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tacho time
ELECTRONIC TACHOGRAPHS
Forget the Millennium bug. There's a far more serious hi-tech threat to hauliers on the horizon in the shape of Tacho 2000—the all-electronic replacement to the current generation of tachographs. The story so far is a disturbing mix of confusion and uncertainty combined with a frightening lack of direction.
In 27 months' time every HMI that rolls off the production lines of LEG' LATION Europe's truck manufacturers will be fitted with the long-awaited electronic tachograph—maybe.
There's no doubt about the principle. Last June, after a decade of discussion, Europe's transport ministers finally agreed to proceed with the basic "1.B" system and a timetable for the introduction of Tacho 2000, as it's otherwise known. The final specification will be hammered out by July of this year; electronic tachos will be fitted to new vehicles from 1 July 2000—possibly.
Not that the system itself is in any real doubt. It's the timetable that's looking wobbly, as equipment suppliers such as Lucas Kienzle struggle to meet legislation that has more holes in it than a colander. Managing director Nick Rendell already reckons that the 2000 deadline is a non-starter.
"It will probably be delayed to the beginning of July 2001 but nobody will admit it," he says. "For it to happen, the legislation only requires one tachograph manufacturer to have a unit type-approved by the end of 1999. But nobody's decided what type-approval means for this, what it is, or how we're going to test it!"
While manufacturers such as Kienzle have the unenviable task of trying to second-guess the final legislative requirements of an electronic system, when it comes to the basic components of Tacho 2000, much has already been decided.
Out will go the old round tacho with its T built.in speedometer. In its place will be a sep arate speedo, backed up by an electronic a)
z recording unit the size of a car radio with a liquid crystal display, a tally-roll-style printer 2 and buttons to select various operations.
1. >The old wax-coated chart will be replaced
iby a credit-card-sized "smart-card"; one for 8 each driver, which can store electronic data ia along the same lines as the points cards operated by fuel companies.
The one advantage of the current system (or disadvantage, depending on what side of the fence you sit) is that with an existing tachograph there is just one source of recorded data—the chart. With Tacho 2000 that's no longer the case.
"Eating charts to destroy evidence is no longer an option!" says Rendell.
Within the new system there will be six separate memories, all capable of recording and storing data, and that's in addition to a printout. The smart card itself will have two memories, as Rendeli explains: "The first holds information about the driver, who they are, what kind of vehicle they're qualified to drive and might contain other data, but we'll have to wait for the final technical specification to find out what it is. This data memory is passive—the new tachograph will only be able to read it. The second records driver activity for the past 28 days, including which vehicles have been driven."
That "activity" will include driving time, rest periods and other work, but not how fast he's been driving. Moreover, as the card is a "rolling" store, if it's not downloaded after 28 days then the earliest data will be lost as new information is added.
The third memory is located within the new electronic tachograph. It will hold information including a unique serial number for the unit, the vehicle chassis number and possibly the vehicle's owner. The bad news for the tacho cheats is that as it decodes the encrypted signal from the sender unit it can detect and record any attempt to fiddle the system. Memory four is a rolling 24-hour record of the vehicle's speed, second-by-second. And here's where the fun begins. "If a fleet operator wants to monitor a vehicle's speed, which is quite a common request from our tachograph bureau customers, this information will have to be transferred to an office computer on a daily basis," reports Rendell, If your trucks return to base every night that won't be a problem. But if they're away from home for more than 24 hours and you want to know how fast your drivers have been travelling beyond that period then you'll need to record that information independently on a separate on-board computer. That's hardly an "improvement" on the old tachograph, which not only logged excessive speeding but provided long-term evidence through the use of daily charts.
The nature of the rolling 24-hour speed log also means that if an operator wants to use the new tachograph's speed data in any accident evaluation he'll face the same problem. "In order to analyse the vehicle's speed the information in the new tachograph would need to be extracted within 24 hours of an accident occurring," says Rendell.
The fifth or "mass" memory in the main unit records the identity of all the drivers who have driven the truck, their driving times and distances, storing this information for the past 365 days. Last but not least is memory six, an office computer, which will typically be located where a history of driving times is kept. "Effectively it will be a database of drivers and vehicles supported by an hours law analysis program," says Rendell.
Despite this apparent overkill in terms of data capture, there are no plans to change existing drivers' hours regulations. The centre-field data currently entered by the driver on a conventional chart, such as his name, will be created electronically and stored on the smart card and in the vehicle's mass memory. What is different is how drivers will enter their start and finish locations. • It's proposed that these will be selected by the driver using buttons on the main in-cab unit. Instead of simply writing in "London" or "Glasgow" at the start or finish, the driver will have to scroll through country "identifiers" and then through various regions within each country. "These will be a set of numbers, and presumably each driver will carry a list of these country and regional codes," Rendell suggests.
