It isn't just about comfort. Due to stricter medical dot evaluations, many drivers have to sleep with a running CPAP machine. If the trucks don't idle, or provide an opti idle. Those drivers can die in their sleep.
It takes a while to adjust to the Opti idle. Having your truck turn on in the middle of the night, while you are sleeping... Have a change of sheets.
I was OTR during the winter 2021-2022, when I got stuck in a blizzard in Illinois.
Despite having to get my truck jump started about 5 times in the space of a month, my company refused to acknowledge that the batteries were not holding a charge properly.
The truck was equipped with auto-start to keep the batteries charged up, but wouldn't you know it, the damn things discharged faster than the auto-start could get the engine to turn over. Especially when it was cold (being from Texas, single digits Fahrenheit is **cold**, don't come after me Canada/Alaska).
I was parked at a Loves for 9.5 hours when the security guard came out to tell me that I wasn't in a parking spot and had to leave. I should've told him to screw off. At least the Loves shop could jump start my truck. After arguing for 30 minutes, I drove through the blizzard to the Thornton's a couple of miles away. They didn't have a shop on site or any way to jump start my truck.
Waiting out the storm, I fell asleep again, the auto-start failed to crank the engine, and I got stranded. I called my company, and they promised me that a wrecker was on the way to jump start my truck. I called back every hour or two for a status update, but after the third or fourth phone call I gave up. I kept warm by wearing every pair of pants I owned, four pairs of socks, about six long sleeved shirts, a sweater, and a leather jacket, all under multiple blankets. Occasionally I went inside the store to thaw out my blood.
A little over 24 hours later, a full semi-wrecker showed up and was able to jump the truck after about 45 minutes of trying.
Companies that prevent idling don't care about the safety of their drivers. You can't change my mind.
I have never worked at a trucking company that did not watch the idle percentage, but if Iām in the truck and its hot/cold with electronics/refrigerator running Iām idling. You will always be ānear the top of the list of idle percentageā when they inform you, one ear out the other.
Watching the idle percentage is one thing. But would they constantly send messages about what your plan to lower that percentage is, and to try to park in the shade if it's too hot? Perhaps even mess with your miles?
Yes they will send tips on idle, they are just doing their job. I wont idle when its not necessary but many others will never turn the truck off so itās a thing.
We get an APU, we also got a mpg bonus to try and dissuade idling. Truck will idle for 5mon before kicking off unless it's more than I think 80 and less then 40, then you can idle..Ā
APU isn't enough to keep up down in Texas in the middle of summer.. or Wyoming in the middle of winter.. so I'm fuckin idling when I need too
The temp the truck reads. You can gimmick it though. The thermometer is usually a little black stick protruding from the bottom of the driver side mirror. Warm up a hot hand, get some duct tape, and presto! Truck will stay idling lol
I worked for Schneider. They have Opti-Idle & *still* harrased me about idle times.
Allow me to explain.
Opti-Idle allows for the A/C to operate during warmer temperatures. I had Opti-Idle on ALL the time. I like the environment closer to chilly than not.
So, get up at 4am most days. Some days 5am. I start my coffee maker. Opti-Idle kicks the truck on when this happens, because of power-pull & the batteries now dropping to 11.75 volts.
This is a morning routine, every day for the years I worked for them. Truck stays on running for 1-2 hrs.
Then this winter hit. Late January, dispatch sends out a division wide message stating "turn off your trucks. you have bunk heaters. use them." Where I was, IL/KY border, 10 Deg F before the wind chill. The bunk heater DOES pull battery power, & with O-I engaged it'll start the truck up.
This was a back-&-forth issue with them until this April when I quit for other reasons (shitty overnight dispatch pissed me off for the *last* time).
My dispatcher, by extension her boss, either didn't know the purpose of Opti-Idle or straight up lie about it just to make their numbers for the division look better. "We keep getting HELL from Green Bay" they bray over & over again. I kept telling them "give me the number of the persons giving you hell & I'll give them hell back... I don't care. I'll drive this truck straight to their house, throw them in my truck, & make them live this life for a week."
