For those of you who are over the road truckers or hot shot drivers, you understand that driving hours on end comes with many responsibilities. This includes the tracking of your miles and the jobs you’re attending. DOT requires you to log this and when it comes down to it, you want to have your logs easily and readily available. With EZ LYNK‘s newest ELD program, it is simple.

If you’re familiar with EZ LYNK, you’ll know these guys offer a high-end, techy product that allows you to do more on your phone than you would think. The AutoAgent allows you to monitor the vehicle’s vital signs while on the road and that is peace of mind when you’re hours from home. Adding to that, the ELD software allows you to track your work too.

For me, I drive quite frequently pulling Project DeadSpool around the country racing. Although I don’t have to answer to the DOT when it comes to travels, I still want to be able to show you the capabilities of this product and explain how it can make life easier for those of you who do. This weekend I am heading down to Florida for the Diesels’ On The Beach event. Since the event is 600 miles away, what better way to showcase this than now, right?

EZ LYNK ELD APP

I talked with John Clark with EZ LYNK about getting setup with this program and it was much easier than I thought. Since I already had an EZ LYNK account, I had to create another account for the ELD program making myself a Fleet Manager. Now if you’re using this with a fleet of trucks, this will make more sense. I just need to create this account to show you its capabilities, but as a fleet director, you can see all of the progress and logs of your trucks in seconds.

Once I had the application download onto my iPhone, it was just a matter of connecting the phone to the AutoAgent. Once unboxed, the AutoAgent is then plugged into the OBD-II port, like a standard AutoAgent is, and you then make your WiFi connection to your cellular device. Once your phone is connected, you can then start customizing your platform with your details.

ELD USERS

• Record and store your last 7 days and current 24 hours of data locally.
• Access up to 6 months of recorded ELD logs on demand.
• Provide data to officials on-demand via the web, email, or on-screen inspection.
• Add and operate with a co-driver and edit HOS rules via the Settings menu.

ELD CARRIERS

• Create and modify driver, admin, and other ELD user accounts.
• Store ELD data securely and privately for at least 6 months.
• Edit driver records that can / should be confirmed by the driver.
• Access ELD troubleshooting/malfunction reports and inconsistencies.

As you can see above, with the app in motion, different parameters are available for you to monitor. It can show you drive time, how long you’re stopped for a break, how much time is left on your shift, and so much more. On top of being able to keep a close eye on these things, they are being logged too. For DOT inspections that require this information, you’re ready to show them this information on the fly.

If this isn’t enough for you, you still have the traditional EZ LYNK app where you can monitor the vital signs of your vehicle using the OBD-II port as well. In our trip, we used both functions to see how they worked and as expected, it was a flawless performance. Even though we aren’t answering to the Department Of Transportation, for those of you who do, this will make life much easier.

DOT Inspections Made Easy

• BEGIN INSPECTION- Tap and hand over your mobile device for inspection of your last 7 days and current 24 hours of logs.
• SEND LOGS- Send a copy of your logs for the last 7+ days via web or email.
• ROUTING CODE- Enter an optional comment or routing code provided by the inspecting safety officer.
• INSTANT DELIVERY- Tap send to complete and send all required logs to FMCSA.

Hundreds of different areas you can monitor all while being ready for DOT stops.

Daily Logging

• CERTIFIED LOGS- Certified logs will always show a ‘success’ visual indicator.
• LOG ALERTS- If a log needs your attention, the app will display an alert indicator.
• LOG DETAILS- The daily log interface details events and offers the ability to certify a log.
• EDIT EVENTS- Edit events to add some missing required details such as location or to add a comment.

Closing Thoughts

My opinion on this product is a positive one. One thing I noticed and Clark told me this from the beginning when using the ELD application, you must leave the application open. He suggested using an iPad or a tablet of some sort to keep the ELD function going. Once you close out of it, or just open another app while driving, (music, social media, etc.) it will glitch and stop recording.

This does make for an inconvenience for those of you who don’t have a tablet or something else to use, because how can you use them both at the same time, right? They are actively looking to fix this, but other than that, the ELD function is great. Luckily for us, I had multiple devices on hand so we could still jam to music and podcasts and benefit from the AutoAgent simultaneously.

For more information about EZ LYNK and all of their products, head on over to their website here. We are pleased with how well this worked and see how easy it would be for a fleet of trucks to operate with this on board. Make life easier with this ELD-supported AutoAgent. Let us know what you think in the comments below.