Thanks for the advice.
I’ve been using cruise control whenever I can and slowing down very early for roundabouts using engine brake positions one and two.
Fuel economy is very important these days with the price of the stuff, so I can see where companies are coming from using this technology.
Davyboy:
cant beleive what i’m reading here,what a load o pish,if you can get a all your deliveries done with clean P0D’s and return the wagon to base with no damage in a legal time is that not enough!!!.Don’t think i could keep a straight face if some office knob started reading out stats like this,some parts of this job really are a joke
Thank Christ for that !! 
I thought it was just me 
I’m amazed that drivers on here are giving this creedance by discussing it in a serious context 
…Yet ANOTHER example of complete ■■■■■■■■ thought up by office bound bell ends who know zb all about the job in real terms, but “everything” about the theory, ,…Microlise FFS!
so how much are all these companies spending on these fuel monitoring/vehicle tracking/driver spying technologies ■■?
and on the admin part of it.
I bet it is far more than what they might save in fuel figures
Trukkertone:
so how much are all these companies spending on these fuel monitoring/vehicle tracking/driver spying technologies ■■?
and on the admin part of it.
I bet it is far more than what they might save in fuel figures
Yep more than likely.
Wiretwister:
First thing to do is to try and relax, you’ll be a smoother driver, it’s only a guide.
1 - Get into cruise as early as possible. Our fleet will let you engage at 19mph/30kph, then build the speed up gently and reset the cruise at intervals. This enable you to ease off without having to touch the brakes. If you are lucky cruise will stay engaged when you touch the brakes or exhaust break. Also reduce the cruise setting early if approaching hazards so as to keep it engaged as long as possible. If on a rural road I run with the cruise on a low setting and use the throttle as normal.
2 - A soft right foot is absolutely crucial. Don’t race away or brake late that burns a lot of fuel.
3 - Use the night heater to keep warm on breaks. Idling the engine will crucify your performance, if the night heater is defective report it, every day, till it’s fixed.
4 - Don’t idle for more than 5-10 seconds. Turn of at gate house, in the gate house queue, doing your walk round. If you have to build air up raise the rev level to about 900rpm it will not register as idling.
These, as well as all the usual empathic driving skills, are what I use and get a fuel target performance of about 120% all be it with a rating of B, never had an A rating have had the occasional C rating but to be honest the number of my colleagues who are performing, by this measure, worse than me suggest that I have a long wait before my tea and bickie chat with the TM. As a foot note I don’t have an allocated truck so will be in “any available” from day to day.
Forgot to say, call me a dinosaur, old ■■■■, or anything similar you choose, but the day I have to go through all that horsecrap to appease aholes and dheads to keep hold of a job will be the day I jack for good if everybody just told them to go and ■■■■ themselves they wouldn’t continue to dream up these dickwhit ideas and just leave us to do our jobs.
Hey has anyone had any problems with this green band section of the microlise as our trucks are automatic (rigid + drag ) 12 speed and it always wants to over rev even when just fethering the accelerator , our green band stops at 1700rpm also when on the cruise control 85kmh it is just at the very tip of the green so the slightest down hill or a bump it sends it over , i now find myself having to knock it up a gear manually when gaining speed but then again it tries to compensate and over rev in that gear if i dont catch it , also i have to now drive at about 82-3kmh ~51mph and constantly braking to avoid going over the green in 12th gear , my mpg has dropped on the motorway by 3ltr per 100kmh . but granted has gone up by 1ltr per 100kmh on average on country roads and bypasses etc…
sorry if my grammer is a bit dud i never have been good at english even tho i am lol
Your company can change the parameters of the green band zone and everything else come to think of it.
I was loading at some place yesterday and looked at the drivers’ league tables on the notice board and noticed that several drivers had infringements for “harsh acceleration”.
And that’s why I am an owner-driver. 
They are not “infringements”, they are “performance indicators”. As an owner-driver I’m sure you try to keep your costs down, by choosing where you buy fuel, tyres etc, and (probably) driving with an eye on fuel economy too? Surely you don’t clog the motor flat out from every standing start?
Roymondo:
They are not “infringements”, they are “performance indicators”. As an owner-driver I’m sure you try to keep your costs down, by choosing where you buy fuel, tyres etc, and (probably) driving with an eye on fuel economy too? Surely you don’t clog the motor flat out from every standing start?
Why not? That’s what the engine ecu is for.
Trukkertone:
I have No idea which Flipping Transport company you might be on about.
we’ve had it at Egotistical Silly Little willy wavers for four years now! Harsh break = reversing onto king pin on trailer, idling for an hour = moving in traffic jams on tick over and my favourite when using exhaust break coming down windy hill, shoots revs into the blue band, it drops to 11th gear in the scans and cuts off THE FUEL! Martin Bolger you RICHARD HEAD! 
robroy:
sorry for taking so long obviously missed page 2 in the index.