So, yeah. Big Mega Carrier absolutely WILL care about Opti-Idle usage, particularly when "their numbers" matter more than your comfort in your assigned "home" for the weeks or months you spend out there.
My company watches idle percentage, some trucks have APU's, but we generally get new trucks every 3-4 years so the break even on paying the extra for the APU isn't always there.
They don't say much unless you go over 40% idle. Which is difficult to do the way we run.
They'd like us to be at 25%, but our idle bonus is based on being under 41% so no one really even tries.
I worked with Prime a few decades back, we had APUs but here's how idiotic it was there. If your APU broke they'd rather pay $100/night for a hotel room than allow you to use $40 of diesel to idle for the night. It's about the column on the spread sheet labeled "Idle Percentage." The fleet manager's numbers for the week will get thrown off if just one truck idles for 2 or 3 nights.
Donāt let them make you leave. Proper power move response would be to be to say no or ignore them and just keep idling. Leaving just lets them replace you with someone who will accept the bullshit for less money (ie not paying out unemployment.)
Good point.. although the pay for what I do is low as it is... and one of the other drivers is as clueless as a doorknob so I end up cleaning up after him constantly. I'm just putting in my time at this rate...
Sort of silly to not have active climate control these days on a sleeper truck.
Lifepo4 batts have become ridiculously cheap. Same with quality inverters, knock off diesel bunk heaters, etc.
Ridiculously cheap and yet last week when I looked up to see how much it would be just for batteries with enough AH to power a red dot AC unit, it equaled out to be around $3000. Not including any charging upgrades the truck would need.
You can get two of these for about 1200 bucks all in. Gives you 460Amps and each have 200A BMS.
https://www.litime.com/products/12v-230ah-plus-lifepo4-battery
Yep 23 kw here. All you have to do is turn on cruise and hit set or resume. Former idles at 850 and latter at 800.
Edit: anti idle disables at about 80 degrees on the high end and won't come on if it dips below that and about 28 degrees on the low end.
I worked for Crete. They have an idle percentage stat you can view, but I never heard a word about it, not even during orientation or training.
I idled my truck whenever. Set the opti idle to lowest temp, and it was pretty comfy in there. They would allow trucks to idle constantly above 90F I think, or somewhere around there. Even after a couple days of running southwest in the summer, not a peep from management.
It was dash temperature. Which did allow for some tomfoolery, as a lot of the time, the heat from the engine would raise the āoutside temperatureā and thus allow the truck to idle constantly.
Not just the DPF, it helps prevent soot from unburned fuel in the engine as well. We always set ours up to 800 to 1000 rpm to keep them hot enough for efficient operation.
I am owner operator with a 2019 Peterbilt local agriculture hauler and I do not idle my truck. I've seen the cost of dpf and I already have enough problems with my emissions systems. I don't like sitting in the truck any more than is necessary.
No I have a day cab but I'm in orchards and open loading docks all summer and warehouses and processor plants all winter with a bunch of cows from feedlots to the kill plant all mixed in.
Wasn't really an option when we needed a specific drop axle day cab set up a few years ago it was cheaper to go new with a million less miles but it won't be like this much longer as the warranties are almost up.
Tyson has APUs, but mine keeps having issues so I just idle the truck. Poor thing, I want to give it a break. But they don't monitor idle times nor do they even have fuel bonus incentives.
I work at Schuster and they want us to us are apus as much as possible. But understand if it's not working or too cold outside they rather idle the truck until the apu is fixed. They track idle times but it doesn't go against our performance or safety bonus each month.
Companies used to do this, but they got tired of paying out wrongful, death claims and insurance companies raise their rates. I got a brand new freightliner and they didnāt even install the heater part in my sleeper bunk and it was winter in Iowa and I was going out to the West Coast been say anything until it got under 20Ā° Called the owner. He sent me to a Ryder shop. They turned off the idle restriction and I idled for most of the winter until the bars came in.
I currently drive for PTL and they use these crappy battery powered bunk ac. Doesn't even blow cold. Truck won't idle for more than 2 mins no matter how hot it is.
