Tyre Pressure Monitoring and Brake Testing are important considerations for any company that operates company vehicles especially now that new sentencing guidelines have been introduced. At the beginning of February the Sentencing Guideline Council published it’s recommended sentencing charges for corporate manslaughter and health and safety offences causing death. These are the first guidelines for sentencing organisations not individuals. The council uses these guidelines to help courts make decisions on sentencing organisations that have caused death through a serious breach of care of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.
Tyre Pressure Monitoring and Brake Testing are two ways that organisations with a driving workforce can be vigilant in avoiding accidents at work. Even in the case of an incident some of these products can assist in demonstrating a company has done everything in it’s care to protect its driving workforce.
New guidelines, which took effect from Monday (February 15), have set out the precise financial risk that organisations face if they have not done everything possible to minimise health and safety hazards with their vehicles. Such as monitoring their tyre pressure or ensuring brakes are tested on a regular basis
Under these new guidelines, if a work-related road death leads to a prosecution for a breach of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, the fine will be ‘…seldom less than £100,000 and may be measured in hundreds of thousands of pounds or more’.
And if conviction of corporate manslaughter is proven, the fine imposed will be ‘…seldom less than £500,000 and may be measured in millions of pounds’.
Tyre Pressure Monitoring and Brake Testing are two ways that organisations with a driving workforce can be vigilant in avoiding accidents at work. Even in the case of an incident some of these products can assist in demonstrating a company has done everything in it’s care to protect its driving workforce.
The CET (Caravan Electrical Tester) will cover all the functions on the 12N and 12S as well as the 13 Pin Euro Plug. With a connection to a battery it will apply power to all the functions during the test.
The lights are fused at 5 amp and the Charging / Live / Fridge are fused at 15 amp, all fuses are breakers which means no fuse to change.
An LED will stay illuminated to indicate the fuse has not tripped.
An AMP meter connected which will prove the draw of power for the Fridge and Battery Charging / Permanent Live, a toggle switch will turn switch power to test the lights (Old 12N functions) separately or the functions of the old 12S, this is to ensure that you can work on lights and not cause too many fault errors to caravans fitted with ATC.
The CET is well constructed for any workshop and is powered by connecting a battery via the supplied battery terminals.
The CET has been made following a request from a caravan dealer to test their caravans, it has been made for the trade and will suit mobile caravan service engineers.
Priced at 99.00 + VAT this tester is a must for any caravan repairer.
Recent statistics published by Startrescue suggest that the recent Big Freeze has affected the condition of the UK’s roads. These conditions in turn have caused an increase in call-outs for tyre and suspension related repairs to rise rapidly in the 2009-2010 winter season. This breakdown recovery service has reported a 13 per cent increase in December and January.
Startrescue.co.uk spokesperson Ricardo Sagnella comments: “More and more motorists are telling us that their problems are largely due to the thousands of potholes that have appeared since the ice and grit has finally cleared.”
These figures highlight the importance of checking the tyre pressure of your vehicle on a regular basis. Monitoring Tyre Pressure regularly is made simple by a small investment in a device such as PressurePro. This tyre pressure monitor takes the guesswork out of determining the correct tyre pressure of your vehicle.
Click Tyre Pressure Monitor for more details
Or click aide automotive for a full list of all of our prodcuts on offer
Fuel theft is an increasing problem for many businesses that have a fleet of vehicles. aide automotive have some excellent anti fuel theft devices that are easy to fit and can prevent the siphoning of fuel from commercial vehicles.
Some of these devices are currently on offer for a limited period only
Check out aide automotive for our full product portfolio
Police are concerned about the safety of truck drivers following the increasing problem of fuel thefts from lorries parked in lay-bys. They have been warning truck drivers travelling through Neath, Port Talbot in an attempt to overcome the issue of fuel theft. Over 150 litres of fuel was siphoned from a lorry parked along the A465 as the driver slept.
Lorry driver Steven Orchard, 34, from Carmarthenshire, was parked on the same road at Resolven when his vehicle was targeted overnight, “Some lorries can hold 800 or 900 litres of diesel. It’s easy money,” he said. The Freight Transport Association (FTA) said truck drivers are popular targets for thieves and the Resolven incident was “not a rarity”. Don Armour, of the FTA, said: “Instances of fuel siphoning and general truck theft are all too common. Truck stop provision is pretty poor throughout the UK – there are basically none in mid Wales
The siphoning of fuel from trucks is a costly business in terms of stolen fuel, replacing that fuel and vehicle downtime. One way that companies can protect their vehicles against fuel theft is by a small investment in an anti fuel theft devices such as TP Anti-syph.
