Voted NO. The trucks that ply our national highways are adequately powered to haul the factory specified load. Its overloading which is the perennial malpractice that continues unabated, that is the biggest problem.
I am unwilling to believe that 'Overloading' of trucks on Indian highways is 'off the charts'. On the contrary it continues unabated.
There are some consequences of this malpractice that are there for all to see, on Indian highways , if looked closely:
(1) Consider a newly laid highway road, constructed with bare minimum standards one could expect from those who had been contracted to do the job. If they exceed expectations then that's great . Anyways, when its open to public traffic. Prior to its opening, a certain time period is estimated after which its repair becomes a necessity. Lets assume 10 months from the day it was opened for public. Barely half of that time period is elapsed and you would find that repeatedly you come across sections of the roads where the layers are kind of overlapping, if one were to drive the vehicle over them. It would seem as if the left front-rear tire went over a slight bump whilst the right front and left didn't and vice-versa. How did these undulations on the road surface came into being that you would repeatedly come across on our major highways. We cannot possibly blame cars or for that matter seldom overloaded highway buses! The deterioration came into being due to overloaded trucks plying on the highways. Its like a metal worker hammering on the metal to make it malleable. That's the kind of effect these overloading trucks do to those highways roads. We may be right to a certain extent if we blame those contractors who have been employed to do the job of constructing roads. Who may cut corners in order to fulfill their obligation. But you cannot deny the fact that the deterioration of roads problem becomes acute thanks to the overloaded trucks plying on those roads. I haven't yet factored in the rains which are there to cause deterioration of the roads.
(2) I have come across a peculiar specimen, if one were allowed to use that word for the deformity associated with a exterior shape of a truck whose deformity I will attempt to set forth in detail to the best of my abilities. One fine day , as usual on my drive on NH1 (Highway to Hell, reason for this title: it used to be the Grant Trunk road and as far as I know it issues out to Pakistan or Hell; or may be it doesn't then I am mistaken, then correct me wrong). Anyways, coming back to the peculiar specimen , that peculiar truck 20 meters ahead and if one were to draw an imaginary line from the front left side mirror of the truck to its rear , you would expect a straight line if the truck were bearing down the highway on a straight road and no overtaking. Yet, it wasn't straight! the rear seemed to be drifting to the right while the front stayed its course. It seemed that the engine is not only doing the job of keeping the truck in motion but is trying to compensate the drag associated with the rear deformity. How did this monstrosity came into being!!? Surely it can't be true that the buyer bought the truck and ignored this deformity or a manufacturer would be callous enough to push it down the throat of a dealer for him to sell it! I think the reason behind the deformity is 'Overloading' , and that too practiced repeatedly. You find the same on some of the DTC buses plying on Delhi roads which seem to outsiders as the bus is about to become lopsided or going to fall on one side as the weight on one side is greater than the other , therefore unbalanced. Repeated overloading of such a truck would inevitably cause a permanent damage to the truck and thus take the deformity in its stride!
An overloaded truck is not merely bearing down additional weight on the rear axle way past its specified tonnage. To move such a truck into motion and to continue doing so would stretch the limits of each and every component of that truck, whether those components are part of the engine, braking …etc. Add to the fact that the drivers are overworked and let go of sleep in order to reach their destination. Looks like a recipe for disaster and yet they keep it together. Not to mention the additional fuel expense incurred for that journey. The trucks that ply our national highways are adequately powered , overloading is the problem.
One wonders , what amount of profit or incentive overloading brings to the owners of such trucks that they are willing to evade the above stated facts.
There has been a mention of trucks driving on the far right near the central median instead of on the far left. The reason for the same could be in order to avoid wrong side tractors, cyclists or some vehicle trying to join the highway and who is least bothered about incoming highway traffic. Coming across such trucks unwilling to leave the far right lane, the car has to overtake from wrong side if the truck is unwilling to budge from the far right lane, albeit with correct estimation of road ahead. I wish the truckers would choose the middle lane instead of the far right lane, if they disdain the far left so much. Driving on the middle lane and in case they come across a scary situation which they cant out break. Then they have the choice to either overtake from left or right lane depending upon the availability and their judgement.
Those situations in which the trucks are hogging all the lanes and ambling at their own pace much to the acute mortification of the car drivers behind them. In this situation you would know prior to approaching these trucks from far away that they are not going to clear any lane by the time you approach them and you can figure out that at least one of them has that sufficient relative speed which may enable that truck to surpass the other trucks, then align your car behind that truck which is going to surpass the others, albeit maintaining sufficient distance. Nevertheless, its possible that by the time to do that ,that specific truck may slow down and then the other trucks are able to surpass and clear space for cars to move ahead.
Quote:
Indian trucks need:
- Air conditioning that cannot be switched off
- Better driver's seat with full range of adjustments
- Automatic transmission (AMT)
- More power/torque & stronger brakes
- Some sort of cargo load limiter that that cuts off the engine beyond limit
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Agree to the above except (Automatic transmission (AMT)
- More power/torque) . The rate at which the number of trucks continue to overload they will kill the AMT. The trucks have enough (power/torque) , its overloading, that's the problem.
Besides the point, there was this series shown by Discovery Channel few years ago, If I remember correctly aptly named 'IRT: Worlds toughest trucker : India' (Correct me If I'm wrong here). That had 3-4 American\Canadian truckers including one women by the name of Lisa Kelly. They picked up some TATA 1616 trucks bearing UP number plates--seemed they were picked up from Ghaziabad as per the number plates--and drove from plains to the Himalayas. In their innumerable attempts to bear with the unruly traffic, the one sided conversations that they had with their co-drivers and the whole of conversation pretty much ending with cursing, complaining about the bad driving habits of car, bus drivers all around them which according to their first world nation standards were incorrigible! If we kept all that aside, even when they came across situations where they were asked to drive overloaded trucks. They drew the line and didn't relent.