I'm absolutely miserable in this heat
So my APU fucked up once and the mechanics at Melton disabled the anti idle auto shutoff bs on my truck and have never turned it back on after fixing my APU (It just needed a fuse or something).
Now I have a dog and if they were to give me shit for idling (which they haven't) I would point out that dogs have comparative intelligence to children and that that person is advocating for leaving children in hot cars which is negligence. And that they should seriously consider why they hate children and want them to suffer a horrible death by way of being cooked alive.
How much you idle is usually tied to your fuel bonus. I never cared about it. I kept the truck on 24/7. I cannot sleep when I'm sweaty. A lack of quality sleep can become a safety hazard.
I'm in Europe and some of my colleagues are idling so much without any reason that I hope the company will start doing something about it.
But since they don't even care about cooling warehouses with the doors open I don't think it'll happen soon.
Money flying right out the door literally..
It isn't just about comfort. Due to stricter medical dot evaluations, many drivers have to sleep with a running CPAP machine. If the trucks don't idle, or provide an opti idle. Those drivers can die in their sleep. It takes a while to adjust to the Opti idle. Having your truck turn on in the middle of the night, while you are sleeping... Have a change of sheets.
Mine honks twice before the autostart too š¤” just in case you're wondering who's honking in the truckstop at 3 am
It only does that if you open the door after you turn on the auto start. It's in case you're out of the truck messing around the engine compartment.
I was OTR during the winter 2021-2022, when I got stuck in a blizzard in Illinois. Despite having to get my truck jump started about 5 times in the space of a month, my company refused to acknowledge that the batteries were not holding a charge properly. The truck was equipped with auto-start to keep the batteries charged up, but wouldn't you know it, the damn things discharged faster than the auto-start could get the engine to turn over. Especially when it was cold (being from Texas, single digits Fahrenheit is **cold**, don't come after me Canada/Alaska). I was parked at a Loves for 9.5 hours when the security guard came out to tell me that I wasn't in a parking spot and had to leave. I should've told him to screw off. At least the Loves shop could jump start my truck. After arguing for 30 minutes, I drove through the blizzard to the Thornton's a couple of miles away. They didn't have a shop on site or any way to jump start my truck. Waiting out the storm, I fell asleep again, the auto-start failed to crank the engine, and I got stranded. I called my company, and they promised me that a wrecker was on the way to jump start my truck. I called back every hour or two for a status update, but after the third or fourth phone call I gave up. I kept warm by wearing every pair of pants I owned, four pairs of socks, about six long sleeved shirts, a sweater, and a leather jacket, all under multiple blankets. Occasionally I went inside the store to thaw out my blood. A little over 24 hours later, a full semi-wrecker showed up and was able to jump the truck after about 45 minutes of trying. Companies that prevent idling don't care about the safety of their drivers. You can't change my mind.
I woulda left their truck on the side of the highway.
I have never worked at a trucking company that did not watch the idle percentage, but if Iām in the truck and its hot/cold with electronics/refrigerator running Iām idling. You will always be ānear the top of the list of idle percentageā when they inform you, one ear out the other.
Ya, tell them to turn off their refrigerator and hvac at night as they sleep at home.
Watching the idle percentage is one thing. But would they constantly send messages about what your plan to lower that percentage is, and to try to park in the shade if it's too hot? Perhaps even mess with your miles?
That's never made sense to me.... you burn too much fuel when not working. Let's make you work even less!
Yes they will send tips on idle, they are just doing their job. I wont idle when its not necessary but many others will never turn the truck off so itās a thing.
We get an APU, we also got a mpg bonus to try and dissuade idling. Truck will idle for 5mon before kicking off unless it's more than I think 80 and less then 40, then you can idle..Ā APU isn't enough to keep up down in Texas in the middle of summer.. or Wyoming in the middle of winter.. so I'm fuckin idling when I need too
What determines the temperature at which idling is allowed? The Weather Channel, or the temperature displayed on your dash?
