the VW headlight bulbs!

 

[Steve L]

Hi Dusty.
It is certainly a task and a half. BMW never thought out the plan of fitting their engine into a Rover. the average quote for the clutch change on mine and BMW Mini's is around 2K.

 

[Willi-Wonti]

Slightly changing the subject.
Does anyone on here understand what a yellow painted box junction is.
We have one painted outside our fire / ambulance station, on the A38 duel carriageway out of Brum, but when the traffic lights 50 mtrs up the road turn red, most cars will park blocking the exit for our fire appliances & ambulances.
Perhaps it is no longer in the highway code, but I am sure I saw it when refreshing for my 3 yearly advanced E.F.A.D. (emergency fire appliance driver) test last year.
Whilst we need to keep cool under the circumstances, it is frustrating when trying to turn out & not getting any where fast

 

[Steve L]

Know what you mean WW.
I drove that road for twenty years every friday and I used to stop before the yellow box if my 38ft truck & trailer wouldn't fit the other side. The low and behold 4 cars would *** round and block the access.

I often thought the emergencey vehicles should have bush bars fitted to ram the idiots out of the way to get through. I had to turn into the access on one occassion so that the cars could back up to make way.

My cousin got into hot water at Billingham for knocking a dozen car door mirrors off with his fire engine, trying to get to a house fire with persons trapped. Apparently the crew should of got out, knocked doors and asked before phsically bumping the cars over to make way. And all because people wouldn't use the council garage block with a free garage to each house.

The world's gone barmy if you ask me.