Click Anti-fuel theft for full product details
CabCheckS is the PC software that enables BrakeChecks brake test results to be downloaded to a PC. This software is now compatible with Windows 7.
CabCheck software is a better option than a portable printer as it gives you the ability to download, store and print brake tests from your PC. CabCheckS gives the professional edge to Brake Testing, by the capacity to print onto a sheet of A4 quality paper compared to the portable hand held print outs. And another bonus is the BrakeCheck and a PC kit is cheaper than buying a BrakeCheck and printer.
Another benefit is the additional option of adding extra details to the print out for instance comments can be made on the ground condition, brake maintenance, weather and performance. Printing tests and saving to the PC hard drive is at the click of a button. Each printed test report can be embedded with your company name.
aideautomotive have a number of automotive products to suit your needs
A coroner ruled that a pensioner whose car burst into flames after being hit by a lorry was unlawfully killed. The inquest was told the lorries brakes had not been maintained properly.
The 85-year-old’s car was struck on the side when the Lorry veered on to his side of the road and pushed his car on to the verge where it burst into flames.
The lorry driver had borrowed the vehicle from a friend in Chester who owned a commercial vehicle company. He said he went over the brow of a hill and into a bend, but when he tried to brake there was no response. Mr Mason said he had done a quick visual check of the vehicle when he picked it up from Mr Currie’s garage the previous night and had not noticed any defects. Worcestershire coroner asked Mr Currie how often the vehicle, used for business purposes, was serviced, as his operating licence stated it should be about every eight weeks.
Mr Currie said it had not been serviced since July 2008 and although he’d checked it himself, he’d not noticed the severely corroded brake pipe underneath the vehicle.
Mr Williams said Mr Currie had breached his duty to keep the vehicle in a roadworthy condition. He recorded a verdict that Mr Bird had been unlawfully killed.
Horrific stories like these only demonstrate how important it is to not only to check your brakes but also be able to demonstrate that you’ve been doing so on a regular basis.
Follow this Brake Tester link to find out more details on our Brake Tester BrakeCheck
Lee Lock is a patented product to stop pallet trucks from rolling in the back of a truck and causing damage to the goods or the trucks curtain sides.
Lee Lock addresses a fairly widespread health and safety problem in a simple but ingenious way. And as fleet managers are becoming ever more concerned with the potential long-term costs of health and safety risks, the modest one-off price for the Lee Lock is a very attractive solution.
Pallet trucks are often left loose in the truck cargo area or lifted onto tyres, either way there is the potential of the pallet truck crashing into the goods or ripping the curtain side when the truck had to brake hard or goes over a speed hump.
Lee Lock is designed to lock the pallet truck in place at all times, hence reducing any chance of the truck slamming into any goods or slashing the curtain side, and as the pallet truck slots into the Lee Lock there is no chance of any back injury by lifting the truck as would be required if using a tyre.
Lee Lock is the only pallet truck holder to 100% lock the pallet truck down, no risk of damage or employee injury.
To find out more click on aide automotive and contact us for more info via our contact page or go to Pallet Truck Lock.
Kuehne and Nagel Ltd who recently purchased the product said “The product showed an increase in MPG and any air loss in the tyre, we had a slow puncture on one of the tyres and the product highlighted this which saved us a breakdown / callout. Overall the product does what it says on the label “AirAlert”.
Waitrose have also seen the benefits of this simple and effective device and have purchased 1,000 Air Alerts to use across it’s fleet of vehicles.
To find out more about Air Alert follow Tyre Pressure Monitoring and get all the facts and product information
As britain is going through The Big Freeze maintaining vehicles becomes more important to ensure that everything is working correctly. Employers don’t need stranded vehicles in cold wintery conditions because of issues such as flat batteries. Similarly in winter weather it’s vital to ensure that their vehicles are in top condition, regularly checking the condition of brakes and tyres can prevent accidents in icy conditions. There are a numberof products on the market that assist through the winter.
If a company driver is stranded because the battery will not start the vehicle or simply batteries need charging to avoid them not working Check out these links to help fix battery issues
- SOS Battery Booster restores Flat Batteries starting a battery from cold or dead.
- Midtronics Battery Tester confirms a vehicle’s battery efficiency.
- Battery Charging prolongs the life of a battery by keeping it fully charged at all times
To ensure your workforce are driving a safe vehicle in wintery conditions, tyres and brakes should be legal.
Categories: Automotive Tools and Accessories Tags: Aide Automotive, Air Alert, Automotive Products, Battery Testing, Brake Check, brake efficiency, brake tester, BrakeCheck, braking efficiency, PressurePro, Tyre Pressure Monitoring, Tyre Pressure Monitors