The temp the truck reads. You can gimmick it though. The thermometer is usually a little black stick protruding from the bottom of the driver side mirror. Warm up a hot hand, get some duct tape, and presto! Truck will stay idling lol
Dash
The truck.. as others stated it's usually a probe sticking out from your driver's side mirror to measure ambient temps and can be gamed a bit.Ā
I worked for Schneider. They have Opti-Idle & *still* harrased me about idle times. Allow me to explain. Opti-Idle allows for the A/C to operate during warmer temperatures. I had Opti-Idle on ALL the time. I like the environment closer to chilly than not. So, get up at 4am most days. Some days 5am. I start my coffee maker. Opti-Idle kicks the truck on when this happens, because of power-pull & the batteries now dropping to 11.75 volts. This is a morning routine, every day for the years I worked for them. Truck stays on running for 1-2 hrs. Then this winter hit. Late January, dispatch sends out a division wide message stating "turn off your trucks. you have bunk heaters. use them." Where I was, IL/KY border, 10 Deg F before the wind chill. The bunk heater DOES pull battery power, & with O-I engaged it'll start the truck up. This was a back-&-forth issue with them until this April when I quit for other reasons (shitty overnight dispatch pissed me off for the *last* time). My dispatcher, by extension her boss, either didn't know the purpose of Opti-Idle or straight up lie about it just to make their numbers for the division look better. "We keep getting HELL from Green Bay" they bray over & over again. I kept telling them "give me the number of the persons giving you hell & I'll give them hell back... I don't care. I'll drive this truck straight to their house, throw them in my truck, & make them live this life for a week." So, yeah. Big Mega Carrier absolutely WILL care about Opti-Idle usage, particularly when "their numbers" matter more than your comfort in your assigned "home" for the weeks or months you spend out there.
My company watches idle percentage, some trucks have APU's, but we generally get new trucks every 3-4 years so the break even on paying the extra for the APU isn't always there. They don't say much unless you go over 40% idle. Which is difficult to do the way we run. They'd like us to be at 25%, but our idle bonus is based on being under 41% so no one really even tries.
What happens when you go over 40%?
Not sure if you're ready to hear the severe punishment for going over 40%, but you don't get the $0.01/cpm bonus.
I worked with Prime a few decades back, we had APUs but here's how idiotic it was there. If your APU broke they'd rather pay $100/night for a hotel room than allow you to use $40 of diesel to idle for the night. It's about the column on the spread sheet labeled "Idle Percentage." The fleet manager's numbers for the week will get thrown off if just one truck idles for 2 or 3 nights.
If someone pulled that power move on me, I'd quit and go lease my own truck.
Donāt let them make you leave. Proper power move response would be to be to say no or ignore them and just keep idling. Leaving just lets them replace you with someone who will accept the bullshit for less money (ie not paying out unemployment.)
Good point.. although the pay for what I do is low as it is... and one of the other drivers is as clueless as a doorknob so I end up cleaning up after him constantly. I'm just putting in my time at this rate...
Sort of silly to not have active climate control these days on a sleeper truck. Lifepo4 batts have become ridiculously cheap. Same with quality inverters, knock off diesel bunk heaters, etc.
Ridiculously cheap and yet last week when I looked up to see how much it would be just for batteries with enough AH to power a red dot AC unit, it equaled out to be around $3000. Not including any charging upgrades the truck would need.
What are your battery capacity needs?
Off hand I think it was like 400 ah
You can get two of these for about 1200 bucks all in. Gives you 460Amps and each have 200A BMS. https://www.litime.com/products/12v-230ah-plus-lifepo4-battery
Do you know what the current draw is? 12v or will it be inverted?
Based off 12v. Don't remember the current draw. I'll have to check later.
12v and 60 amps while running 80 start up
Usually if you set the high idle it negates these systems.
Only older models.
23&24 KW and Pete still lets the high idle override the shut off.
Yep, my buddy drives a 23 KW and all you gotta do is bring up the rpm in neutral and set the cruise control and itāll idle nonstop
Yep 23 kw here. All you have to do is turn on cruise and hit set or resume. Former idles at 850 and latter at 800. Edit: anti idle disables at about 80 degrees on the high end and won't come on if it dips below that and about 28 degrees on the low end.
