Trucking Digest

Changing the Guard – Azyet has reached the point when she goes on R & R. I parked her up for the last time on October 29th and climbed into the new truck. It seems a bit sad when this time comes although I know that we’ll be travelling together again in future. Here she is in all her glory…

…with the Polizei. We had a laugh about that when I was asked if we were pulled over – I said, “We would have been if he’d seen my hand-signal.”🤣

The view from the driver’s seat in Azyet is very good and I like the mirror placement…

…That’s a shot as we were running into Lyon on one occasion. The info on the dash is good too, though you’re guessing a little regards the speed for setting cruise as the needle is affected by your eye angle. I’m going to miss the reassuring rumble of the Paccar 460HP engine and the gearbox that is well attuned to my preferred driving style.

Azyet did have one last duty to do just prior to going on leave – carrying the special paint job celebrating 10 years of Euro Truck Simulator 2…

Enter the new lady in my life – meet Aleixa…

…She’s a Renault – I guess, as a French company we should have Renaults 😅 In more depth, she’s a Range T High with a 480HP engine and Optidrive gearbox. Drive-wise it’s an interesting comparison. The engine sounds mushy compared with the DAF but it certainly has a lot of grunt. Those extra 20HP are working well. So far, the fuel consumption is looking good and I’d expect that we will achieve similar lphk between the trucks despite having more horses because of the improved technology of Aleixa’s Euro 6 engine compared with Azyet’s Euro 5.

Aleixa’s forward view is pretty good…

…Passing another truck in northern Spain. The digital speed indication removes any doubts about what speed you’re actually doing. Lots of other important info clearly shown too! The mirrors are pretty well placed – though I prefer the DAF arrangement. I guess I’ll get used to it😅

Aleixa is based at our Barcelona depot and, in case you were wondering, her name is Catalan in origin 😎👍

See you on the road soon!

Trucking Digest

It is fitting that the one place I was feeling comfortable over the last few weeks has been the Truck Simulator games. It is possible to sit back and relax as you watch the scenery go by most of the time and that gives time to review one’s thoughts. In the course of the last few weeks I’ve driven Azyet and Miss Lola over many long runs. I have in mind target distances for them to achieve before they take a rest stop and let another truck take the reins. Miss Lola is just over halfway to her target of 65000 miles…

…while Azyet is close to 75% of her 100000km target…

Currently we’re expecting another upgrade to the background code of the game in the next couple of weeks – v1.46 is in Beta testing. For Euro Truck, this will include a new area of map around Madrid and in American Truck we’ll be getting a section of US-20 between Idaho and Montana. Both games will get ownable Chemical Tankers (not sure if I have a use for those – possible for pesticides in ATS). There’s also going to be a new Steam achievement in both games for reverse parking 🙂 We’ve been seeing lots of updates on the SCS blog regarding the forthcoming Texas map and it’s looking good. This morning we noticed that 6 new hidden Steam achievements have appeared overnight and that tells us that release of this long awaited DLC is imminent – possibly a week after v1.46 releases? So, I’m in for a busy trucking time 🙂

In my post about some recent mental health issues, I included this image…

…The majority of the serious players of these Simulation games drive very safely (unless they’re having a joke around with friends on multi-player). It has become a bit of a meme that when you roll your truck due to mis-judged handling, you post the image of it lying on its side and other players will sympathise with comments along the lines of “Aww – the poor thing’s tired.” or you may even caption it yourself along the lines of “My truck fell asleep.” In my company profiles I haven’t needed to post one of those for several years 🙂 That doesn’t mean I don’t have accidents. I will occasionally rearend something when the ai stops dead in front of me for no obvious reason – doesn’t happen very often I’m pleased to say! Then there are the accidents caused by changes to the ai behaviours after an update. It’s to the dev’s credit that they continue working to improve that aspect of the game. The v1.45 update brought a change that finally allowed the ai to merge from slip roads and most of the time it works quite well. The only downside is that the traffic on the main highway has to adjust its speed to accommodate the arriving vehicle. As, of necessity, the basic notes of changes delivered with each update don’t mention a lot of the minor background things, that sort of change comes as a surprise, and I had a couple of side taps on my trailer at intersections from vehicles merging before I worked out the new mechanic 😉 The other types of accident I get involved in are purely ai issues – there is a reason why we sometimes refer to non-player vehicles as Assault Imminent or Attack Incoming! The ai sometimes misjudge your position on roundabouts and pull out into the side of your truck. Then there are the T-Boner’s – the ai that drive straight over a give way marking at a normal junction to hit you. There are strategies for both, which mitigate against but can’t entirely prevent these collisions. If that’s given a bad impression of the ai, don’t let it put you off – generally the in-game traffic is quite realistic (if a bit light on traffic volume).

None of the above behaviours explain why Miss Lola is upside down and I appear to be viewing her from the underworld. Every game has glitches. Compared with some high-profile recent releases, the Truck Simulator games have very few. One glitch that occasionally manifests itself revolves around the ai. Normally an ai collision with either the player or another ai results in the ai stopping and putting on hazard lights – and the player cursing, stopping and switching to camera mode to photograph the villAIn 😉 Very occasionally, when one ai hits another, one of the vehicles is launched high into the air – and I mean passing airliner type high! So, there I was, cruising the I-80 just west of Laramie with a load of cattle, when suddenly a trailer dropped onto the highway just in front of Miss Lola. I barely had time to clock what it was and no time to take avoiding action. As I wrote in a community Tweet – “Bang!! 100% damage and burgers-on-the-hoof barbequed” 😉 It’s a very rare occurrence – in 6 years of play I have had ai vehicles spawn in front of my truck on 3 occasions and this is the first time I’ve had something drop out of the sky (though I have seen a very-occasional fly-by). That’s not a bad record for a game that has been in continual development throughout the time that I’ve been playing and represents just 4 bad experiences in over 5500 hours in the cab!

Share Your Desktop – September 2022

Middle of the Month and it’s time to join in with Clare’s Share You Desktop Challenge 😎 Clare’s got a rather nice Orchid adorning Her’s which you can see when you follow the link above. I have two desktops, so let’s start with the Gaming PC.

This time, instead of a shot of one of my trucks in the scenery, it’s the view I get from inside the cab of Azyet, my DAF XF 105.460…

The shot is taken as I pass through the tunnels of the Pyrenees on the Spanish side of the border with France. It was an overnight leg of a long-haul trip from Cordoba to Amsterdam with a load of Carrots, so it was darker outside than it was in the tunnel 😉 At the end of the tunnel, the lanes merge before joining another autoroute, so I’ve positioned myself to allow room for the ‘Bear to come across in front of me. There’s the usual array of ornaments on the dashboard and screen. Pennants including Le Tricolore – we are a French company. There’s also Monsieur Bibendum – the Michelin mascot – and a DAF mug for my tea. I’ve got a satnav stuck on the screen – the lady speaks to me in French – and I’ve got a pair of Michelin shades next to the wheel for when it’s sunny. Unfortunately, you can’t put them on in game 😉 As you can see from the gauges, we’re cruising at 80kph – that’s a good economy speed in top gear so, although much of the road network in Spain and France permits 90kph for trucks, we rarely go faster than 80 🙂

The Photo PC has something altogether more simple and also somewhat prettier…

A Ladybird, or Ladybug if you wish, on a Fresia leaf. There are many variations of Ladybird and this is the 7-spot. These are a friend of the gardener as they consume large numbers of aphids while in the larval and adult stages of their lifecycle. They’re also one of the most attractive of insects you come across regularly in summer.