How do you do split sleeper properly

OK I'm looking at my driver manual given to me at orientation when I was first hired, specifically the little chapter about splitting the sleeper berth time.

Here's what is written:

"You can stretch out your driving time by using the sleeper berth. But remember, you are still limited by the driving time rule. You do not need to take all of your sleeper berth time at once. You can obtain 10 hours off duty in two (2) separate periods. Eight hour must be in the sleeper berth and the remaining 2 hour can be in the sleeper or off duty but will count toward the 14 hour rule.

Drive part of your 11 hours. Then use the berth for at least two hours. Drive the rest of your 11 hours and go into the berth again to finish you 10 hours of rest before driving again.

After your sleeper-berth time, can you drive 11 hours? NOTE: Don't forget the time you were driving in between the sleeper-berth periods. You had not rested ten hours yet. So subtract the previous driving time in between the two sleeper berth periods from the allowed eleven hours to figure you hours left to drive. You can be on duty 70 hours in any continuous eight day period if you are an interstate Driver. Drivers must keep a log for every day, including days off. Even if you go on vacation or miss work for a few days, you need to show it on a log."

Mostly to me these 3 little paragraphs are annoying not only because they interchange spelling out and listing numbers below 10, spelling out 'eleven' when it should be 11 lol, but that they don't mention one word about the 14 being split up as well. They also go way off track talking about 70 hours, vacation time and hometime which is not helpful to the new driver looking for information on split breaking the sleeper.

The way I did it for a long time was based on the second paragraph up there, make a mark on my log denoting the beginning of the 14 and a dot at 14 hours later, somewhere in between I would take two hours off then eight hours off and start a brand new 14 and do it again the next day. Nothing in the Swift manual would seem to suggest that is or is not the right way to do it.

So this is what I have come to understand, and I will be calling my safety tomorrow morning on this same thing, it is embarrassing that as an almost one year driver I should not know this backwards and forwards already.

Start your day, make a mark. Go over 14 hours make another mark. Somewhere in between, take a break. Make a dot at the end of that break and count over 14 hours and make another mark. Must take second break before this dot expires.

Sound about right?

 

Not quite.

If the break you are referring to is an eight-hour one, then yes, count the remainder of your 11 & 14 from the end of the eight. If the first break is two hours, then no, your original 11 & 14 stand.

You do not need to take the second break "before this dot expires." That dot marks the end of your 11 & 14 so it is treated just the same as if you were on a regular schedule (not splitting). When you are running a regular schedule you do not need to take your 10-hour break "before this dot (14-hour mark) expires."

 

I really don't care what the Swift manual says on this. I go from FMCSR. When I have a few minutes, I will quote chapter and verse, verbatim, the rule in the Green Book. It's written pretty plainly, so it should make sense.

Scottie, you are over-complicating it.

 

Okay, we all know the split must consist of one period of at least 8 consecutive hours in the sleeper and one period of at least 2 consecutive hours either off-duty, in the sleeper or a combination of both.

FMCSR 395.1 (g)(1)(ii)

As I said before: when you complete a qualifying rest period, subtract hours used since the previous period: driving hours against your 11, all hours except the 8+ against the 14. There is not going to be a complete restart for your 14 until you take a 10.

 

) Calculation of the 14-hour limit includes all time except any sleeper-berth period of at least 8 but less than 10 consecutive hours; compliance must be recalculated from the end of the first of the two periods used to comply with the requirements of ["split sleeper provision"].

OK cool, that concurs with what I wrote up there, Start your day, make a mark. Go over 14 hours make another mark. Somewhere in between, take a break. Make a dot at the end of that break and count over 14 hours and make another mark. Must take second break before this dot expires.

Have to take that second break before the second portion of 14 expires because otherwise nothing left to split.