Dot Truck Inspections

Whiteline, Brickman is right, depends on the situation under which the DOT man is looking at your coloring book; however, four hours for one hour's worth of driving may mean you have to answer some questions for the DOT man. That's why I loose leaf: Log on duty and go; then later in the day (after a shipper or receiver has been able to waste part of my day) tear it up and throw it away (in a trashcan, not the can or bag in your truck!)and start over, and make it look nice and legal.

I try not to make this a habit, and have gotten a lot better about it; used to be I'd rewrite every day, do save 15 mins anywhere I could. Now, if it's acceptable (even if I have wasted some time), then I leave it alone.

 

MAn , that is a bad break ! I hate to get a fine for just doin' my JOB!
Trucking is the only occuption that I know of that you are "penalized" for doing your duties Quickly & "too" efficiently !
I agree the loose leafs do help make the paperwork neater !

 

I don't know that the DOT would go through your trash, but when it comes to official docs, I am always a little paranoid. So I tear up any logs I plan on throwing away, until it's in nice small pieces.

 

Has anyone ever heard of the law about the bed sheets? And about the inside door handle for the passenger door. I was recently stopped in Texas and the officer checked to see that my door handle worked and if my bed had sheets on it, he said the sheet deal was more of a health code than DOT but I'd never heard of the inside door handle.

 

Never heard of the inside door handle thing , or the sheet thing. I read in another post that we're required to have white sheets, so they can be used as bandages at an accident scene. Couldn't say for sure on either one though.
But, back to the loose leaf issue, and I don't wanna preach to the choir... but I hope those of you that do that never end up in an accident or other situation where the DOT would feel the need to "dig a little deeper". I've done the same thing that you're talking about, as well as taking days off, and then backing up your log so that you "lose" the off days. But it ain't worth it.
I was stopped this morning for a level 2 in Arizona, between the Gorge and Mesquite on I-15, and the man actually went through my log CAREFULLY, comparing times and such. He reamed me about 2 things....I had a flat repair, and the service truck dated the receipt wrong, so I logged it on 1 day and the receipt showed the next day. Also, this morning I had a brain fart and started today's log on Pacific time instead of Central time, and he chewed me about that too.
We're all adults here.....at least for identification purposes....so do what you want. But I hope nothing happens to make DOT nosey...
Oh, and the thing about throwing old logs in your truck trash bag/can...yes, DOT will look in there, especially if it's right on top in plain sight. Had that happen myself....she pulls the wadded up log out of the trash bag, and just smiled at me. Fortunately, all I did was redo the previous days log, because I had gotten pretty sloppy on it, so no harm done.