Bosses look again at cab heaters
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THE EXTREME cold faced by drivers forced to spend up to 10 nights in freezing conditions in the French Alps last month has renewed controversy over whether or not independent heaters should be fitted to cabs.
The Road Haulage Association will be considering how to keep drivers warm at night, senior officer Bob Duffy told CM on Monday. "We do not want to exaggerate but some drivers suffered very badly from cold."
Drivers stuck near Mont Blanc said independent cab heaters should be mandatory, at least for all lorries doing international work. They said they had woken up to temperatures of —10 degrees C inside the cab and —18 degrees C outside. Independent cab heaters are mandatory in Germany if the driver is sleeping in the lorry, they said.
But there was criticism also of independent heaters themselves, many of which failed to work because of fuel waxing. "It freezes when it's cold and works when it is warm," said Brian Downward, who drives for W. H. Barley of Milton Keynes.
Heaters are designed to work at very low temperatures — the Eberspacher works down to —40 degrees C — but are only as good as the fuel used with them.
The critical temperature for many heaters is —9 degrees C. At this temperature, normal British winter grade diesel starts waxing, and higher grade diesel must be used The problem is even greater in Italy, where normal winter diesel waxes at —2 degrees C.
Eberspacher UK managing director Richard Yonwyn agreed on Monday that the thin tube leading from the main fuel tank is the biggest problem with independent heaters. The tube should be installed in areas that are as well protected as possible. Lagging helps, he said.
Separate fuel tanks can be used so that the heater can be run off a higher grade of fuel than the diesel being used for the lorry's engine. The price of an Eberspacher, fitted by a dealer, is about £400 he said. Mr Yonwyn estimated that at most 10 per cent of all British lorries used on international work had purpose-built night heaters. The Society of Motor Manufacturers had given a very negative response to the suggestion that they should be made compulsory, as had the Department of Transport.
"We lag behind German law," he said. In Germany, all lorries are required to have a heater while the driver was in the cab, and drivers are not allowed to leave their engine idling for more than five minutes. This effectively means that long distance lorries must have independent heaters.
Mr Yonwyn warned against the use of propane gas heaters, which are used by some drivers. Drivers had died of suffocation because the heaters had used up the oxygen in the cab. The cab had to be well ventilated, he said.
SMMT said: "This is really just a matter for individual operators, most of whom have no requirement for such heaters."