DOT E Logs?

sexxy · Mar 6, 2017

I drive a smallish bob truck hauling hospital equipment. I have been hearing about a government thing requiring any commercial truck to have electronic logs. True/not true? When is it to take effect? I am rarely more than 100miles from my local base Tupelo MS, main office is in Franklin tn. A friend from church hauls campers all over the US, and said he is going to either need e logs or quit hauling by the end of the year. Trying to keep myself legal or get a ticket and let company pay whatever I get. What are you doing to keep yourself legal?

Dirt700 · Mar 6, 2017

I work for the railroad, and they are telling us that we have to have e logbooks by end of the year. I don't usually travel over a 100 miles, so I don't have graph right now. Not sure how it will work once it goes electronic.

zeb3 · Mar 6, 2017

The mandate is set to take Effect Dec 16, 2017. As far as you being affected with what you drive I'm not sure. I'm trying to read the law as well but its still not in its final form. The Elogs that you use must be approved as well and there are only a handful that are already approved.

CHASMAN9 · Mar 6, 2017

JJ Keller has all that E log stuff

Beerj · Mar 6, 2017

They mounted some elog touch screens in all of our cmv/cdl trucks a few years back. Of course then they never hooked them up so they just get used as a table. :****:

wayne86 · Mar 6, 2017

It's a bunch of BS! I sell specialty fertilizers. I have a class A CDL to drive a pickup truck and gooseneck trailer (GVW over 26,000). So I can't drive a semi or anything with airbrakes. Anyway, I'm supposed to keep a log book, but how in the hell am I supposed to deliver a customer his product and get it all done in 10 hours a day when we do 80% of our deliveries for the year in two to three months because of the seasonality of it all? :dunno:

How do they know if I was driving my pickup for a casual sales call and didn't just hook my truck up an hour before they pulled me over?

trucker · Mar 6, 2017

Re:

I didn't think e-logs were going on anything but class A trucks. We have them in our semi but I still use paper logs. The law has two different deadline dates. One is for the end of this year and the other is in 2 years. The company I work for said we don't have to use them for another 2 years. Everytime I try to read up on it, it gives me a headache and I become more confused than before I started reading the law.

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onepieceatatime · Mar 6, 2017

Re: Re: DOT E Logs?

wayne86 said:
It's a bunch of BS! I sell specialty fertilizers. I have a class A CDL to drive a pickup truck and gooseneck trailer (GVW over 26,000). So I can't drive a semi or anything with airbrakes. Anyway, I'm supposed to keep a log book, but how in the hell am I supposed to deliver a customer his product and get it all done in 10 hours a day when we do 80% of our deliveries for the year in two to three months because of the seasonality of it all?
How do they know if I was driving my pickup for a casual sales call and didn't just hook my truck up an hour before they pulled me over?

You get a 14 hr work day with 11 hrs of drive time.

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onepieceatatime · Mar 6, 2017

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I used to be worried about E Logs until I got a job that paid me more and I didn't have to run illegal to make decent money. I don't agree with the idea that the government can mandate E Logs but even if they didn't I'd still run them so I didn't have to mess with paper logs. It's a lot easier to log into a computer that does everything for ya. Plus it's a lot less hassle when you get pulled over.

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ROKTOY829 · Mar 6, 2017

Re:

They put one on the rollback truck, we use to haul forklifts. Not sure if it was required or something they just went with.

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91jeepyj · Mar 6, 2017

I've dealt with E-Logs for the last 7 years, but from the safety/operations side. Most driver hate them at first, but once they get used to them they really like them. The key is working for a company that pays well to begin with. From the safety side they are great because you don't have to worry near as much when a driver has an accident. I saw my previous company pay out $750k because a drivers logs were not correct even though the accident only caused $1,500 damage to a vehicle. I've also seen that same company not pay out anything in a fatality case when the driver was on E-Logs and fault was somewhat questionable.
I am placing an order this week for several PeopleNet units at the new company I work for. Our 100 air mile radius trucks will not run E-Logs, but everything else will.

