DVSA reveals new under-vehicle inspection tech
An under-vehicle roadside inspection device has been revealed by the DVSA for the first time.
The DVSA is about to trial the new technology, which is designed to improve roadside vehicle investigations. The Hades-5 was revealed to the public for the first time at the recent IoTA event at Cozy Travel. Not even all of the Agency’s vehicle examiners had seen it at the time of the event.
The remote-control device is driven underneath a vehicle for roadside inspection. It has cameras that show the underside of the vehicle on the inspector’s hand-held controls. The inspector can zoom into any of the ‘crystal clear’ pictures it picks up and the images (both stills and video) can be recorded to form evidence.
It even has a thermal camera, which highlights any temperature anomalies underneath the vehicle that may be of concern, such as exceptionally hot areas. The cameras are tiltable, allowing the inspector to get a better look.
“It’s a fabulous piece of kit,” said Caroline Hicks, DVSA Head Regulatory Services and Transformation
The Hades-5 is soon to be given to inspectors to try during its current trial stage with DVSA. It solves the issue of some vehicles being hard to get beneath on the roadside. “It’s a fabulous piece of kit,” said Caroline Hicks, DVSA Head Regulatory Services and Transformation.
Caroline showed the audience at the event how the DVSA is making the roads safer using technology. The Agency has access to the 80m ANPR records taken each day. It has a team monitoring the roads every day, with inspectors directed to where to inspect using a ‘heat map’, which shows the location of target vehicles. Caroline said: “We know the worst offenders navigate around our sites. But if they’re a serious non-compliant vehicle, we can still pull them over.”
DVSA is also using cameras to identify vehicles with tampered speed limiters by working out the average speed between points captured on camera.
The DVSA is also to roll out remote tachograph readers, which comply with smart tachograph version 2 parameters, which allow its staff to read tachographs as vehicles drive by.