this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2024
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According to records filed in the case, Achtemeier conspired with mechanics in garages and operators of truck fleets to disable the anti-pollution software installed on diesel trucks.

Coconspirators who wanted to disable their trucks’ pollution control hardware system—a process commonly known as “deleting”—sought Achtemeier’s help to trick the truck’s software into believing the emissions control systems were still functional, a process known as “tuning.”

Monitoring software on a deleted truck will detect that the pollution control hardware is not functioning and will prevent the truck from running. Achtemeier disabled the monitoring software on his client’s trucks by connecting to laptops he had provided to various coconspirators. Some of the coconspirators would pass the laptop on to others seeking to have the anti-pollution software disabled on their trucks. Once the laptop was hooked up to the truck’s onboard computer, Achtemeier could access it from his computer and tune the software designed to slow the truck if the pollution control device was missing or malfunctioning. Achtemeier could “tune” trucks remotely, which enabled him to maximize his environmental impact and personal profit.

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[–] TheReturnOfPEB@reddthat.com 47 points 8 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago) (1 children)

Trump pardons then nominates him for head of transportation

[–] OCATMBBL@lemmy.world 8 points 59 minutes ago
[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 16 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

coconspirators

It's okay to keep the hyphen in there. It's more readable, and also it's once again a word.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 9 points 2 hours ago

Coco 'nspirators

[–] TachyonTele@lemm.ee 75 points 13 hours ago (13 children)

Sounds like an awful lot of work for... some reason.

[–] Free_Opinions@feddit.uk 10 points 2 hours ago

These systems often cause issues and it may be quite expensive to repair but if you bypass it, it doesn't affect the performance of the vehicle.

[–] Mac@mander.xyz 7 points 5 hours ago* (last edited 5 hours ago)

Reduced running costs, ease of maintenance, engine efficiency.

[–] clockwork_octopus@lemmy.world 16 points 7 hours ago

Money. It’s always money.

From the article:

Achtemeier charged as much at $4,500 per truck for work that often took him two hours or less. Achtemeier advertised his services on social media nationwide, doing business as Voided Warranty Tuning (VWT) or Optimized Ag. Between 2019 and 2022 his company took in more than $4.3 million in gross profits.

[–] ocassionallyaduck@lemmy.world 13 points 9 hours ago

When you run out of DEF or the DPF is clogged, you can't run your truck for more than a brief while. You get half output in a limp-mode to go refill your DEF or have the DPF serviced. DEF is the reactant for the exhaust that makes diesel burn cleaner, but means modern trucks have 2 tanks now. Users hate it, but it cuts emissions massively. Also adds a few grand to the vehicle exhaust system in hardware and sensors and control units. Anyways:

Time = money.

For a commercial or even semi private vehicle if you bypass even one indicent of downtime by doing this is paid for itself.

That said, the DPF is a filter, and can physically clog and cause an exhaust fire if there is no monitoring software. I hope at least this guy had it wait till it was almost critical and then stop, not entirely disable the stop signal. Otherwise there is a serious risk to the vehicle and passengers.

[–] Nougat@fedia.io 20 points 13 hours ago (5 children)

Yeah, someone is going to have to explain to me how $4500 worth of emissions control deletion is worth the money.

[–] TachyonTele@lemm.ee 28 points 13 hours ago (3 children)

It sounds like it's just spite-modding with no benefits.

[–] Cornpop@lemmy.world 9 points 11 hours ago

You will get a very large HP boost and can get better MPG as well. Also don’t have to add def fluid anymore or maintain the def system.

[–] whostosay@lemmy.world 2 points 7 hours ago

According to this dumbass "journalist" and his editor, this is "TuNInG"

There's a much easier and accurate way to write this article.

[–] Nougat@fedia.io 12 points 13 hours ago (9 children)

Nah, there's no way long haul truck owners are going to spend money just to be assholes. There's got to be profit in it somehow.

[–] StrawberryPigtails@lemmy.sdf.org 20 points 12 hours ago (7 children)

The EGR and DPF systems used in diesel trucks cause (or caused, it’s been a while since I last looked it up) a big reduction in fuel mileage. I think it was a 2 or 3 MPG reduction.Doesn’t sound like much, but it adds up when you are running 200,000+ miles a year per truck. With the system running I believe the average fuel mileage for the trucks in our company is around 6 to 8 MPG depending on the route.

Additionally the systems are expensive as all get out to repair and maintain. When the DPF and DEF systems on my truck went out, the truck was down for 3 months waiting on parts, and from what I heard from our mechanic, the final repair bill was around $15,000USD.

That said, the fines for bypassing the emission systems are big enough that it’s really not worth it, but some owner operators don’t realize it as many don’t run their trucks like the businesses they are. They just know this is expensive as hell and they can reduce the cost by bypassing them.

[–] Mirshe@lemmy.world 5 points 2 hours ago

It's almost like we should've stuck with electric trains for long haul freight and left OTR hauling for last-mile. Almost like that would've seriously helped the CAA rather than a bunch of half-fixed like this.

