Does anyone remember “the wire”? ISTR that it was a fairly standard piece of Euro-trucking kit back in the 1980s… couldn’t imagine doing it in my wildest dreams now!
I think some nations still use it,
Most handy tool in the kit,but I had mine through the cigarette lighter ,it was wired through the lighter to the taco ,the lighter was soldered up to make a circuit and when not in its holder it broke the circuit,very useful for 2 Barcelona’s per week !!
Just a quick edit, I also had the rheostat switch which controlled the brightness of the dash lights wired to the fuel gauge ,very useful when you could not cross some borders with more than 250 litres,when they looked at the gauge I was nearly empty.
kerbut:
I also had the rheostat switch which controlled the brightness of the dash lights wired to the fuel gauge ,very useful when you could not cross some borders with more than 250 litres,when they looked at the gauge I was nearly empty.
Sheer brilliance…
I once came back into Germany at Frankfurt-Oder with 2000 litres of Russian diesel in a belly tank. The young Zoll man pointed to it suspiciously so I said “No, it’s empty, look”. and I got a hammer out of the cab and whacked the tank. There was a dull thud then I said “See, that’s what they sound like when they are empty” and he said “Ja, das ist gut!” so obviously that made my day!
For a while, the modern equivalent was “The magnet” they fixed that one too…
In the SK Mercs, there were two banks of fuses.
If you removed the second bottom fuse in the left hand bank, (ign = off) the tacho would still turn. (Recording bed of course.)
However, the odometer plus the speed and distance traces were disabled.
It was a mate of mine that told me, not that I’d try removing fuse #14.
Apparently…
in the old Scania’s earthing the blue wire in the connector block with the tacho seal under the fuse box worked well…!
Then there was the ‘extra’ joint in the tacho cable, usually behind the front TIR plate.
Remember the one that the tacho station ‘forgot’ to seal.?
Crocodile clip and snap-on connectors for the cherry !!! the small front tanks were wired to the fuel gauge and Mr Frog was not happy because the 10/20 franc note was not sitting in the tacho. plus, the head board tanks !!
Apparently Ford Transcons were possible as they had 2 tacho cables and no one ever checked the sealed joint, allegedly
I must have been very innocent, or lucky, I just used to change the disc when the time ran out.
The nearest I came to fiddling a limiter, not illegally, was when I had a brand new 3300 and discovered it had a limiter set to 80k/hr. Soon discovered that it was wired through a bog standard, and easily got at, fuse. Just had to remember to put it back at service time though.
On Daf 3300s you could shunt around a bit without showing any movement by firing the thing up and then immediately turning the key back to ignition position 1 (the one where the radio comes on but that’s about all).
Or so I’m told…
Harry said
I once came back into Germany at Frankfurt-Oder with 2000 litres of Russian diesel in a belly tank. The young Zoll man pointed to it suspiciously so I said “No, it’s empty, look”. and I got a hammer out of the cab and whacked the tank. There was a dull thud then I said “See, that’s what they sound like when they are empty” and he said “Ja, das ist gut!” so obviously that made my day!
That reminds me of the famous Harry Wuffenden coming home at Waidhaus , parked nose uphill ,the zoll did,nt believe Harry was empty, and decided to to take the 4500lt belly tank end, metal inspection plate(my trailer had see through ones on) off as harry was partaking coffee at one of the agents offices, looking out of the window muttering
oh dear hope its lower than the plate,
it was,nt and out came a diesel soaked kraut fuel running down the parking area, two days later and £2500 lighter Harry was on his way home.
Anyway back to the original topic a mate of mine, tried to pull the wire out, as he was being stopped at Quimper, and it snagged on something live, and took fire and burnt his hand, and when the french vosa man opened the door out came the smoke and a coughing driver this episode cost over 5k to sort
The best interuption device was the 113 scannys and the thumb in the middle of the tacho head then whoose with no evidence
Then they recalled them all and replaced the plastic with glass
tut,tut,tut
klunk/■■■■■■■■
The best interuption device was the 113 scannys and the thumb in the middle of the tacho head then whoose with no evidence
Then they recalled them all and replaced the plastic with glass
And I believe that is why 21 years later Scanias are still often voted as the favourite trucks by many people, including owner drivers. There cant be any other reason
Scanias dont half move along when the limiter fuse “blows”. Allegedly.
In true Scrooge mood I’m going to have to mention
roadtransport.com/Articles/2 … nline.html
we really don’t want instructions on how to break the law on here
Denis F:
In true Scrooge mood I’m going to have to mentionroadtransport.com/Articles/2 … nline.html
we really don’t want instructions on how to break the law on here
Quite right too Denis!!
Everything we’ve mentioned on this topic are reminiscences of what our mates told us they did.
dieseldave:
Denis F:
In true Scrooge mood I’m going to have to mentionroadtransport.com/Articles/2 … nline.html
we really don’t want instructions on how to break the law on here
Quite right too Denis!!
Everything we’ve mentioned on this topic are reminiscences of what our mates told us they did.![]()
I used to drive a F plate MAN 362 which everytime you used the passenger side electric window the speed limiter would cut out that was a cold winter i can tell you
and a 400 Seddon Atkinson with the eurotech cab and twinsplitter which I was told that if you held the gearlever back when in top gear it would overrun the limiter as well.