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America's champion talks to CM
Page 53
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NOT DOUBLE but triplebottoms with a gross weight of up to 90,000 lb (just over 40 tons) are likely to be the norm in America if present proposals are accepted. In an exclusive interview with CM this week, Bill Moore, the National Driver of the Year for 1974 of the USA, revealed that in the four Western States of Oregon, Washington, Nevada and Utah, outfits comprising a tractive unit and either three 28 ft trailers or two 40ft trailers can be legally operated and efforts are being made to make this standard acceptable nationwide. They will be operated only on the interState highways, however.
Welcomed and encouraged by the former Nixon administration, these standards are not popular with the drivers, said Bill, for "that last trailer on a triplebottom looks a long, long way back".
With 37 years behind the wheel and about 31/2 million miles without a blameworthy accident (the basis for his US championship) 64-year-old Bill Moore averages about 380 miles a day which, with a half-hour break, involves about 8 hours on duty. He was interested to see that British vehicles were not built with the cab floor as high as vehicles in the States.
The present 55 mph restriction on speed in the States is reputed to have reduced accidents and the authorities are reluctant to relax this restriction. However, owner-drivers will attempt to go faster and faster — from between 75 to 100.mph if they can till the authorities crack down again,. thinks Bill. Speeding fines are payable by the drivers anyway, he told me, but overweight and mechanical offences are payable by the operator.
Different regulations in different States can sometimes be disconcerting, too. For instance, Iowa is the only State with an overall length restriction of 55 ft, which rules out the twin-28 ft double-bottoms acceptable elsewhere; despatches must ensure that a driver's route avoids this State with a long vehicle. Should a driver consciously or unwittingly stray off route, however, he is then responsible for the resulting fine. Such a diversion could, in the Iowa example, save well over 100 miles and the temptation to take a chance is almost irresistable at times.
Different gross weight limits also create problems for despatchers and drivers. On Bill's thrice-weekly trUnk run from his home State of New Mexico to Kansas he encounters four different State gross weight-limits, the lowest being Kansas. "But there's no weighbridge on the toll road into Kansas," says Bill with a grin.
Ironically, the State (Idaho) with the highest limit, 90,000lb, has a 28,000 lb limit when winter weather strikes -a "frost lair" which can catch drivers out.