In Gear - Today's Trucking

Works Committee for public
input and deputations.
The motion, presented to
City Council by Councillor
Michael Walker, proposes to
ban all truck deliveries in
the city’s downtown core for
six hours a day, during
morning and evening rush
hour. The plan would
restrict picking up or dropping
off goods between the
hours of 7:00 a.m.-10:00 a.m.
and 3:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m.
Truckers wouldn’t mind
at all avoiding the most
congested areas of the Big
Smoke, says Ontario
Trucking Association (OTA)
President David Bradley.
But delivery times aren’t his
members’ problem.
“Schedules are not established
by the trucking
industry. Our customers—
in this case the businesses
located in the downtown
core—dictate when and
where our trucks pick-up
and deliver goods,” Bradley
wrote in a letter to Toronto
Mayor David Miller. “The
problem is, and has always
been, that few businesses are
24/7 enterprises and have
staff available to receive or
load goods during off-peak
times. By forcing all trucks
to make deliveries during a
limited narrow delivery
window, the result may also
be increased truck traffic
during 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.”
Things are much less
batty on the Atlantic Coast,
where Nova Scotia’s major
city simply wants to divert
truck traffic away from
city centres.
A soon-to-be released
report commissioned by
the Halifax Regional
Municipality (HRM) and
the Halifax Port Authority
(HPA) says a truck-free
on the
Docket
The U.S. National Transportation
Safety Board
(NTSB) says improper
manual adjustment of a
truck’s automatic slack
adjusters was a direct contributing
factor in a collision
that claimed two lives in
Glen Rock, Pa. on April 11,
2003. In its report, NTSB also
cited the lack of information
on the hazards of manually
adjusting automatic slack
adjusters in CDL training
manuals, and, the generally
poor knowledge and understanding
of brake diagnostic
practices and knowledge of
the proper use of auto-slacks
by mechanics.
The carrier, Blossom Valley
Farms, Inc., was also cited by
NTSB for “lack of oversight” in
the operation of its truck
fleet for employing a driver
with no experience with airbraked
vehicles, permitting
him to operate an improperly
maintained truck with
out-of-adjustment brakes.
The driver was unable to
slow the truck on a steep
narrow downgrade. Near the
bottom of the hill, the driver
struck four cars before careening
through a gas station
parking lot and coming to rest
several hundred feet from the
site of the first collision.
Complicating the issue
was the fact that the
untrained 21-year-old driver
claimed he “pumped the
brakes” on the way down the
hill—a technique applicable
to hydraulic brake systems—
depleting the air supply and
further reducing the force
applied by the pushrods.
Dispatches
NTSB CONDEMNS AUTO-SLACK
ADJUSTMENT PRACTICE
IMPROPER ADJUSTMENT AND MAINTENANCE OF
AUTOMATIC SLACK ADJUSTERS LEAD TO FATAL COLLISION
STEPS TO DISASTER:
The NTSB report highlights
the lack of understanding of
the proper function of autoslacks
by both drivers and
mechanics. Interviews
conducted during the investigation
revealed that the truck
had been taken out of service
a year before the accident for
out-of-adjustment brakes in a
CVSA Level 1 inspection.
The driver, at that time,
manually adjusted the brakes
to restore the proper pushrod
stroke, and did so on several
occasions prior to the fatal
accident. The last manual readjustment
occurred
three months before
the accident; again,
done by a mechanic.
The NTSB was
critical of the
mechanic(s) and
the company for
simply readjusting
the auto-slacks
rather than determining
and remedying
the cause of
the out-of-adjustment
condition.
Interestingly, in a
random survey of mechanics,
NTSB found a majority of
them would simply re-adjust
an auto-slack found in an
over-stroke condition.
In another investigation
mentioned by NTSB, a dump
truck driver in El Cerrito,
Calif. took out seven cars,
injured seven people, and
burned a million-dollar
house to the ground when
he failed to negotiate a steep
down grade in August 2003.
He says he manually
adjusted his own auto-slacks
at least twice a week.
At the time of the accident,
the automatic slack adjusters
for all four of the accident
truck’s brakes were capable of
working properly; however,
the quick-connect clevises
and clevis pins for both rear
brakes were worn to the
extent that they prevented
the auto-slacks from properly
adjusting the brakes.
According to brake system
diagnostic expert Dale
Holman of TruckWatch
Services in Georgetown, Ont.,
an auto-slack with working
parts can “unadjust” itself in
as few as two or three brake
applications.
“I’ve seen it happen on my
own trucks, and I’ve seen it in
the field, too,” says Holman.
“What’s more frightening, I’ve
seen trucks go through the
shop where the mechanics
routinely ‘setup’ auto-slacks.
They’ve got to learn to leave
them alone unless there’s an
obvious problem.”
Read more of this story at
TodaysTrucking.com.
MARCH 2006 15