The Heavy Duty Parts Report
Each week Jamie Irvine and his guests have conversations that empower heavy-duty people. They discuss tips, tools, and technology that help heavy-duty parts manufacturers and distributors sell the right parts to fleets, repair shops, and truck operators.
The Heavy Duty Parts Report
Brake Safety Week 2024
Episode 333: What if a simple brake inspection could save lives on the road? In this episode we talk about the life-or-death importance of Brake Safety Week, running from August 25th to August 31st, 2024. This safety week is organized by the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA).
We emphasize the crucial role of brake upkeep, especially given that brake violations are the top reason for taking commercial vehicles off the road during safety inspections. Brake Safety Week aims to remind everyone that vigilance is necessary all year round, not just for one week.
Show Notes: Visit HeavyDutyPartsReport.com for complete show notes of this episode and to subscribe to all our content.
Sponsors of this Episode
Heavy Duty Consulting Corporation: Find out how many “fault codes” your heavy-duty parts business has. Meet with us today. Visit HeavyDutyConsulting.com
Hengst Filtration: There's a new premium filter option for fleets. If you're responsible for a fleet, you won't believe how much using Hengst filters will save you. But you've got to go to HeavyDutyPartsReport.com/Hengst to find out how much.
Diesel Laptops: Diesel Laptops is so much more than just a provider of diagnostic tools. They’re your shop efficiency solution company. Learn more about everything Diesel Laptops can do for you today by visiting DieselLaptops.com today.
HDA Truck Pride: They’re the heart of the independent parts and service channel. They have 750 parts stores and 450 service centers conveniently located across the US and Canada. Visit HeavyDutyPartsReport.com/HDATruckPride today to find a location near you.
Disclaimer: This content and description may contain affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, The Heavy Duty Parts Report may receive a commission.
Sign up for our weekly email so you never miss out on an episode: Follow the Show
You're listening to the Heavy-Duty Parts Report. I'm your host, jamie Irvin, and this is the place where we have conversations that empower heavy-duty people. Welcome to the Heavy-Duty Parts Report. I'm your host, jamie Irvin. In this episode, we're going to talk about Break Safety Week. Break Safety Week 2024 occurred between August 25th and August 31st 2024. So if you're listening when the episode first dropped, you're right in the middle of it.
Jamie Irvine:Now, in this episode, we're going to talk about the history of Brake Safety Week and where it came from. We're going to talk about the impact it's had on the trucking industry and we're going to talk about why this is such an important initiative. Because, let's face it, when brakes on commercial trucks and trailers go, bad things happen. Let's get into it. Before I get into the history of Brake Safety Week, I just wanted to share with you a personal story that really emphasizes why this is such an important subject. So when I was new in the heavy-duty parts industry, we started getting into relining commercial brakes and I remember one of my mentors telling me he said in the inner city limits of the greater Vancouver area, trucks and trailers that operate within those limits do not usually have to go through the scales and they don't have to go through certain inspection points that are set up as trucks and trailers are coming in and out of the greater Vancouver area. And so he said to me. He said I'm going to tell you something. I tell my wife never, ever, pull out in front of a dump truck in this city. Now why was he saying that? Well, he was saying that because a lot of the dump trucks never left the city limits and therefore, unless they got pulled over by a roadside inspection, they never went through any kind of enforcement to make sure that their brakes were right up to expected levels and therefore it made them dangerous, because if you pulled out in front of them and they tried to stop quickly and they couldn't, you were the one that was going to lose that interaction. Now, remember this was over 25 years ago. A lot has been done to try to ensure that there is a standard that is universally applied to the trucking industry. And so I tell you that story because when we get into the history of Brake Safety Week, we can't talk about Brake Safety Week without talking about the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance or CVSA. Those two are closely connected.