TacomaJD · Mar 7, 2017

All of the drivers that work for the trucking company contracted with my employer are worried about this. They are in the catagory of the only way they can make good money is running illegal. They've been pulling loads for us for many years, longer than I've worked here, and sadly we have fell into pretty much depending on them to run illegal now, in order to meet shipment deadlines. It sounds like it's going to be a clusterfuck for them and us if this goes into effect with no loopholes.

RockHales · Mar 7, 2017

Re:

trucker said:
I didn't think e-logs were going on anything but class A trucks. We have them in our semi but I still use paper logs. The law has two different deadline dates. One is for the end of this year and the other is in 2 years. The company I work for said we don't have to use them for another 2 years. Everytime I try to read up on it, it gives me a headache and I become more confused than before I started reading the law.

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class A or B. they are even making the under 26k crowd us then when the time comes.

ibrokeit · Mar 7, 2017

A touch off topic but lemme ask here. I have my class A (with air brakes and all that jazz so I can drive the semi at work). I drive my personal F350 for work (construction company). Occasisionally, I pull a lot of weight for work. I grossed 41,260 over the CAT scales on Friday. 1- am I supposed to stop at DOT weigh stations on the interstate? I blew right by one Friday. 2- What kind of trouble am I going to be in if I ever get weighed?

e4cutler · Mar 7, 2017

I'm an estimator for a powerline construction company building transmission lines in Texas and the bordering states. Our entire fleet department is flipping out over this and has been trying to prep for it since early last year. From my end, it's a concern regarding cost as we also do a LOT of illegal loads to save money which helps me stay competitive when bidding jobs. This E-Log stuff is really going to raise my mob/demob costs especially when working in Oklahoma. Plus our in-house drivers won't get as many weekly hours and if they quit then I'll have to sub out a lot of loads we usually do ourselves.

wayne86 · Mar 7, 2017

ibrokeit said:
A touch off topic but lemme ask here. I have my class A (with air brakes and all that jazz so I can drive the semi at work). I drive my personal F350 for work (construction company). Occasisionally, I pull a lot of weight for work. I grossed 41,260 over the CAT scales on Friday. 1- am I supposed to stop at DOT weigh stations on the interstate? I blew right by one Friday. 2- What kind of trouble am I going to be in if I ever get weighed?

Yes sir! Surprised they didn't chase you down. If you are not overweight they will give you a ticket for bypassing the scale.

ibrokeit · Mar 7, 2017

wayne86 said:
Yes sir! Surprised they didn't chase you down. If you are not overweight they will give you a ticket for bypassing the scale.

What about pulling an empty GN? It's a personal vehicle. I guess what I'm asking-what determines when I should stop and when I shouldn't?

What kind of trouble would I have been in if I went though and weighed 42k in a single wheel F350?

Zjman · Mar 7, 2017

ibrokeit said:
What about pulling an empty GN? It's a personal vehicle. I guess what I'm asking-what determines when I should stop and when I shouldn't?

What kind of trouble would I have been in if I went though and weighed 42k in a single wheel F350?

You cannot operate a personal vehicle like that legally for a business, you need a dot number and a annual inspection and a lot of other bs, every state is different but in Ohio u get a fine and not allowed to leave scales till ur legal, and that can get very expensive, some states gives you a ticket and let's you go, my neighbor got by for years till doing same thing but the dot man caught em and they had to put dot number on there pickup that they just drive back and forth from job site

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wayne86 · Mar 7, 2017

Zjman said:
You cannot operate a personal vehicle like that legally for a business, you need a dot number and a annual inspection and a lot of other bs, every state is different but in Ohio u get a fine and not allowed to leave scales till ur legal, and that can get very expensive, some states gives you a ticket and let's you go, my neighbor got by for years till doing same thing but the dot man caught em and they had to put dot number on there pickup that they just drive back and forth from job site

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Beat me to it. I have a Chevy 2500 and pull a 22k trailer. I have to have DOT numbers and an annual inspection of the truck and trailer. You have been operating "illegally". It's still a very gray area as far as I'm concerned. I called the BMV about my setup and they couldn't give me a straight answer.

ibrokeit · Mar 7, 2017

Ok. So-

1. What can I legally pull for personal use with NO CDL and no dot numbers?
2. What can I legally pull with for personal use WITH CDL and no dot numbers?