HGV Trailer Brakes

Honest John Back Room » The Back Room Archive
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Fri 18 May 2001 15:51
HGV Trailer Brakes - stuart bruce
There is a problem at the moment with people fitting cheap pattern unapproved connectors to trailer air lines. Usually the problem is that the length of the central pin is a little bit wrong, with the consequence that when the tractor unit connects up the trailer brakes don't work properly.

Now I know that there are very responsible firms out there who leave no nut unturned in their quest for efficiency and safety, but there are a lot more who don't. So when it was suggested that legislation should require that E-approved connectors be fitted there was an outcry.

At a conference a speaker stated that it was not acceptable to enforce this due to cost, it would cost the UK industry £10million. I don't know if that is true, but in the same conference (it may have been in the same speech which makes it worse) it was stated that there are 250,000 trailers in use in the UK. Again I don't know if that figure is accurate.

But maybe I'm being thick but it seems to me that simple arithmetic suggests that a very vocal part of the UK transport industry is resisting implementing a safety measure for the sake of £40 per trailer.

Any views?
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