Escorting a large load

[adam_farming]

Which gets me onto another thing. Reversing bleepers on combines. What's the point? If you can't hear a combine reversing at you, would you even hear the bleeper.?

Interesting point on this. I was on a telehandler course once and apparently the white noise beepers that you sometimes now hear are partly for people with hearing difficulties that use hearing aids. The regular high pitched beep sometimes doesn't come through on hearing aid too well but the white noise type ones are specifically designed to cut through. So the man said anyway, I thought this was interesting as I'd wondered what the white noise ones were all about.

 

[roscoe erf]

The worst car drivers now seem to be those in the little noddy cars that seem to have become fashionable with planet saving woke’s

 

[Robt]

I have often thought the escort vehicle creates more of a problem than it solves. First they have to overtake you in the combine which can be hair raising enough, then they have to get past the escort vehicle which is another risk to take. Its bollox in my view. As said, if they can't see the combine what hope is there.
Which gets me onto another thing. Reversing bleepers on combines. What's the point? If you can't hear a combine reversing at you, would you even hear the bleeper.?

Yes but on normal roads with bends the combine will be over the white line in the middle. A good escort driver will get a head of the corner to warn on coming vehicles they have to slow down or stop. Its this warning that reduces accidents.
In regards to the dual carriage way. The escort driver again isnt wider than the lane so is there to warn vehicles behind of the width restriction up front.
You can always tell the new interns at Claas each year as you see them in their new golfs with twin beacons on the A14 IN FRONT of the demo combine they are escorting. Always makes me chuckle. Nearly as much as when father in some cases grandfather decides to escort combine. He drives the old red hilux about 10 feet ahead with hazards on and arm out of window waving.....

 

[Robt]

Tractor and header on trailer in front, 4ft sign on weight frame saying Wide Vehicle Following, lights on, flashing beacon; and drivers still seem genuinely surprised to encounter the combine following a few 100 yds behind it.
You can only do your best, and be legal. Blocking the road with the escort seems to be akin to setting a slalom challenge for some of the idiots. HGV drivers tend to be no trouble at all.

you have to think like joe public. How do they know that your tractor and header isnt the wide load? after all you have wide load board and lots of lights..

 

[JP1]

The worst car drivers now seem to be those in the little noddy cars that seem to have become fashionable with planet saving woke’s

To be fair they'd be annoying in charge of a trolley in a supermarket

 

[principal skinner]

Escort vehicle behind in dual carriageways, if something’s getting written of from a rear end shunt I would rather it’s my pickup than my combine!

 

[PSQ]

You learn to lip read when you escort loads.
That 10% of drivers that look at your 'wide vehicle' sign and lights on the pickup, shake their heads at your 'defensive driving' but don't slow down. By the time they're almost level with my bonnet they usually spot the behemoth coming round the corner and mouth the words "Ohhhh F......!!!", as they stand on the brakes.
We've read the transport regulations and are fully compliant with licensed radios etc, but even with this being a rural area there are plenty of drivers completely oblivious to the threat in front of them. 'Common sense' is clearly far from common.

 

[glasshouse]

Escort vehicle behind in dual carriageways, if something’s getting written of from a rear end shunt I would rather it’s my pickup than my combine!

What about your wife in it with kids?

 

[ollie989898]

If you are escorting on a back road why would you be hundreds of yards in front of the vehicle you are escorting? I'd be ahead of it but still well in vision distance. You won't stop heros going by at 70mph who ignore wide load signs but you have done all you can.

Tractor and header on behind better on dual carriageway but pick up would be equally good.

I was always told the escorting vehicle should not be itself towing anything.

 

[Robt]

If you are escorting on a back road why would you be hundreds of yards in front of the vehicle you are escorting? I'd be ahead of it but still well in vision distance. You won't stop heros going by at 70mph who ignore wide load signs but you have done all you can.

Tractor and header on behind better on dual carriageway but pick up would be equally good.

I was always told the escorting vehicle should not be itself towing anything.

you were told correct Ollie!

 

[Y Fan Wen]

Living where I do not many agricultural large loads about. The escorts for static caravans really know their stuff.

 

[yellow belly]

On the a1 we escort behind the combine too dangerous to be in front

on any other road in front To slow down oncoming traffic

i also have the combine trunking low on the road Because if a car or truck runs into it when it is up high the driver of the car has no chance When it hits the windscreen

 

[BBC]

Combine escort is my job.
When you know there is a narrow strech of road or bad bend I get well ahead and block the road to on coming traffic, much safer than them meeting in the wrong place (although many fail to understand initially) . The other main job is to watch the combine through narrow gaps past parked cars etc or to knock on doors to get cars moved if needed.

I wish it had been you escorting two big tracked Lexions, their cutterbars and a chaser bin that I came across about two miles up a narrow, high hedged single track road in deepest, darkest Cornwall a few weeks ago.

Would have struggled to find somewhere to have got two cars to pass each other let alone that lot. If only someone had gone on ahead and blocked it off! Ended up reversing about a mile before I could find a big enough gateway so they could get past, and even then the tracks were only inches from my door. Didn’t envy them having to move that lot around those roads, would be a nightmare in the height of summer.

 

[wuddy]

Tractor and header on trailer in front, 4ft sign on weight frame saying Wide Vehicle Following, lights on, flashing beacon; and drivers still seem genuinely surprised to encounter the combine following a few 100 yds behind it.
You can only do your best, and be legal. Blocking the road with the escort seems to be akin to setting a slalom challenge for some of the idiots. HGV drivers tend to be no trouble at all.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that the escort vehicle should not be towing!

 

[roscoe erf]

What about your wife in it with kids?

Wtf sort of question is that

 

[glasshouse]

Wtf sort of question is that

Look at principle skinners comment.
I would rather a car ram the combine than my pickup with my entire family in it

 

[roscoe erf]

Look at principle skinners comment.
I would rather a car ram the combine than my pickup with my entire family in it

Think you need to read it no mention of putting his family in it especially if it’s an escort vehicle

 

[glasshouse]

Think you need to read it no mention of putting his family in it especially if it’s an escort vehicle

I wasnt talking about him
I frequently get my wife to escort me and the kids have to go with her

 

[roscoe erf]

I wasnt talking about him
I frequently get my wife to escort me and the kids have to go with her

Then don’t quote him if you want to put your family in that’s up to you

 

[Suffolk Serf]

The worst car drivers now seem to be those in the little noddy cars that seem to have become fashionable with planet saving woke’s

The ones that drive at 40mph in a 30mph limit, then when the limit gets back to 60 continue in their merry way at 40?