Finally, as both the smart card and new tacho have built-in clocks and calendars, the time and day of each journey will be automatically recorded, as will the odometer reading at the start and finish of every journey.
Technical specification
So is that all there is to Tacho 2000? "It's as much as we know today," ventures Rendell. "We now have to await the final technical specification in Jul}" So what does it all add up to for British hauliers? If you're an owner-driver, spending all your time on one vehicle day-in and day out, then you'll probably be able to get by using the mass memory on the in-cab unit, which will have a continuous record of your activities for the past year, should the enforcement agencies need to see it, plus the 28 days held on your smart card (see below left).
Rendell says that although there are issues to be resolved such as what happens to the information held on the mass memory if you sell a truck, or if the new tachograph goes wrong, "in general it seems the owner-driver will not need additional equipment to comply with tachograph or hours regulations". Considering the large number of ownerdrivers in this country; and indeed on the Continent, that has to be good news.
The bad news comes in when you operate a fleet where drivers use different vehicles every day. I lere, you're probably talking about monthly or even weekly data downloads from each vehicle unit..
"We think most people will have to have a drivers' hours database which consolidates all that data," Rendell believes. "We can see no other sensible way of managing drivers' hours information on a day-to-day basis. It would be impractical to go to every truck a driver has driven to obtain details of his activities if his smart card were lost, darn aged or faulty." But who would hold those records? Could operators be trusted to collect and store their own electronic data?
Rendell says there's talk of the DVLA or Vehicle Inspectorate holding the data: "It's been mooted but! don't think that's a goer. If you do have a drivers' hours database and the police came in and looked at it, how would they know it hadn't been manipulated? You'd have to have a system whereby the holder of a database was somehow accredited to show that they hadn't changed the data. For example, it could be handled by someone like the Freight Transport Association. But nobody's thought that out yet. The downloading and operating side has not been covered by legislation and it clearly has to be resolved."
So how will the policeman check these new tachos at the roadside? According to Lucas Kienzle's marketing manager David Thomas: "He'll probably say 'Give me a printout' to the driver or he'll put his own enforcement smart card into the unit and get a printout that way. I think they'll be given their own smart cards."
However, Thomas adds that "it will only give you a printout of what the vehicle's been doing—not the driver if he's only been with that vehicle for one day. The fundamental problem is that the bulk of the data goes with the vehicle, not the driver, yet the whole point of drivers' hours is that it relates to the driver!"
Big issues
Another of those big issues yet to be resolved is where a driver gets a smart card from. "The original document says that a card comes from an Issuing authority'," says Thomas. "Our understanding is in the UK it could be the DVLC—but there's nothing in the document at all which says for sure what an issuing authority is."
Whoever the issuing authority was, it would need to ensure that no-one could apply and get more than one card at a time. "I'd be staggered if somebody who's trying to break the law doesn't try and use two cards," says Thomas. Then there's the small matter of whether a driver could apply for, and be issued with, a card from another EU country. And what happens to the driver who loses his own smart card? Is he barred from driving until he gets a new one?
Worrying aspect
Perhaps the most worrying aspect of Tacho 2000 is that despite all the unresolved problems over data storage, card issuing, enforcement, repairs and general compliance, the European Commission seems determined to introduce the electronic tacho without first confirming that the system will actually work.
"When you consider that you could end up with fitting electronic tachos to four-million trucks across Europe, if anything ever needed trials then this is it," says Rendell.
In just over two years Tacho 2000 could be with us. Which begs the question: "What is the EU's real objective in introducing the system—will it make drivers' hours easier to enforce?" Thomas believes that too much emphasis has been laid on making the new system more tamper-proof rather on than enhancing the recording of drivers' hours. He says bluntly: "It will be a nightmare."
Rendell clearly finds it hard not to be cynical about the whole program: "There just isn't an understanding of what the problem is— and in the rest of Europe they largely ignore it anyway. Our view is that we've no problem with the system being changed, but this isn't the right solution."
by Brian Weatherley
COUNTDOWN TO TACHO 2000
• 17 June 1997: European Union transport ministers agree to adopt basic "111" electronic tachograph system.
• 31 July 1998: Final technical specification of system is due to be approved.
• 1 July 2000: Fitting of electronic system to all NEW vehicles is due to start.
• There are NO plans for retrofitrnent, but if your truck is registered after 1 January 1996 you must install a new electronic system if the old tachograph fails. What constitutes a "failure" is not clear.