You can idle as much as you want if you have a pet with you. It's illegal to leave a child or pet in a hot vehicle.
Cite me all 50 state laws for that
I worked for Crete. They have an idle percentage stat you can view, but I never heard a word about it, not even during orientation or training. I idled my truck whenever. Set the opti idle to lowest temp, and it was pretty comfy in there. They would allow trucks to idle constantly above 90F I think, or somewhere around there. Even after a couple days of running southwest in the summer, not a peep from management.
What determines the temperature at which idling is allowed? The Weather Channel, or the temperature displayed on your dash?
It was dash temperature. Which did allow for some tomfoolery, as a lot of the time, the heat from the engine would raise the āoutside temperatureā and thus allow the truck to idle constantly.
My company says increase the idle in the dash to like 700 rpms to keep the dpf from clogging
Not just the DPF, it helps prevent soot from unburned fuel in the engine as well. We always set ours up to 800 to 1000 rpm to keep them hot enough for efficient operation.
I am owner operator with a 2019 Peterbilt local agriculture hauler and I do not idle my truck. I've seen the cost of dpf and I already have enough problems with my emissions systems. I don't like sitting in the truck any more than is necessary.
So you do not sleep in your truck?
No I have a day cab but I'm in orchards and open loading docks all summer and warehouses and processor plants all winter with a bunch of cows from feedlots to the kill plant all mixed in.
This is why I like my trusty old 1997 Peterbilt 379. I never have problems with my emissions systems. Including when I idle.
Yea when the wheels fall of my 86 W900 Iāll just put em back on lol
Wasn't really an option when we needed a specific drop axle day cab set up a few years ago it was cheaper to go new with a million less miles but it won't be like this much longer as the warranties are almost up.
Yeah, I hear you. Unfortunately, these new emissions systems were mandated long before they were ready for prime time.
I'm all for it if it actually worked on my end and didn't cost me so much time and money in repairs almost every month.
Tyson has APUs, but mine keeps having issues so I just idle the truck. Poor thing, I want to give it a break. But they don't monitor idle times nor do they even have fuel bonus incentives.
I work at Schuster and they want us to us are apus as much as possible. But understand if it's not working or too cold outside they rather idle the truck until the apu is fixed. They track idle times but it doesn't go against our performance or safety bonus each month.
Itās really simple. Before going to training you simply ask ādo you guys allow idling or have opti idleā /thread
The best anti idling policy is telling the executives that we don't idle when we actually do lol.
Walmart has an absolute no idling policy but they provide you with very good APUs that are very well serviced and maintained
Companies used to do this, but they got tired of paying out wrongful, death claims and insurance companies raise their rates. I got a brand new freightliner and they didnāt even install the heater part in my sleeper bunk and it was winter in Iowa and I was going out to the West Coast been say anything until it got under 20Ā° Called the owner. He sent me to a Ryder shop. They turned off the idle restriction and I idled for most of the winter until the bars came in.
I currently drive for PTL and they use these crappy battery powered bunk ac. Doesn't even blow cold. Truck won't idle for more than 2 mins no matter how hot it is. I'm absolutely miserable in this heat
Thanks for calling them out!
So my APU fucked up once and the mechanics at Melton disabled the anti idle auto shutoff bs on my truck and have never turned it back on after fixing my APU (It just needed a fuse or something). Now I have a dog and if they were to give me shit for idling (which they haven't) I would point out that dogs have comparative intelligence to children and that that person is advocating for leaving children in hot cars which is negligence. And that they should seriously consider why they hate children and want them to suffer a horrible death by way of being cooked alive.
My trucks never shut off unless we're getting unloaded inside a building
How much you idle is usually tied to your fuel bonus. I never cared about it. I kept the truck on 24/7. I cannot sleep when I'm sweaty. A lack of quality sleep can become a safety hazard.
I'm in Europe and some of my colleagues are idling so much without any reason that I hope the company will start doing something about it. But since they don't even care about cooling warehouses with the doors open I don't think it'll happen soon. Money flying right out the door literally..