Jamie Irvine:Now let's go and talk a little bit about this origin and formation of the CVSA. It started in 1980 as an informal gathering of state agencies and a couple Canadian provinces and these were all on the west side of the continent and they were really focused on creating some standards and some procedures and methods to improve the enforcement and efficiency of certain regulations that were in place to try to regulate commercial vehicles, just basically, at the end of the day, to try to make them more safe on our public roads. Now, eventually, there was the development of a memorandum of understanding or an MOU, that was really focused on establishing uniformity in highway enforcement on commercial vehicles so that we didn't have a situation where a commercial truck in one area was held to a different standard than a commercial truck in another area. And really, when you think of this memorandum of understanding, this was the beginning of where a nationwide standard was to be established. Now, eventually, this alliance that was formed in a couple of the western provinces in Canada and a few of the states on the west coast, that alliance began to expand and really it went from a regional focus to international scope. And that expansion started in 1982, where more states and Canadian provinces became associate members of this alliance. Now, eventually, there was integration between the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance standards with the US Surface Transportation Assistance Act of 1982. And this led to the formation of a unified North American standard. Eventually, this came about by about 1984. And so, really, once this uniform standard was applied nationwide in both the United States and Canada, it brought this consistency in standards and the enforcement of certain regulations which, theoretically, was going to lead to safer trucks on the road. Now, eventually, cvsa's headquarters moved to Washington DC. Obviously, there's a close connection between the alliance and federal regulators, and the CVSA has now truly become a North American council because Mexico joined in 1991. And so this truly became a North American alliance. So that's the history of the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance.
Jamie Irvine:And where does Brake Safety Week come into all of this? Well, brake Safety Week was just one of the initiatives that this alliance put forth to try to educate people, to try to bring awareness to some of the most important systems on a commercial truck or trailer that have led historically to the most amount of collisions. Let's talk about that for a moment. So, according to CVSA, brake violations comprise the largest percentage of the out-of-service violations that are cited during roadside inspections. Last year's international road check, brake violations were the top of the vehicle violation list, comprising of 25.2% for all of the vehicle out-of-service violations during those three days. So one of the things that's really important to remember about just collisions in general that lead to loss of life, that lead to injury, that lead to damage to vehicles. Brakes with commercial vehicles are really at the top of the list, and so if you look at what Brake Safety Week was all about, really it was brought forward by CVSA because they saw the need to be more awareness brought to things like driver inspection, regulatory compliance and enforcement initiatives, and so this brake safety awareness and outreach became an opportunity to really try to drive that awareness and to remind people who operate commercial equipment of the importance. Now this is just a week-long focus, but it was really designed to be able to spur that on an ongoing basis throughout the entire year. So Break Safety Week is this intense week of focus on it, but really the hope is that people are thinking about their breaks all year long.
Jamie Irvine:Now let's talk a little bit about the results of the last couple brake safety weeks over 22 and 23, and then we'll talk about what the focus is going to be in 24. So, according to the CVSA, brake safety week in 2022 resulted in 13.3% of the out-of-service violations leading to vehicles being taken off the road. This decreased to 12.6 percent in 2023. Now the question is, of course is this trend going to continue in 2024? And it is possible that we will see a decline, but there might be a compelling reason why we will see an increase. Now we're going to talk about what the focus of 2024 is and why we might see an increase in 2024 of out-of-service violations during break safety week. When we come back from our break, we'll be right back.
Jamie Irvine:Are you deferring maintenance because of filter cost or availability or, worse yet, are you trading down to no-name filters to try to save a few bucks? Either way, you're rolling the dice. The good news there's a new premium filter option for fleets Hanks Filtration. If you're responsible for a fleet, you won't believe how much using Hanks filters will save you. But you've got to go to heavydutypartsreportcom slash Hanks to find out more. That's heavy duty parts report dot com. Slash H E N G S T Head there now At Diesel Laptops.
Jamie Irvine:They go way beyond diagnostic tools. They are your complete shop efficiency partner, from diesel technician training to complete repair information, parts lookup tools and robust technical support. They are there to support you every step of the way. Learn more and download your free starter pack today by visiting DieselLaptopscom. That's DieselLaptopscom. Hda Truck Pride is the heart of the independent parts and service channel. They have 750 parts stores and 450 service centers, conveniently located across the US and Canada. Visit heavydutypartsreportcom slash hdatruckbride today to find a location near you. Again, that's heavydutypartsreportcom. Slash hdatruckbride and let the heart of the independent service channel take care of your commercial equipment.
