60/70-Hour Limits and the 34-Hour Restart Explained

A dispatcher assigns a Tuesday load to a driver who "had a weekend off", and by Tuesday afternoon the ELD shows a cycle violation. The weekend was 31 hours, not 34. Monday's long shift still counts, and the six hours that roll off at midnight belong to a light day eight days back. The driver is parked, the receiver's appointment is missed, and the planner swears the board showed hours available.

That gap between the hours a planner sees and the hours the regulation allows is avoidable. A fleet that can calculate the rolling recap for each driver, knows which day drops off next and can tell whether an off-duty block truly reached 34 consecutive hours will stop booking loads that cannot be driven legally, and will choose restarts deliberately instead of by accident.

• What this guide covers: the 60-hour and 70-hour limits in 49 CFR 395.3(b), which on-duty time fills them, recap arithmetic, the 34-hour restart in 395.3(c), the exceptions that shorten or remove it, and India's different approach under its 2020 labour code.
• What it adds: an eight-day worked log, a failure trace, a formula you can drop into a planning sheet, a dollar and rupee cost comparison, and a review checklist for a fleet's cycle policy.

Which weekly limit applies: 60 hours in 7 days or 70 hours in 8

The schedule depends on the carrier, not the driver: a carrier that operates commercial motor vehicles every day of the week uses 70 hours in 8 days, and one that does not uses 60 hours in 7. Section 395.3(b) bars driving once the limit is reached, regardless of how many motor carriers use that driver.

Two definitions in 395.2 make the window concrete. "Seven consecutive days" and "eight consecutive days" each begin at the time the motor carrier designates for a 24-hour period, and the 24-hour period itself starts at the time designated for the terminal from which the driver is normally dispatched. So a carrier that sets its day start at 00:00 Central counts every driver's week from that boundary, wherever the truck is parked.

Property-carrying drivers under 49 CFR 395.3(b) stop driving after 60 on-duty hours in 7 consecutive days, or after 70 hours in 8 days when the carrier runs trucks daily; ELD duty records must show the total stays at or under the limit at every driving minute, with zero tolerance.

The weekly limit is a driving bar, not a working bar. A driver at 70 hours may still do yard paperwork, attend training or unload, but every such hour is on-duty time that pushes recovery further away. That detail matters when a terminal manager asks a capped driver to "help on the dock" for the afternoon, because the help extends the time before that driver can roll again.

On-duty time that fills the cycle, beyond hours behind the wheel

The cycle counts all on-duty time, so loading, waiting and inspection hours consume it just as driving does. Fleets that track only driving hours against the weekly limit overestimate availability, often by 15 to 25 hours across an eight-day period for drivers with long dock waits.

Section 395.2 defines on-duty time to include waiting at a carrier, shipper or public property to be dispatched unless relieved; inspecting, servicing or conditioning the vehicle; all driving time; loading or unloading, supervising it, or giving and receiving receipts; attending a disabled vehicle; drug and alcohol testing directed by the carrier; any other work for a motor carrier; and any compensated work for a non-motor-carrier employer.

• Second jobs count: paid work for a warehouse or a ride-share platform is on-duty time under item (9), so a part-time weekend job can consume a driver's weekly hours.
• Resting in a parked truck: time resting in or on a parked vehicle, or in a sleeper berth, is excluded from on-duty time, subject to the attendance rule for hazardous materials in 397.5.
• Team passenger seat: up to 3 hours riding in the passenger seat of a moving property-carrying vehicle, immediately before or after at least 7 consecutive sleeper hours, is also excluded.
• Multiple carriers: a driver used by more than one carrier in a 24-hour period must give each carrier a record with all duty time and the start and finish times worked for each, under 395.8(j)(1).

Rolling recap: the oldest day's hours return at the next day start

Recap is not a rule term; it is the arithmetic consequence of a moving window. At each carrier day start, the oldest day in the 7-day or 8-day window drops out, and its on-duty hours become available again. The hours returned equal what the driver worked on that oldest day, not a fixed amount.

That is why two drivers with identical totals can have very different tomorrows. A driver whose heavy shift sits eight days back gets a large recap at midnight; a driver whose eighth day back was a short shift or a day off gets little or nothing. Planners who look only at the total remaining hours miss this, so the board should show both "available now" and "returning at next day start".

