CVSA Brake Safety Week

The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) is conducting Brake Safety Week between the dates of September 13-19, 2009. The goal of the week-long event, which is taking place across North America, is to help improve commercial vehicle brake safety by emphasizing proper brake inspection, maintenance, and operation. The CVSA is carrying out this important safety event at truck stops, weigh stations, and other locations by way of enforcement, educational activities, and through distributing helpful information.

Learn more about the CVSA's Brake Safety Week.

MSC Research Hits the Presses

Over the last 7 months, MSC has been part of several research-intensive projects related to Heavy Vehicle ECM/EDR technology. We've traveled to Hattiesburg, MS, Charlotte, NC, and Wisconsin's Fox Valley for these tests. We've put quite a bit of time and money into these tests and we're happy to see the resulting publications start to roll off the presses.

Last month, the ECM Field Guide was published in the Accident Reconstruction Journal. The Field Guide was authored by Tim Austin (Wisconsin State Patrol) and co-authored by Bill Messerschmidt. It is meant to serve as a guidebook for accident investigators so that critical, crash-related evidence is preserved. Download a copy of the ECM Field Guide.

In October, Collision Magazine will publish Testing the Last Stop Record in the Mercedes MBE 4000 Engine. This article is authored by Benjamin Smith (ASI Investigations) and co-authored by Bill Messerschmidt and Ron DeMonia.

During September, we'll submit the first draft of our next research paper to SAE International, authored by Bill Messerschmidt and co-authored by Tim Cheek, Tim Austin, and Benjamin Smith. Then, on 29 September Bill will speak at the Pennsylvania State Police Reconstruction Seminar, where we expect to make two big announcements to the crash investigation community.

MSC Returns to Fox Valley for HVEDR Testing

Over Labor Day weekend, we returned to Appleton, Wisconsin, for another day of HVEDR/ECM testing at Fox Valley Technical College (FVTC). This was the fourth day of testing in a series of tests that we began in March. The testing has included controlled, instrumented tests of Detroit Diesel, Mercedes, Caterpillar, Cummins, and Mack trucks with EDR capabilities.

Thanks to the professional skill of Rob Behnke, Truck Driving Program Director for FVTC, and members of the Wisconsin State Patrol, we were able to complete over 50 fully-instrumented test runs, putting the total number of tests over 150 for 2009.

Over the fall and winter of 2009/2010, we’ll be preparing the data from these tests (along with a few more planned test runs) for publication in a variety of journals and industry publications. In addition, MSC is expecting to announce some big news on two fronts later this fall. We’ll announce the news through special editions of the MSC Newsletter and also on this blog as soon as the ink is dry!