OOS in Florida- will other states know.

revelation u come from a town named for u, Moody! I hope u have better luck with them folks in ohoi. cause they done put u in a bad mood!

 

Two scenarios you can be in with a DOT inspection;

#1. (Leo) Good morning, can I see your log book?

(you) Yeah, its here somewhere, let me find it. Why did you stop me? I wasn't doing anything wrong. You're going to make me late. Hope you're ready to explain that to the company. Here's my log.

(leo) Do you realize your log book shows you in violation of the 14 hour rule?

(you) Do you realize a log book is a violation of my constitutional rights?

(Leo) Why don't you get the rest of the paperwork and step back to my car?

10 minutes later you show up with half the paper and an attitude. And so begins an embattled Level 1 with you ranting about your rights and his falsifying paperwork. Months later, you go to court, pay some fines, and YOU ARE ON YOUR WAY.

#2
(Leo) Good morning, can I see your log book?

(you) Yes sir, its right here.

(leo) Ok, if you would, gather up your other paperwork and step back to my car.

(you) No problem, got it all right here.

10 minutes later you sign the Level 3 report, he says be safe driver and YOU ARE ON YOUR WAY.

Far fetched???? Maybe, maybe not.
#2 has worked for me so far. Think I'll pass on trying #1

 

I wonder if you are correct about hot shots being picked on Revelation? Wonder if anyone keeps stats on this. Would have to be by percentage to get a true picture. I bet 18 wheels is highest percentage. And I'm thinking box truck (6wheel) is next. See a lot of them getting checked out.

 

I have stats from one inpsector in ohio from 2008. He did 75% more level one's on hotshots than class 8 and most were put OOS for false logbook.
And everone I intervied said the samething he never did half of a level two on them. He had done this for over twenty years till I put the brakes on him.
He got a bad employee evaluation after that . I have his employee file from ohio and I think I have over 1600 hundred inpsection reports he done.
If you have a hotshot it's like have a bullseye on your door.

 

Not to be a pain, but I see some hotshots that are not exactly in compliance. Especially RV guys, and boat guys. Some fly by night car hauler was beside me the other night at the truck stop. He had two cars on a flat 2 axle car hauler. No carrier name. Had Dot number though. No lights on the trailer and two bald tires on trailer. He watched me as I did my walk around and asked me what I was doing? He couldn't have hada CDL, had no clue what a pre trip was.

On the other hand, I know 2 that are pretty square. I've also seen guys that have tip top equipment and definately look the part. From my experience you have some folks in every type vehicle that are good and some that are not so good.

Revelation what type stuff you hotshot? Do they consider the goose necks that haul general freight hotshots as well? or just the vehicle types?

 

Enforcing the federal regualtions can (obviously...) leaves a lot of room for an officers judgement. I do not want my back side kissed by a driver, you know who we are, what we are doing and we dont need a reason to stop a commercial vehicle. Does judgement change when someone is extremelly rude, sure it does, and that goes both ways. We are the down side to some or most truck drivers and carriers. Some days I look for trucks that really need inspected, sometimes I look for very well maintained trucks and find a lot of no logs, somedays I tell my self the next truck that comes by Im stopping even if its Wal-mart, I could keep going with these examples. If its someone whos rude or just plain stupid, how far you dig may get deeper. If there is something there thats false log, and Im only given 8 days of log pages, and the current shipping paper. I will take it if Im told no I dont have any fuel receipts, past shipping papers, or toll receipts to prove that was a clerical error. I pretty sure I have never found a false log on a driver who simply handed me the whole log book, receipts, shipping papers and all, drivers that count out 8 pages, all the time. I will never forget the driver who I put OOS for false log (claiming Memphis,TN to Boise, ID in one day (26 hrs!!) shipping papers and fuel receipts confirmed) who stood in the T/A parking lot and yelled "Why would I go from Memphis to Boise and then just turn around and come back?" as I stood there trying to think of a professional reply instead of the ones that were coming to mind. A gentleman leaned out the window of his truck and said calmly in a foreign accent "because thats what trucks do!!" I was told once by a driver I was wasting my time kicking his tires. I went back to my truck and wasted some more of his time. Then took him his OOS inspection for the flat tire. I have to do my job, Im sorry kicking his tires is part of it. Why be so rude?? I understand drivers have been stopped by rude, mean, unprofessional officers. Unless I am that officer, individual people (officers and drivers ) deserve a chance to prove they can be cival and its that same chance I give every driver I stop.



As for 6 wheelers etc. The reason a lot of officers pull them over is we have to do so many Level 1's and some would rather crawl a 6 wheeler then a class 8, and a lot of 6 wheelers are not air brakes. So no brakes to measure. I am not patient with giving log book lessons along side the road. Do not prefer 6 wheelers, would rather crawl an 11 axle steel hauler.


A valid CVSA decal covers an annual inspection for one year, yet an annual inspection is a wheels off inspection. If they have shields over the brake shoes I cant see them, much less the bearings etc. They are trying to change the CVSA decal covering as a annual. There are a lot of reasons a inspection may stop at some point; air loss, non-manufactured hole in a parking brake chamber. I have seen inspections that werent what they should be for the level claimed. Thats what that inspector has to live with if that truck kills someone the next day. If I end an inspection the reason is in the inspection.


As for stacking violations, if your pigtail is out I can write all individually or as one, if they are all under the same code (393.9A Inoperative required light) they only count once on CSA, and if there is a fine they only cite once. If theres 3 flat tires they all are to be wrote seperate, but they still only cite once. Same goes for all violations.

 

Anyone regularly crossing scales knows the proportion on 1 ton trucks parked behind the scales is much higher per 1 tons on the road than Class 8's inspected and put OOS .
Every hotshotter I knew that went from a 1 ton to Freighliner FL told me the biggest difference they noticed was being checked less at scales .

 

You are right about the inspection part. The downside is the FL60-70 rides worse and seems to have a shorter service life.

 

You're wrong about that everything thats written counts. Just do a random search of the fmsca site and you will find it everywhere in there.
Now you may write only one violation of a light? But if you're from ohio I doubt that. That state is one of the most corrupt I have seen. They will present lies and then try and defend them when caught. I know this for fact Dale w testified he was writing up level ones and then said he never done what was required and said every officer there was doing them the same.
So blow smoke on someone that don't know.
This is fact I can prove. Ask dale if it isn't true? I would vote to give ohio to canada nothing there worth keeping. When that turd threatened me and threw my logbook at me, I decide then it would be war anytime I was wrote up and didn't think it was right. If ohio was burning down I wouldn't piss on it. and if you think my attitude is bad pull any of dale w inspections and interview the people I did.

 

The problem with a lot of inspectors is they are given a class with 1 truck, 1 brake setup, etc and are told this is what you look for on this side of the truck, the other side is examples of what is wrong.

Example, I had to do a road service call to a truck that was placed out of service for misadjusted brakes. The driver said his brakes were stroking too far. I get under there, look at the brakes, measure them and find the stroke at just over 2 inches. Problem was the chambers were long stroke chambers and although if they were a standard chamber they would be out of adjustment, they were in proper adjustment for the chambers he had.

There are all these requirements for the equipment to be in certain condition and so much training for drivers to get the training to get their CDLs, but there aren't any standard training guidelines for inspectors to be certain they are properly trained to do these inspections.

I think if you are going to have a battle with the inspection criteria, I thinks it needs to start there right along with the changes in the points obtained for violations. Insepctors should be and need to be properly trained so that they know what they are looking at is proper or not.