The Voice of Vehicle Safety & Security
O.W.L. Vehicle Electronic Systems
Reproduced from FACTS -
Fleet operators continue to suffer increases in
running costs and are forced to look for savings
elsewhere.
However, even when times are hard it just
doesn’t make sense to take short-cuts with
safety. Cutting the safety budget is like cutting
your throat. It’s quick and effective, but the
consequences are likely to be just as fatal.
Safety legislation now reaches every level of
management and the potential costs far exceed
any short-term savin gs. Safety is the one thing
that every Managing Director should ensure is
recession-pr oof.
From a purely financial point of view the last thing
any company wants is to have its vehicles off
the road due to an accident or to suffer the cost
of personal injury claims or the adverse publicity
resulting from a major incident.
But it’s not all doom and gloom. The sensible
solution is to spend the budget wisely and still be
able to demonstrate that you and your company
have taken adequate safety precautions.
One of the most cost-effective actions you can
take is to fit your vehicles with talking safety
sounders from O.W.L. Vehicle Electronic
Systems.
Their low-cost real human voice warning
messages are proven to be far more effective
than any other warning system.
Managing Director Tony Phipps explains:
“Whatever the safety application on your vehicle
you can deliver a warning message that instantly
identifies the potential danger and gets an
immediate reaction.
“Cameras, sensors and other devices can help
when manoeuvring but the driver doesn’t stand a
chance of avoiding an accident when pedestrians
simply step out in front of or behind a moving
vehicle.
“The fact that vehicles may be moving slowly
either on the road or in depots means that
pedestrians are often oblivious to the danger.
If there are several vehicles in the area the
problem is even greater.”
O.W.L. have seen a steady increase in the
range of applications called for by customers
and with the advent of near-
vehicles demand for effective safety solutions is
sure to rise even further.
Of course reversing bleepers have been used
for many years, but Phipps tells why they are
not really up to the job.
“Once upon a time bleepers were fitted to
motorcycles to remind the rider that his
direction indicators were operating. But when
they were added to pedestrian crossings as a
safe-to -
of bikes at road junctions and were mown down.
The solution was to take the bleepers off
the motorcycles and promptly put them onto
trucks as reversing alarms - with similar
consequences.
“Fact is bleepers are often ignored. It is difficult
to identify where the sound is coming from and
the tones carry for considerable distances in all
directions.
“The human voice is completely directional, you
automatically turn towards its source. Talking
sounders deliver the message precisely where it
is needed, and that is in the danger zone”
O.W.L. produced the first talking reversing
alarms back in the 1980s and it is a tribute to
the technology that even then they outlived the
vehicles they were fitted to.
From humble beginnings the product range has
grown to cover warning systems for almost any
safety or security application you can imagine
on vehicles and in premises. Compared with the
overall cost of buying and operating a vehicle
the price of a talking sounder is minute, but the
potential savings can be enormous.
Take for example the widespread problem of
runaway vehicles. Near-mi sses are never
heard of but when an incident occurs loss of
life or injury is par for the course and damage
is extensive. Can you afford just one incident?
Most runaways happen not because of brake
failure but because the handbrake has been
left off.
A talking warning sounder in the cab can easily
prevent the problem by instructing the driver to
‘apply the handbrake’ if he opens his door whilst
the handbrake is off. An extra weatherproof
speaker outside even ensures that the driver
can still hear the message if he leaves the cab
and closes the door behind him. It continues to
sound until the handbrake has been applied.
Then we all know the dangers of cycle lanes in
busy town centres. A large commercial vehicle
stops at a road junction waiting to turn left. Just
as the driver prepares to move off a cyclist or
motorcyclist undertakes on the nearside and
goes straight across at the junction. Legislation
now requires the fitting of blind spot mirrors, but
mirrors can never stop the cyclist undertaking.
A vehicle can now have sounders mounted
on the nearside of the vehicle with a message
‘warning... vehicle turning left’.
Activities involving equipment and vehicles are
carried out many times each day with the result
that drivers and equipment operators are often on
auto-pilot. This means that sometimes their full
attention is not given to the task in hand.
When this requires manoeuvres or movement of
cranes, loaders or other equipment near to other
workers or members of the public, there is always
the potential for accidents to happen.
Every day vehicles are driven away with stabiliser
jacks down, lorry loaders raised, tailgates open
and other equipment not securely stowed.
In most cases a suitably worded warning
message can prevent the incident. And with a
little thought on the method of installing and
triggering the systems there will never be any
noise nuisance, because if there is a no danger
situation, the message will not sound. So when
it does sound for real it generates an immediate
response.
Talking sounders can say whatever you want
them to. O.W.L. have provided systems for
applications in local languages from South
America to China. As a customer you can
choose a standard message or have a bespoke
message personalised to the vehicle
operator or a specific application. O.W.L.
supply to vehicle manufacturers, body builders,
distributors, local authorities, utilities, blue-chip
fleet operators and owner-drivers.
Cutting the vehicle safety budget is false economy