Jamie Irvine:Okay, we're back from the break. Before the break, we were talking about the history of the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance. We were talking about what the point of Brake Safety Week was and we talked about the percentage of out-of-service violations that were issued in 22 and 23. Now we're going to talk about 24. Now in 2024, now we're going to talk about 24. Now in 2024, the focus for 2024 is going to be all about the lining and the friction material and there's going to be a heavy focus on that specifically. So inspectors are going to be looking for excessive wear in the brake linings and pads. They're going to look for cracks in that. They are going to be looking for other things like, for example, rubbing airlines. Now TransService Logistics.
Jamie Irvine:Jim Ward, who is a service and safety manager at Transverse Logistics, had this to say. He said those rubbing airlines get written up a lot. If you have two brake lines, which some of them are rubber and others are made of a poly material, what happens is those two hoses have a lot of pressure going through them and they're sitting right next to each other. So over time, with the vibration of the truck, they tend to rub against each other and they can start leaving little marks on each other, and sometimes they'll wear down far enough that it actually puts a chafe in the hose. That's something that is often overlooked. According to Ward, it may look fine, but if those two hoses are touching, you're going to get written up for it because you should make sure that they are kept separated. So inspectors are going to be looking at a lot of different aspects of your foundation break system to ensure that you're in compliance.
Jamie Irvine:Now I wanted to talk about seven ways that you can make sure that you're ready for those inspections, which really will cover off the things that those inspectors are going to be looking for this year. So, number one make sure you inspect your brake lining and look for signs of decay, including grooves in the drum from contact with a rivet. That means that the friction material has been worn right down. Of course, if you're running air disc brake, then it's a pad and a rotor setup. You want to evaluate the shoe to drum clearance to confirm that there's adequate lining on the shoe. Number three we want to search for leaks at the hub that may be contaminating the pad surface. You also, number four, want to confirm that there is no lining that is missing. This actually still happens today, which is crazy to me. Number five, you want to check for cracks in the lining. Number six, you want to look for exposed rivets on the shoe. And number seven, you want to ensure that the rotors are in good condition or the drums are in good condition, they're not oval, they're not showing excessive signs of wear. These are the kinds of things that you should be looking at to prepare yourself for 2024, because these are the things that inspectors are going to look at. There is an official inspection checklist that we have made available in the show notes, and so if you go to the show notes on heavydutypartsreportcom for today's episode, you will be able to download that checklist. It's a much more comprehensive list and will make sure that you are able to get through an inspection with no problem.
Jamie Irvine:So let's talk a little bit about why it's very possible that this year in 2024, we may see more out-of-service violations. Well, the main reason that we might see more out-of-service violations in 2024 is because the CVSA announced that performance-based brake testers, or PBBTs, will be used in some jurisdictions during Brake Safety Week. Now, pbbts are machines that test brake performance. They measure the slow speed, brake force and weight at each wheel of the vehicle. They add up the total vehicle brake force and then they divide it by the total vehicle weight to determine overall vehicle braking efficiency. It's kind of difficult to speculate right now the impact that this is going to have, but the use of this technology could affect the percentage of out-of-service violations because the measurements themselves will be more accurate on the brake performance.
Jamie Irvine:So, according to the CVSA, of the 4,898 inspections conducted on brake safety day, which was unannounced a couple months ago, 88.4% of the vehicles had no brake-related out-of-service violations. However, the inspection did show that 570, or 11.6% of those vehicles did, and they had critical violations that took them out of service. Now, if that number holds for brake safety week throughout the entire week. We will see a continued improvement of this metric of how many vehicles are being taken out of service during these inspections, and that would be a great thing. That tells us that brake safety week is working. But if we see a rise in 2024, it may be due to these PBBTs and therefore we're going to have to recalibrate the way that we calculate this data and normalize it for the pre-PBBT era and the post-PBBT era.
Jamie Irvine:At the end of the day, this initiative of Brake Safety Week is good for the industry Vehicles that have these critical violations are immediately taken off the road and everybody else. There's a lot of awareness, there's a lot of focus on it, and that is good for the industry. It's good for those who share public roads with the commercial trucking industry those who share public roads with the commercial trucking industry. So I hope that this has been informative for you and I hope that you are able to take away something from this. If you're in the part side of the business, talk to your customers. Make sure that they have the parts they need to fix their brakes. If you're on the service side, do these inspections ahead of time. Prepare your customers not just during Brake safety week, but all year long. Let's do our individual parts to reduce the kinds of collisions that happen when there is a break, failure, and with that it's time for that's not heavy duty.
