The adventures of 'Team Klingon'

Discussion in 'Questions From New Drivers' started by Lady K, Dec 10, 2010.

  1. Gears

    Gears Trucker Forum STAFF - Gone, But Not Forgotten.

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    No worries Klingon. At least your eyesight is even better than before. Congratulations on getting all your tests passed, and continued good luck!
     
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  3. Katey

    Katey Medium Load Member

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    Glad you were able to get new glasses! Hope everything goes smoothly this morning. Let us know when you can :)
     
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  4. CarolCreates

    CarolCreates Light Load Member

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    Hi LadyK,
    I read your post and it reminds me of me and my husband. We two are going to do the Long haul trucking. Chris is studying now for his CDL's and is weighing out which school to enroll in. Chris has had his own construction bus. for over 30 + yrs. and I wk from home as a Ad Editor for Microsoft. Both jobs are getting very slim in work load. Chris has always wanted to drive trucks, so we've decided this is the path we will take. He is going to get on the road and drive for a while then I will jump into all the training so we can be team drivers. On one hand I'm totally stoked about this great adventure, and on the other hand it's really scary. The biggest vehicle I've ever driven was my sister in laws small SUV. So the thought of me getting behind an 18 wheeler, well, it's just hard for me to grasp at this point of the journey, not to mention living is such small quarters, but hey, I'm game for adventure :biggrin_25520:

    Well, I said all this to introduce myself to you and suggest that maybe we can keep in touch and compare notes as we both set out on this new journey.

    ~Carol~
     
  5. chompi

    chompi Road Train Member

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    One thing to keep in mind as newbies is that the driving industry is just as slim as the rest of the jobs out there. Trucking is the very first thing that gets hit when the economy slows.

    People buy less product = less product being shipped around!

    Of course with that being said this affords the trucking companies to be much more picky who they hire. Also lets them thin out their current bad "stock". If you have a good background and clean mvr as a husband/wife team you should be able to make some money. You will need to hustle though. I spent many of sleepless days and nights out on the road and so did my wife. It is a very tough career choice. A lot of newbies leave their current career and for some reason think they are just going to be toodling around the country. Not so much. Do you think you can handle driving coast to coast three times a week? (7000 miles a week) This is what is expected of husband wife teams. It's tough driving by the truck stops and rest stops at night seeing everyone sleeping in their comfy trucks while you are out there chugging along. When you are sleeping it is like being in the dark on a bumpy rollercoaster! Takes a little getting used to.

    Carol, my wife was very leery at first. The biggest thing she ever drove was a truck and a horse trailer. Their were a few times I had to take over like in tight spots or really bad weather (which right now is every day!) but overall she actually did better then the both of us expected. We would back and forth coast to coast so much that occasionally after stopping for fuel she would get back on the interstate going the wrong direction! She claims it only happened twice!

    If you do decide to give it a hack keep in mind that the first three months are going to be extremely tough and very stressful. The two things that were the absolute most stressful to my wife was
    A. Getting used to the lifestyle - that's mainly what the three month mark is for.

    B. Getting lost all the time - it is going to take some time learning the country, interstates, where you can and can't go, and planning your trips with your atlas and GPS. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. Being a team you cover a lot of ground and the time zone thingy will throw you for a loop. Like when you are in CA and you are planning a load on the bills it says you deliver in Boston at 8am. Well that's 8am eastern time. You are currently in Pacific time. If your company is in the midwest then you have to run your logs and qualcomm time off of Central time. So now to complete this load you are juggling three time zones. Your dispatcher is going to want the time in correlation to where they are sitting so that it isn't hard on them, right!? You need to tell them exactly when you can be there (don't wait until 8am when it has to be delivered you want to get there as soon as you possibly can) so they can start to find you another load while you are in route. Plus as a team there is a lot of drop and hook. So if you can be there a day ahead of time your DM might have you drop your trailer and grab a loaded one to go back to the west coast. They will have a single driver deliver your load. This is where you make your money, by keeping moving.