Rolling cycle hours, evaluated at each carrier day start t

A(t)        = H - SUM( OD(d) ) for d = t-N+1 to t
R(t+1)      = OD(t-N+1)                 hours returned at the next day start
A_plan(t+1) = A(t) + R(t+1) - P(t+1)    hours left after the planned load

H     = 60 if N = 7 (carrier does not run every day), 70 if N = 8
OD(d) = on-duty hours (driving + on duty not driving) on carrier day d
P     = planned on-duty hours of the next load, including dock dwell
Rule  : dispatch only if A_plan(t+1) >= 0 at every planned driving minute
Reset : if off duty is continuous for >= 34.00 h, OD before the restart
        drops out and A = H when the off-duty period ends

Apply the check at the minute level for the last load of the window, because a load that is legal at 06:00 can become illegal if the shipper holds the truck for three hours and the drive then crosses the limit. A dispatcher should treat any plan that ends with less than one hour of cycle left as a manual approval, not an automatic tender.

How a 34-hour off-duty period restarts the count under 395.3(c)

Section 395.3(c) lets any 7-day or 8-day period end with the beginning of an off-duty period of 34 or more consecutive hours. After a valid restart, the earlier on-duty hours stop counting and the driver begins a fresh window with the full 60 or 70 hours.

The test is continuity. One on-duty entry inside the 34 hours, even a 15-minute pre-trip inspection or a quick yard move, breaks the period, and the count of 34 starts again after that entry ends. A restart is also optional: nothing obliges a driver to take one, and a driver working light shifts may never need it because recap returns hours each day.

The 2019 rule was technical: it removed text that was already unenforceable, restored 395.3(c) to its two short paragraphs and removed the old paragraph (d). Check your ELD provider's ruleset and your dispatch software for any leftover night-period or 168-hour validation, which some fleets configured during 2013 and never removed.

A 34-hour restart under 49 CFR 395.3(c) needs 34.00 or more consecutive off-duty hours, with no night-time window or 168-hour spacing since the FMCSA final rule of 12 September 2019; ELD logs must show no on-duty event inside the block, so even a 15-minute pre-trip voids it.

An eight-day log worked through recap and then a restart

The fastest way to see recap and restart interact is a real-looking log. The example uses a carrier that runs every day, so the 70-hour, 8-day schedule applies, with the carrier's day starting at 00:00 at the home terminal. The driver began Day 1 straight after a valid restart, so no older hours sit in the window. Hours are on-duty totals per carrier day, and the figures are illustrative.

At the end of Day 8 the driver has 2.5 hours. Midnight returns only 6.0, because Day 1 was a short shift, so Tuesday offers 8.5 hours. A Tuesday load needing 11 hours on duty, including a two-hour live unload, cannot be completed. Wednesday would return 11.5, but only if Tuesday's hours do not refill the window first.

• Recap path: work an 8.5-hour Tuesday, reach 70.0, then gain 11.5 at Wednesday's day start; the long load moves to Wednesday anyway, with Tuesday spent on a shorter run.
• Restart path: go off duty at 19:00 Monday, stay off until 05:00 Wednesday, and start Wednesday with a full 70 hours for the rest of the week.
• Relay path: keep the driver on an 8-hour Tuesday run and hand the 11-hour load to a driver with cycle room, at the cost of a swap and some empty miles.

A restart that fell 40 minutes short, traced through the ELD

Most restart violations are not deliberate; they come from an early start that nobody compared against the 34-hour end time. The trace below follows one such case for a 70/8 driver who was close to the limit before the weekend.

1. Saturday 18:10: driver changes to off duty at the yard after a 10.5-hour Saturday, with 69.0 hours in the 8-day window. A valid restart would end at 04:10 Monday.
2. Monday 03:30: dispatch texts that load 44817 can go early; the driver logs on duty for a pre-trip at 03:30. The off-duty block is 33 hours 20 minutes, so the restart fails and the old window stands.
3. Monday 03:45 to 09:15: the driver drives 5.5 hours. The Sunday and Monday day starts returned only 4.0 hours, leaving 5.0 hours from 03:30, so the driver passes 70 hours at 08:30, while ELD ruleset alerts are muted in the cab.
4. Monday 11:05: a roadside inspection reviews the record of duty status, finds the driver over the 70-hour limit and places the driver out of service; the load sits at the inspection site.
5. Monday 13:30: the fleet sends a relief driver 90 miles; the receiver reschedules load 44817 to Tuesday, and the safety team opens a corrective action for the early-start text and the muted alert.

