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Weight watchers
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If you overload your vehicle and get caught, the penalties can be severe it can even put you out of business. Luckily, there are companies that offer on-board weighing systems. Here's a round-up of what's on offer.
Operators who overload their trucks can look forward to precious few favours from the enforcement authorities.Those found guilty can expect to be penalised — fixed penalties are being issued these days — and firms that are serial offenders can anticipate action being taken against their 0-licence&
However, there is no need for this fate to befall them, if they fit on-board weighing systems to their vehicles and take notice of what these devices are saying.
Admittedly, such systems don't come cheap — but what price the future of your business?
A variety of different industries are starting to Plf=23:13
appreciate the value of on-board weighers, says Derek Hack, sales manager of Axtec, a leading specialist in the field.
Dirty Loads thinking,for example, about businesses that deliver clean roller towels to washrooms in offices and factories and pick up dirty ones," he continues.
Soiled and sometimes sopping wet, the latter are heavier than the former, so a driver will head back to the depot at the end of the day carrying more weight than they started out with. The result could be an overloaded truck.
Axtec's on-board device uses sensors to monitor road-spring deflection. This is the way in which the springs on a vehicle compress as a heavier burden is imposed on them, or relax as that burden is gradually removed.
"We fit a sensor to each axle," says Hack.
Suitable for two-, three-, or four-axle rigids, the company's On-Board load indicator can also be installed in semi-trailers. "Bear in mind that you may have to recalibrate it every time you couple the trailer up to a different tractor unit," he warns.
The equipment from A xtec can show a gross overload, and issue an alert if individual axles are overloaded. The information is shown on an in-cab display.
"If the figures are green, then everything is OK and you're legal," says Hack. -Get 10 80% of the permitted load and they turn to amber, then flash red if you're breaking the law. You can even have a warning buzzer installed, if you wish.
"On-Board is accurate to within 25% on a four-wheeler and 5% on sixand eight-wheelers. That should be enough to allow operators to stay on the right side of the law."
Equipment recalibration
One drawback of relying on spring deflection is that springs wear. As they do so, the calibration of the on-board equipment also starts to go adrift. "The system we fit allows operators to do the recalibration work themselves," says Hack. "Call out an engineer to do the job and you could be looking at a bill for up to £200.
"Don't forget that the harder the suspension works, the more frequently recalibration will be required."
Aside from periodic recalibration, no other maintenance is needed.
"There are no moving parts, and nothing that needs regular tightening," says Hack. "We fit a lot of our weighers to trucks used by scaffolders and the plant hire industry, and they have proved to be capable of withstanding arduous working conditions."
Sceptics, however, suggest that the sensors used in this sort of set-up might find it difficult to withstand the abuse they will suffer if the truck is going on and off a landfill site.
The ability to show individual axle weights is invaluable in delivery operations that paradoxically risk overburdening individual axles as the load diminishes."If you remove cargo carried to the rear of the back axle, you can be in danger of overloading the front one because of the way the weight of the vehicle shifts as a result," says Hack.
Axtec's On-Board will warn the driver if this starts to happen, so the load can be moved rearwards to prevent it.
On-board weighers are becoming more sophisticated and can now be monitored remotely by way of a telematics system. "If a truck is overloaded for more than two minutes, then the operator can be automatically alerted," says Hack.
"A two-minute threshold is there because a temporary overload can be created every time a driver brakes heavily. That can be as many as 30 or 40 times on a delivery run."
So how much does Aztec's equipment cost? -On a fourwheeler it will set you back less than £1,500 supplied and fitted, rising to under £1,900 if you run a six-wheeler and around £220011' you operate an eight-wheeler," says Hack.
As well as helping operators avoid fines and court costs, on-board weighers can help them earn more.
Trucks are sometimes sent out with less cargo than they are legally allowed to carry because the driver and operator are nervous of overloading them. As a result they are less productive than they might otherwise be.
An on-board weigher ensures they can carry the maximum permitted payload; no more, but, crucially, no less.
The light commercial sector is one that is being addressed by Vishay PM Onboard with Van Weigh, a competitor to Axtec's On-Board. It is said to be accurate to within 3%. and the company claims that stretched springs will not cause it to slip out of calibration.
Vishay PM Onboard boasts a broad portfolio of weighers. The line-up includes BulkWeigh, which has two or three useful extra features. Designed for tippers, it warns the driver if there is a risk of the vehicle rolling over if it is tipping on uneven ground, because, for instance, the load has stuck on one side of the body.
In-cab warnings
The alarm is triggered and a warning flashes on the screen if the cargo is more than 40% off centre. A continuous display shows the driver the angle at which the chassis or body is sitting.
BulkWeigh will also tell the driver if the body is raised and can be combined with a rear-view monitor. If the customer is running arties, the system on the tractor will automatically recognise the one on the trailer, so there is no need to re-calibrate each time the trailer is swapped.
reightWeigh
And you don't have to be in the cab to sec how much weight is being ladled onto your truck.
Barry Napper provides a system that allows the driver to check the distribution of the load from up to 200m away; a useful facility if he is loading it himself from, say, a hopper.
Drawing data from sensors attached to the air suspension, Vishay PM On hoard's FreightWeigh employs a hand-held remote with a range of up to 30m to display the information. Designed to prevent gross overloads, it also shows the percentage loading on the tractor and the trailer as well as the gross weight.
While no sane politician is likely to start advocating widespread adoption of pay-as-you-throw shorthand for weighing individual domestic bins and charging householders for disposing of their contents in the run-up to a general election, the technology is in place ready for it to be implemented. The practice of bin-weighing has long been familiar to commercial users, and equipment has been developed to weigh the bins they fill.
More than two million UK households served by upwards of 40 local authorities are believed to have been issued with bins fitted with microchips ready for pay-as-you-throw. Whoever is elected next year, it won't be a surprise if pay-as-you throw is eventually implemented; daubed with a generous coating of green wash, of course. •