Starting Schneider National Dedicated Flex Fleet

Yes, I'm actually quite impressed with how far I've come in just a year, both in terms of money and experience. I was expecting to end this year with maybe $50k gross, but I'm going to get very close to finishing out the year with 70k. It's mind boggling, especially for my first year. I have some friends that are college grads who aren't making even half of what I've made. It's wild.

I've also gained a bunch of varied experience that I think will prove to be extremely valuable if I ever decide to move up the ladder.

 

So, its time for my 2 week review of the Schwan's account lmao. So, the first Monday (12/6/21) was pretty shaky because no one knew where the empty reefer trailers we were supposed to use were located. I came in bobtail to the pickup, because I knew it was a reefer account, despite the support shift load planners consistently trying to assign me an empty dry van. Another NDF driver showed up to the pickup and actually had the empty dry van, which he wasn't supposed to have. He ended up sitting there for hours until they found somewhere for him to drop the empty. My DBL was under the impression they would have preloaded trailers for us at the pickup, which was not the case. At some point they found out that all of our reefer trailers we're a few miles north at another facility. We we're supposed to make the pickups at 5AM, but after the trailer shuffling, I didn't end up making the pickup until almost 10AM. Had to drive about 6 hours up to Pennsylvania to get in position for the delivery so I had about just enough time to make it up there before running out of my 14. After that everything ran pretty smoothly.

Basically a bunch of dock-to-dock OTR hauls picking up various pieces to make frozen pizza, then the pizzas themselves. First week I went to PA, IN, TN, and OH. This week I had a bit more fun. I made the same Monday PA run again, then the rest of the week I had to spend getting over to Minnesota and South Dakota to make a delivery and pickup. I'd never been to South Dakota before so that was a hell of an experience. I made a pickup in South Dakota on Friday morning, and right as I got hooked up and started heading back down to Kentucky.. it started snowing BIG TIME. I had to drive 2 hours from the pickup to Sioux Falls to get to a scale, I was white knuckling it all the way down there. It started to get really slippery so I had to slow down and at some points I was going 35mph. My windshield wipers started accumulating ice to the point where I could hardly see anymore, so I had to pull into a rest area to knock the ice off my wipers. On the way down the ramp to the rest area I started slipping and sliding a bit as soon as I touched the brakes, so I had to feather them a bit nd downshift and roll into the snow and ice instead of skidding over it. Learned real quick that you have got to go slow, especially on those downhills.

I got to the scale and weighed, was 34,440 on my drive axles. Had to slide the tandems forward a couple holes which proved to be a huge pain in the ### in the ice and snow. The slide rails had a huge accumulation of slush and ice and I had to get up under the trailer and poke all the ice out of the holes so I could find the locking pins. The trailer had one of those fancy air assisted locking mechanisms so they were a pain in the ### to find. I tried sliding a couple times on the ice and snow before I realized it wasn't going to work. Every time I tried to push back on the trailer, I'd just either end up pushing the tandems over the ice, or spinning out my drives in the ice, and couldn't break the rail loose. I started thinking of solutions, thought about chocking the wheels but figured I'd have the same problem. I ended up taking the trailer through the fuel island and parking the tandem axle over the pump where it was dry, and that ended up working. Was finally able to get my tandems where they needed to be.

Then I continued my white knuckle drive out of South Dakota, it was snowing the entire time I was in SD and a little bit into Iowa, at some points you could no longer see the lines in the road and were basically relying on the tracks that other tires had been making. Saw quite a few other trucks jacknifed or flipped in the ditch and I realized how serious it can be out here, it made me extra cautious getting out of there. At some point in Iowa the snow turned into rain and the roads weren't nearly as bad. Started my day in South Dakota and ended it at that huge Iowa 80 truck stop, had never been there before but it was a nice spot after my day. Had some cheese curds and a ribeye at the Iowa 80 Kitchen and it definitely helped ease the stress of the day. That was my first active snow storm in a semi and was valuable experience to add to the repertoire.

Protips for winter driving: get some good wiper blades and washer fluid that will melt the ice off your blades. Be prepared to stop often to scrape the ice off your headlights and knock the ice off your front radar and wiper blades. Go even slower than you think you need to go. Sometimes downshifting is better than brakes.

Now I'm back in Kentucky on my reset. Just got finished trip planning next week and now I'm finna watch the Packers beat the Bears. Til next time.

Added pictures of my SD adventure.

 

There is no time like the present. If you start off doing the hardest and most challenging things it will make the easy days that much easier. You'll have to get the experience one way or another, plus every day of the winter won't be a snowy icy hellscape so you will have some regular driving in there. I started in the winter and I'm having a good time lmao.

I'm gonna start telling my DTL to throw me on the most difficult and challenging accounts that we have so that I'll be able to appreciate the smooth sailing of any account after that.