American Truck Simulator

Well they said that sales were a lot better than anticipated so they wound up hiring a lot more people so I guess it was good enough sales wise that they could afford to do it. They were planning on having a team of 8-10 but it’s going to wind up being 20 iirc

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Interesting article: Hitting The Virtual Roads Of Euro And American Truck Simulator With Retired Truckers | Rock Paper Shotgun

I think i saw an easter egg.

Plinking away through the desert (daytime) i guess in nevada somewhere. I wasn’t paying much attention, and there was no traffic, but something black shot accoss the sky low level insanely fast.

It was gone by the time i realised something was happening. Anyone else seen it, and know what it is? i am guessing an area 51 easter egg or something.

I have seen that. I thinks its just a fighter jet.

Necro thread revival

In traffic with my Peterbuilt and owned trailer enroute to drop off

Job completed and not the easiest of parking spaces with poles each side of the parking bay.

Random encounters can mix things up a bit. Here is one, a nasty crash. Its blocking my exit. This trip there were 3 encounters. I had 2 blocked intersections (one by police barrier the other the afore mentioned crash), and a broken down car on the opposite side of the road which had no impact on traffic.

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Nice! I’ve been driving my Volvo around lately. Pretty decent truck.

Also SCS just announced the next state will be Washington. Which will be out sometime this year.

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Been hanging on the coast in Oregon, looks pretty good.

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To solve this, take contracts for oversized or multiple trailers. They should all be straight in parking

I love ATS and ETS, I put the in-game radio on and drive for hours. The challenge of the heavy cargo is great although a few signs may be missing after I’ve driven through…:grin:

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I used to be a European heavy haulage driver. I’m happy to answer any technical questions about it if anyone is interested. I’ll upload some pics when I find them out. I’ve got some cool cargo photos from those days.

Here’s a couple

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That is cool! What was in that blue container at the back of the trailer? Looks like it’s really compressing the back and rear tyre.

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That was a container full of drums of oil. The trailer was a bit small for the tractor unit as we needed something with twist locks to secure the container. You can see from the horrendous angle its not tall enough for the crane lorry. So once I unloaded the first box all the weight was on the back and the tyres weren’t impressed but space dictated unloading that way round and nothing bad happened. Trailer was horrible to tow behind that big tractor unit as well

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Did you have “duty time” limitations? I’m not sure if they are Dept. of Transportation hour limits or company policies here in the United States…but you often see trucks pulled over on highway exits and rest areas that are grabbing naps. Much like being a pilot…I wonder how you manage to work around the odd schedule.

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You can be “on duty” for 15 hours 3 times a week and 13 hours twice a week.

You can work a sixth day provided your fortnightly hours do not exceed 90 hours total. Although breaks and periods of availability (not on break but not technically working) are subtracted from this each day to bring the totals down (and allow for work days to be used in full over the week and not having to stand down once or twice a fortnight)

The driving rules are slightly different.

You can drive for a total 9 hours a day. 4.5 hours total means you have to take a 45 min break although you can split this into a 15 min and a 30 min break provided the 30 min break is taken before you have been on duty for 6 hours or less and less than 4.5hrs driving daily total.

You can take a second break at 9 hours driving and extend your driving time by 60 minutes for a total of ten hours daily “driving” time 3 times a week.

We have a machine called a digital tachograph in the cab which has a personal card inserted into it at the beginning of a shift and records ALL activity during the day. And stores data for 28 days.

If pulled over by the police or the agency in charge of transport (dvsa) the driver can be prosecuted for any infringements on the card for the last 28 days. This can be thousands of pounds or loss of licence or even imprisonment if serious enough. They REALLY love giving out fines as well so if you get pulled over even if your perfectly legal they WILL find something to get you for. Sods.

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Interesting information…are those Euro-Union wide rules I would assume? I’m guessing that here in the US we have similar rules.

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Yep that’s the EU rules in a nutshell. The US laws are completely different I believe but I honestly don’t know.

I drove in Australia and New Zealand for a bit in my early 20’s and they worked on logbooks recording data and relied more on camerasoon the road network to back up the information stored in the logbook.

I know the US is much more concerned with weigh stations and load inspection than we are. I’m pretty sure that in the US passing a weigh station without using it is a crime. In the EU you don’t need to stop unless blue lights and waving hands insist you do so lol

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Yes…we have a weigh station about a mile from my house on a major interstate. It is a bit of a more modern station that uses “weigh in motion” which (as you probably know) means the trucks exit, but maintain about 35 MPH on the exit and there are sensors embedded in the concrete that weigh them without them having to stop. If they are flagged, a digital message flashes up to instruct them to pull of on an inspection exit. It is probably more convenient than the older type of weigh stations.

Even still, the trucks slowing in the far right lane to 45 MPH or so in anticipation of the exit is fairly hazardous considering there are fools in autos doing nearly 90 MPH flying down the highway. I always laugh because I’m an air ambulance pilot rushing to the airport to get a time critical heart or something and I’m still being passed by people doing 20 MPH over what I’m doing. Nuts.

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I could spend a day recounting stories of idiots in cars lol.

My wife is convinced that people not indicating using turn signals will be what gets me to finally snap and go full ‘postal’

Hence why a career change is coming shortly… Full time flying instructor rather than full time depressed driver/manager of drivers :rofl:

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I hope that your career change works out. It was the best thing I ever did. I still get a tinge of excitement as I walk up to the airplane at the beginning of a trip.

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Yeah…I’m with Paul. I’m so grateful for this aviation career, and I still really enjoy it. That isn’t always the case - I know some pilots that hate their jobs. I’m glad I actually like what I do.

Back on topic though - does American Truck Simulator have some sort of social mode where you can have a shared trucking company?

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