Jamie Irvine:It's truly a scary thing when a commercial vehicle a truck and trailer loaded loses its brakes and you know that puts the driver at risk. It puts the other people on the road at risk. That's not the heavy duty way. Obviously, accidents do happen. Obviously, accidents do happen. But if a brake failure is caused by a lack of maintenance or someone just not doing the repair the correct way, that's not heavy duty.
Jamie Irvine:I want to show you a couple of clips from a video that we found a truly scary incident. Now, if you're listening on the audio version, I encourage you to go to the links in our show notes and click the link and watch the video. But I'll explain it to you. You have a tractor trailer going down a steep grade. They have clearly lost their brakes. Law enforcement is behind the tractor trailer trying to protect other people and keep people behind this truck or trailer. The brakes are smoking. The truck is clearly going down this grade nearly out of control. Eventually the driver, as a professional should do, takes the emergency lane that is specifically there, with the right kind of gravel to slow the truck down. But eventually the truck does come to a stop and actually rolls over. The freight inside of the 53-foot trailer explodes out onto the highway through the top and front of the trailer. The tractor is flipped over on its side. This driver is very lucky to come away alive from this incident.
Jamie Irvine:You could imagine if, through the investigation, it is discovered that this whole situation, where so many people were at risk, could have been avoided, if only proper maintenance and repairs were done. Now, if this is a true blue accident, these things do happen. That's why those emergency escape lanes are on the sides of highways, especially down steep grades, because these things do happen. But you can imagine if this was something that was avoidable and it was just strictly because the wrong parts were used or the wrong methods of maintaining and repairing the foundation brake system were deployed. That's not heavy duty. The heavy duty way is to invest in the right parts, high quality, high performance parts, installed correctly, maintained correctly, so that these things, if they are avoidable, are truly avoided. That's how you do it. The heavy duty way. If they are avoidable, are truly avoided. That's how you do it the heavy duty way.
Jamie Irvine:Well, this brings our episode where we do an in-depth discussion about brake safety week to a conclusion. I want to thank you for listening right to the end. I hope you enjoyed that video. As I said, if you want to watch it if you're listening to the audio version rather than you want to watch the video head over to our YouTube channel or click the show notes and you can watch the link and the video directly.
Jamie Irvine:Now we've got a couple announcements. I just wanted to let you know that we're going to take a couple of weeks of holidays this summer at the heavy duty parts report, but we're not going to leave you without some great content. So the next two episodes are going to be an airing of our two most popular episodes. These are episodes that are in the top five of our all-time most popular episodes, but these two are the most popular episodes of the last year. So next week we're going to talk about low-voltage batteries with Clarios and we're going to re-air that interview. If you haven't heard it, or if it's been a while since you listened to it, you should really listen to it. There was some great technical information in there about electrical systems on modern commercial trucks. The following week we're going to re-air an interview that we had with a general manager at Betts Truck Parts where we talked about the importance of correctly identifying parts and where we really shared some practical tips and tools on how to do that. So if you're in the parts game, this is an episode. If you missed it, you definitely want to listen to it again. After that we're going to be back and that's going to take us into the fall season. We've got more trade shows coming. We've got great interviews coming with guests that I think you're going to really enjoy. So we're going to take a couple of weeks break, but we will be talking to you soon.
Jamie Irvine:Thank you so much for your ongoing support of the Heavy Duty Parts Report and, if you haven't already, I'd like to invite you to take the time to send us a message. We'd love to hear from you. If you're listening to this episode on the podcast player of your choice, go to the show notes. There's a button to send us a text. If you want to just communicate with us by email or through comments, make sure you follow us on one of our social channels or go to the contact form on our website over at heavydutypartsreportcom.
Jamie Irvine:Speaking of that, while you're on the website, sign up to our weekly email, follow the show. You get one email a week where we just give you the most up to date content so you never miss out. If you're on the podcast player of your choice, hit that follow button. If it gives you the option, give us a five star rating and review. I've heard that helps us with reach. And if you watch on YouTube, make sure you hit the subscribe button and hit that bell notification so you never miss out. Thanks to you again for all of the ongoing support and, as always, I want to encourage you to be heavy duty.