I ain’t going to use any of those descriptions towards you but I would just ask:-
Do you race off from a standing start?
Do you brake at the last moment?
Fuel economy is but one aspect of what these sort of systems can help with when trying to control the cost of running a fleet. What about things like SAFED courses do they play a part? There is also brake and clutch wear, tyres as well. Driving with some sympathy to the machine reduces those wear costs as well as being less aggressive/competitive towards those we share the roads with. If you think these ideas are daft fine I don’t mind; I do think they have a place which is my prerogative.
Wiretwister:
robroy:
sorry for taking so long obviously missed page 2 in the index.
I ain’t going to use any of those descriptions towards you but I would just ask:-
Do you race off from a standing start?
Do you brake at the last moment?
Fuel economy is but one aspect of what these sort of systems can help with when trying to control the cost of running a fleet. What about things like SAFED courses do they play a part? There is also brake and clutch wear, tyres as well. Driving with some sympathy to the machine reduces those wear costs as well as being less aggressive/competitive towards those we share the roads with. If you think these ideas are daft fine I don’t mind; I do think they have a place which is my prerogative.
I learnt all required driving techniques relating to economy and safety etc through experience, and belong to the generation where I drive the truck, not the truck drives me . I believe, rightly or wrongly, that when you resort to relying on the type of cack mentioned it becomes just that… Old dog new tricks etc etc (woof woof 
)
My run is a 540km trunk on sc, dc and motorway and about three miles of town work, the system fitted to my motor makes interesting reading when comparing my results to other drivers on the fleet doing the same work.
Less idle time, 26% better fuel returns (monthly average) and a marginally lower (less than 1 mph) average speed, I usually run at slightly higher weights than the rest, gains are really down to driving with my eyes open, reading the road ahead and using cruise control for all but the town work. A fuel bonus was brought in just before I started, worth around £70 a week in my back pocket, some drivers never get a penny but when you see them thrashing the nuts off the motors by putting the trans in semi auto and flooring the pedal at every chance it’s easy to see why.
We have this crap" fitted "to some of our trailers bloody marvellous!
The idiots that fit this garbage have tapped into the ABS solenoid primary feed to power the bloody thing up.Great idea.
First you lose the trailer information module so no odometer or RSP data.
Next you lose ABS and EBS communication.
Now 4 of the trailers need complete new ABS looms as the coupling pins to the Modulator blocks have burnt out.We tell them that abs wiring is specific and should never be “tapped” into for any other system but they say well there is nowhere else that is permanently live.
Instead of fitting this bollox it should have been thrown in the bloody bin.
Notice how its nearly always big companies with loads of a/holes in suits that will swallow any old crap as long as its fed to them by another a\hole in a suit that buy this bloody rubbish.Why dont they leave things up to the people who at least have an inkling what the hell is going on and just get back to driving a bloody desk and shuffling paper about.
Judehamish:
HiJust after tips really. Just started working for a very good company, but they have this Microlise system and do print-outs each week with category’s, and a mark ranging from A - G, and then an overall driver rating, 1-100 for example.
I’ve never idle the engine at all, worry constantly about harsh braking (exhaust brake can cause an hard brake i’m told) so would appreciate any advice from drivers that get good scores.
Many thanks
A little tip on this one, if you find “overspeed” a problem on this if you have weight on etc travelling down hill, and the unit it is auto, throw it into manual and it’ll stay within your green band driving! A friend in work found this out as he was always getting crap scores for overspeed , soon as he started the manual thing he got top scores
Microlise rocks, can’t beat a game of moving goalposts.
As a late afternoon/night driver it doesn’t cause me too much hassle, I do pity the multi drop city drivers on days trying to work around this system.
I love the fact that after doing London peaks London peaks I got to go and talk to a girl who has never driven a truck in her life and be told I’m not using cruise control enough and accelerating too harshly.
Phantom Mark:
Microlise rocks, can’t beat a game of moving goalposts.As a late afternoon/night driver it doesn’t cause me too much hassle, I do pity the multi drop city drivers on days trying to work around this system.
Don’t they take this into consideration and lower the ratings you need to achieve? I know at DHL if your a night driver they want you to get A’s accross the board,but if your doing days they make leeway for this.
Kevwall:
Phantom Mark:
Microlise rocks, can’t beat a game of moving goalposts.As a late afternoon/night driver it doesn’t cause me too much hassle, I do pity the multi drop city drivers on days trying to work around this system.
Don’t they take this into consideration and lower the ratings you need to achieve? I know at DHL if your a night driver they want you to get A’s accross the board,but if your doing days they make leeway for this.
No. If we attain the pre Microlise average we get a c and they are happy. But they make no account of the fact that some of us drive round London for six hours plus two on the motorway and some do seven motorway hours and two urban hours on Manchester or Liverpool.