    Sorry to babble, I may have gotten ahead of you more than you can comprehend right now. You will see, it will all make sense.

    Any way welcome to the forum. If you have any questions feel free to "pm" me. My wife and I drove team for many years so I may have your answers. Good luck to you guys!
     
    Wedge, Lady K, jant96 and 2 others Thank this.
  6. celticwolf

    celticwolf Road Train Member

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    Got to remind you all Central does have eLogs. Makes fudging rather difficult. The qualcomm will scream at you if you start to get into a HOS violation.

    Klingon I hope you got that vision thingy fixed... don't worry you'll have plenty of time sitting around getting on each other's nerves. Hahahah

    The reefer will cover up your snoring too..
     
  7. Lady K

    Lady K Road Train Member

    Sweet!! Hi and Welcome (from Sacramento, CA for right now) - I (thankfully) have driven a few things - and towed trailers - so I have a slight concept as to 'how' - but doing it a BIGGER scale will definately be different I'm sure! Do you know what company you guys are going with?? Klingon and I are going with Central - it is one of the 'driver mills' - but seems to be no better or worse than any other (from what we've read)... bonus for us is that the school is local, so I get to see him for at least 2 more weeks before he hits the road. I look forward to reading your adventures :biggrin_25525:
     
    CarolCreates Thanks this.
  8. Lady K

    Lady K Road Train Member

    THANK YOU for your insight!! I some of it makes sense (at least to me) - thankfully I have the history of Klingon driving before. Please keep the info coming - even if I don't get it now - I will have that info in the back of my mind and I'm sure it will come in handy :D

    Still amazed at the thought of coast to coast three times a week!! At this point - without having experienced it - I'm excited!! I'll let you know how I feel about it after 3 months (if you remind me) :biggrin_2559:
     
  9. Lady K

    Lady K Road Train Member

    With the eLogs (qualcomm) do you still need to do a paperlog?? If not is there a way to get a printout of your time? (for back up to double check income)

    Yep Klingon got shiny new glasses - not to sure how good they work though - he still thinks I look pretty :biggrin_2559: but that's why I love him!!
     
  10. celticwolf

    celticwolf Road Train Member

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    You can request a copy of you logs to the qualcom, but you don't paid based on logged hours or miles. You get paid by dispatched miles.
     
  11. Lady K

    Lady K Road Train Member

    As Klingon said - he failed the vision test in his left eye - so got new glasses. Well he let the instructor at school know that we would be going to DMV as soon as they opened to finish the vision part and get his permit. We got there with time to spare (my Daddy taught me right - "get to the train station BEFORE the train leaves" - that was just one of his favorite sayings). As we are sitting there in the 35* foggy morning - we start to get cold so start my daughter's PT Cruiser to run the heater. The check engine light came on (wasn't lit on the way there) - mmmm - wonder what is causing that. So we do the turn the key on 3 times thing to get the code. Ok we will need to look that up when we get home. So into the office we go - do all that stuff - now back out to the car to head to class w/permit. Car won't start!! It gurgles at us (glug, glug, glug) - sounded like it was 1)flooded 2)vapor locked. We eventually get it started and pull out of the DMV and down the street about 500' - stop for a light and the car DIES!! Not even a click now when turning the key. Lights work - windows work - turn key NOTHING!! Sigh - so now we need to figure out 1) how to get Klingon back to class (he already has a ride home) 2) get me to work 3) now that we need to use the dodge that my daughter was using how does SHE get to work...

    So what did we learn first thing this morning 1) patience 2) cooperative sharing 3) coordination of effort 4) how to look at a situation and work out a solution - might not have been a FUN morning - but we made it though.

    Now to figure out how we are going to do tomorrow - no word yet on what happened w/the car except that it was something electrical and to do with the radio - a short and blown fuses - and how much is this going to cost???
     
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