Pricing cycle hours in a dispatch plan, in dollars and rupees

Running out of cycle is a cost problem before it is a compliance problem: every option for the Day 9 shortfall has a price, and the cheapest one is rarely "wait". The US column prices the three paths from the worked log, while the India column prices the nearest equivalent decision, which is a daily-hours limit rather than a weekly cycle.

India has no rolling 60/70-hour cycle or restart, so the rupee column is a contrast, not a counterpart. It prices a 640 km run whose running time exceeds one driver's eight-hour working day under the 2020 labour code. Every figure in the table is illustrative and should be replaced with your own cost per hour, pay rates and contract penalties.

The restart looks free because no one is paid to sit, but the idle truck is the expensive line. Fleets with spare drivers usually find a relay or a load swap beats both waiting and restarting, while fleets with long-haul single drivers often schedule restarts at home on weekends, where the idle truck would have been parked anyway. Our revenue per truck per week guide shows how those idle hours depress weekly output.

Exceptions with shorter restarts and drivers outside the cycle

A few operations get a 24-hour restart, short-haul drivers keep the cycle but change how it is recorded, and passenger carriers have the weekly limits without any restart text. Apply an exception only when the load and driver meet every condition, and record which exception was used on that day's log.

• Oilfield equipment: under 395.1(d)(1), drivers of vehicles used exclusively to transport oilfield equipment may end any 8-day period with an off-duty period of 24 or more successive hours.
• Construction materials: under 395.1(m), a driver used primarily to transport construction materials and equipment may end any 7-day or 8-day period with 24 or more successive hours off duty.
• Short-haul 150 air-mile drivers: 395.1(e)(1) exempts qualifying drivers from 395.8 and 395.11 logging, but not from 395.3, so the weekly limit still applies and the carrier keeps time records for 6 months, including the start, total on-duty and release time each day.
• Passenger-carrying drivers: 395.5(b) applies 60 hours in 7 days or 70 hours in 8 days, and its text contains no 34-hour restart, so their hours return only through recap.
• Adverse driving conditions: 395.1(b)(1) allows up to 2 extra driving hours beyond the limits in 395.3(a) or 395.5(a); it does not extend the 60-hour or 70-hour limit.

The daily rules interact with the weekly one but are separate clocks. For the 14-hour on-duty window and how a sleeper split moves it, see the 14-hour rule guide; for the driving-time interruption, see the 30-minute break rule. This article stays on the weekly limit and its restart.

Weekly cycle exceptions in 49 CFR 395.1 are narrow: oilfield equipment drivers under 395.1(d)(1) and construction materials drivers under 395.1(m) may restart after 24 off-duty hours, while 150 air-mile short-haul drivers under 395.1(e)(1) keep the 60/70-hour limit and carriers retain their time records for 6 months.

India: daily hours under the OSH Code, with no duty cycle to restart

India regulates truck crew hours through labour law, not a transport rule, and it does not use a rolling 7-day or 8-day cycle with a restart. Since 21 November 2025, the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 governs, and its section 143(1)(f) repealed the Motor Transport Workers Act, 1961.

Section 25(1)(a) of the Code bars requiring or allowing any worker to work more than eight hours in a day, and section 25(1)(b) leaves intervals and spread-overs to the appropriate Government's notification. For motor transport workers, a proviso counts work during the vehicle's running time, subsidiary work and periods of mere attendance at terminals of less than fifteen minutes as hours of work.

In practice, Indian fleets plan around the daily figure: a run whose running time and subsidiary work exceed one working day needs a second driver, a planned halt or a relay point. That is why the cost table above compares a second driver with an overnight halt rather than a restart.

Cycle checks software can enforce and calls the safety team keeps

Summing hours, timing a restart and blocking a tender that would cross the limit are arithmetic, so the dispatch system should enforce them without exception. Deciding whether to restart, relay or reschedule is a commercial judgement, and software should present the options with their costs rather than choose silently. Our HOS dispatch interlock guide covers the 11-hour and 14-hour checks at tender; the weekly checks below sit alongside them.

Retention rules frame the evidence. Under 395.8(k)(1) the carrier keeps records of duty status and supporting documents for at least 6 months, and under 395.8(k)(2) the driver keeps the previous 7 consecutive days available while on duty. A cycle audit therefore works from the last six months of ELD data and dispatch plans together.

If you are reviewing how your dispatch, ELD and planning tools share hours data, or want help specifying cycle-aware tendering for a mixed US and India fleet, you can send us a request for proposal. More transport compliance guides sit in the Logistics and Supply Chain hub.