[–] grue@lemmy.world 3 points 9 hours ago

The EGR and DPF systems used in diesel trucks cause (or caused, it’s been a while since I last looked it up) a big reduction in fuel mileage. I think it was a 2 or 3 MPG reduction.Doesn’t sound like much, but it adds up when you are running 200,000+ miles a year per truck. With the system running I believe the average fuel mileage for the trucks in our company is around 6 to 8 MPG depending on the route.

I think it's worth noting that this is an environmental benefit, not only an economic one. In other words, it's not that people defeating the emissions control devices are making their trucks purely worse for the environment for their own selfish benefit; it's that they're making a trade off between increased 'regular' (for lack of a better term) pollutant emissions like NO~x~/SO~x~/particulates, and decreased greenhouse gas emissions (CO~2~).

I'm not saying they're altruistic -- obviously they do it to save money (at least until they get caught and fined) -- but I am saying that we can't just assume it's bad without first doing the math and making a value judgement about what sorts of emissions we care about.

Geeking out about an edge case where not having the fancy emissions controls is better: using biodiesel


There are also more complicated considerations, such as how getting rid of these emissions controls and retuning the engine may also allow it to run on higher percentages of biodiesel. The trade-offs associated with that are not only the fact that the fuel becomes carbon-neutral (net CO~2~ emissions go to zero, at least for the percentage of the fuel that is bio- instead of dino-), but also that biodiesel naturally has zero sulfur in it (which means zero SO~x~) and burns cleaner (fewer particulates) and hotter (more NO~x~) than dino-diesel. On top of that, more NO~x~ could be a bad thing or a good thing, depending on whether you're driving in a NO~x~-limited or VOC-limited regime.

In other words, using 100% biodiesel in an urban environment (VOC-limited) is IMO enough to actually justify preferring not to have the fancy emissions controls for legit environmentalist reasons: the better efficiency in general (as the parent comment mentioned), zero net greenhouse gas emissions, zero SO~x~, irrelevant NO~x~, and all at the cost of only moderate particulates (more than would be emitted from a vehicle with a DPF, but less than would be emitted if the same car were burning dino-diesel).

Of course, none of those benefits occur unless you actually seek out B100 (or at least, significantly higher percentages than the B5 that normal diesel can be blended up to), and that's a motivation much more associated with the hippie types that drive VW TDIs and old Mercs, not truckers.

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[–] Cornpop@lemmy.world 7 points 11 hours ago

It usually comes with substantially more power, and you don’t have to maintain the def system anymore either.

[–] ocassionallyaduck@lemmy.world 3 points 9 hours ago

Easily. Read my other comment, but this would pay for itself in a single afternoon if you didn't maintain your vehicle and would otherwise get shutdown due to an exhaust failure.

Or if you drive a truck in stop and go traffic, and the filters clogged up early, causing you to delay and let the exhaist system do a cleaning cycle (take 1hr, requires engine running and high throttle.) Etc etc.

[–] NocturnalMorning@lemmy.world 10 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

For semi-trucks at least, my cousin (who drives a truck) told me it costs him a lot of money to have the DEF systems on his truck and operate them, and it costs him money he would otherwise be making on his deliveries.

I thought he was an idiot, and hes risking his and everybody else's health around him with his attempts to defeat those systems. (Don't think he was ever successful at it)

[–] Mac@mander.xyz 2 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

He might be an asshole but he's right that DEF costs money and that emissions systems on diesels are a pain in the ass.

[–] Freefall@lemmy.world 1 points 23 minutes ago

Gas costs money and repairs/maintenance are a pain. It is cost of operation...

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[–] Melatonin@lemmy.dbzer0.com 22 points 12 hours ago (4 children)

The antipollution on a diesel engine (at least a big one) essentially reroutes the exhaust back through the engine and reburns it again. Before the antipollution devices were in place it wasn't uncommon for big diesels to get 500,000 miles before they needed to be replaced. Now with the antipollution devices they're getting somewhere in the neighborhood of 100k before they start having problems of significance.

Those engines and their maintenance are expensive as hell. It saves a whole lot more than the $4,500 having that done. It saves them hundreds of thousands of dollars over the long haul.

[–] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 12 hours ago (5 children)

or they could run on propane, which doesn't make a whole lot of particulates in the first place and is cheaper anyway

[–] Melatonin@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 12 hours ago (3 children)

I'm talking big trucks not forklifts.

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[–] cybervseas@lemmy.world 25 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

So it's a Captain Planet villain, but dumb.

[–] orclev@lemmy.world 13 points 12 hours ago (3 children)

Right, a Republican, exactly.

The way they've all reacted to climate change denialism by actively trying to make pollution as bad as possible is wild. Even if the entire world's scientific community was somehow wrong about global warming, shit like this and "rolling coal" would still be terrible for air quality, but these fucknuts apparently don't care as long as they get to "own the libs". This is peak "eating a shit sandwich to force other people to smell your breath" energy.

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[–] solrize@lemmy.world 12 points 13 hours ago (6 children)

Remotely? Sounds like the manufacturers are up to no good as well.

[–] AbidanYre@lemmy.world 13 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

The summary says he was having accomplices connect a laptop to the vehicle and then remotely accessing that laptop. Sounds like regular old ssh or rdp.

[–] catloaf@lemm.ee 10 points 11 hours ago

I'd bet he's a TeamViewer kind of guy.

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