Central trucks and APU's

You may get lucky and get an off lease truck that has one, but otherwise they do not have them.
Central will not pay for them to be installed.
They have ICON or the Volvo version TAS on company trucks.
This system will start and stop the engine to keep the cab at the temp you set it.
It is not the best system, but much better than nothing.
I always got my idle bonus at central when I was with them.
They charged for over idle my last 6 months with them and I was never charged. You just have to learn how to bank time when you can. And not idle when it is not needed.
Many drivers will run the truck all night in any temp's. This is a waste of fuel if it is between 35 and 70 degrees outside.
Also company trucks have under bunk heaters, that do not require idle.

 

It is for me. It will run the truck to get the temperature that you want then shut it back off. It will also run the truck to keep the batteries charged.

 

You have to get an inverter installed to run your electronics.
I am not sure what the company rule is on this at the moment.
If I was not using Icon for cab comfort, I would always set it on engine management mode.
In this mode it would start and stop the engine to keep battery's charged and the engine warm. This is very important when using the under bunk heater, since the heater will not keep your block warm and fuel from gelling in winter. The engine mode will do that.
Plus at least on the trucks I had the qualcom would not count engine mode as idle, since it would not power up the qualcom unit.
I am not sure if the system is still working that way or not.
I know it counted it as idle when you had it on cab comfort mode. This was when you had it set for a temp in the sleeper.
But you would not use cab mode in winter, you would use the bunk heater. It is on a separate system.

 

You close all cab curtains. This will cover all glass and separate the driving are from the sleeper.
Make sure all glass is covered in sleeper as well.
When driving make sure you have the AC up pretty good in the sleeper with the curtains closed in it.
This will keep the mattress, walls and everything cool. So you do not have to cool them later.

When you stop.
Close all the curtains as I said before and shut off the truck.
Limit getting in and out if possible.
Remember, not idling will not lower idle percent on it's own. You will have to have muck more time with the engine running than not for it to matter.
So always shut off the engine when parked, if you possibly can.
Park in shade, or at least facing away from the sun.
When parked during the day idle will be needed at times, no way around that.
But if you can limit it as much as possible it will help.

Again, only time the engine is running is counted.
So if you drive 10 hours and idle 10 hours you have 20 hours that count. With 50% idle.
With icon the engine will run about 50% of the time it would without it. So this will lower you to around 25% idle.
You are not in the truck that full time though. If you can go into the truck stop and eat, use your computer in a lounge, shower etc for a few hours it will lower your time that you would need to idle.
Maybe then you will be in the truck 8 hours of your break, thus with icon it would only idle 4 hours. Now you are in the good zone for idle.

Also when you are in the northern parts of the country in summer you will not have to idle at night much. You can open vents and get air that way and run a fan.
Same thing when down south in winter. No need to idle much when temps are between 40 and 70.
Trucks idling around you make these temps hard at times, so I try and get on the outside edge of parking lots. that way I only have another truck on one side.
Some people will also nose into pull thru spaces facing the wrong way. I do this as well, so I do not have to be near running hot engines.

I have no icon, no APU, nothing on my truck. I managed keep my idle below 10% for the past year. I idle when I have too, but in cooler temps I will use allot of blankets. In warmer I will try and find shade and I have 2 fans. When I get hot I run the truck.

 

Central does not have APU on company trucks, and very few O/O have them as they must pay for them themselves, they do have Idle control systems but that is it.