A truck-mounted attenuator truck (generally shortened to TMA truck, for obvious reasons) can be a vital piece of safety equipment for many working crews, especially those who commonly work alongside busy roads and thoroughfares. However, if you are in the market for a new or used TMA truck, simply purchasing a truck with an attenuator stuck on the back may not be enough; for maximum safety and ease of operation, your new TMA truck should also be fitted with the following accessories:
Attenuator visibility markings
These are applied to the attenuator itself and may also be present on other parts of the truck which can be exposed to traffic, such as side sills and doors. In their simplest form, they consist of patterns of reflective paint or adhesive tape, which are arranged for maximum visibility and designed to reflect the headlights of passing cars at night. As you can imagine, they make your TMA truck a far more visible obstacle in dark conditions.
However, for extensive night time work you will require something more immediately visible, so you may also wish to invest in an attenuator-mounted lightboard. These large devices are fitted with a series of powerful lightbulbs for maximum night time visibility. Most create a simple series of lighted arrows to guide oncoming traffic safely past your truck, but more advanced (and expensive) models can be programmed to display specific warning messages or alerts.
Truck-mounted lighting
Mounting lighting on your truck will serve to further increase its visibility to oncoming traffic and can help improve safety for work crews. There are two kinds of lighting that you may wish to have fitted to your truck:
- Strobe lighting: Almost always a legal requirement, these bright, rotating lights are fitted to the extreme corners of your truck (and often mounted on the attenuator itself) to provide a quick and easily identifiable warning.
- Work lighting: Particularly useful for evening or night work, these powerful floodlights can dramatically increase visibility for your workers at night and are generally mounted on the roof of the truck for maximum lighting range. If you opt to have work lights fitted to your truck, however, you should be careful to have them mounted in a position where they will not dazzle other drivers.
Storage space
Even with a highly visible attenuator and bright lighting protecting your truck and workers, there are still more measures you can take to increase worker safety. Traffic cones, temporary traffic lights and other traffic control equipment can take up a large amount of storage space, however, so you may wish to have your truck fitted with additional storage capacity.
If your TMA truck is a simple flatbed truck, the best way to go about this is by having equipment racks fitted. These are generally fitted to the sides of the flatbed, or behind the driver's cab, and provide handy storage room where cones, lights and equipment can be stacked and stored without encroaching on valuable flatbed space.
Alternatively, you may wish to have a box cover fitted over the bed of your truck, essentially turning your TMA truck into a box van. This truck configuration provides excellent storage capacity (especially when it comes to protecting electronic equipment from wet weather), but it can dramatically increase the weight and running costs of your truck.
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