And so it begins...

Well our first day is in the books. There are 4 people in my class and I'm the only one looking to go regional. One girl is doing this for a promotion at work, another guy doesn't know what he wants to do or if he'll even use his cdl and the other guy has an opportunity lined up with a local milk carrier.

Spent the first night filling out some paperwork and going over the first couple chapters in the book. Basically gen knowledge of qualifications and disqualifications for a cdl along with drug and alcohol testing. Then basic controls of the truck.

Tonight we get to go out to the yard and start to learn some more of the basic controls with hands on. Also going to be starting pre trip stuff. Apparently the trainer we are with tonight is a wiz at the pre trip.

 

Sorry it's been kind of hectic studying for permit tests and the pre trip.

Been spending most of our time in the classroom going over the basics and getting prepared for permit tests. Had a few recruiters come in and give us their pitch. I think some of them are getting annoyed with all the questions I ask. One guy even told me that I may be too picky. Recruiter from the company I plan on driving for came in today and it was nice catching up with him.

Been taking the practice tests on here every night after class and again in the morning. Passing them every time now so I think I'll be ready to get that over with next week.

Been memorizing 10 steps of the pre trip everyday and making my son go over it with me multiple times. He is really starting to get sick of it but by the end of summer he may ge the only 8 year old in America able to do a pre trip. I've got the first 51 or 52 down pat and should have everything down by the end of next week.

We got to perform our first brake test today which was interesting. Was able to get through that with no issues.

We also started straightline backing. In the beginning I could get through the 100 feet but the trailer and tractor were all ####eyed when I stopped. Instructor worked with me a little bit having me watch my target instead of watching each individual cone and by the end of the night I was able to keep everything in a straight line. Biggest problem I was having was forgetting to get the tractor back up underneath the tailer after making my adjustments.

We'll be doing more pre trip tomorrow and start learning how to couple and uncouple. I'm sure there will be a significant amount of time working on our straighline as well.

So far it has been a lot of fun and the three others in class are great to be around. I love being behind that big ole wheel and can't wait to learn the other backing maneuvers. We start to hit the road in about three weeks.

 

Last night in the yard was fun to say the least. Started off with pretrips again. I have the first 60 steps down pat and was to get through them in about 8 mins. After that we worked on safe starts and air brake tests.

We then worked on uncoupling and coupling trailers.

After that was a couple of hours paired up working on our straightlines. Now that I've got the physics figured out, my straightlines are getting significantly better. Definitely better than the other night. Didn't struggle except for one time when I turned right instead of left because I was looking out the right mirrors.

 

Thanks. I've wanted to do this for years and finally got the blessing for my wife to just stop talking about it and go don it. I love being behind the wheel so why not get paid to do that.

 

Another fun night in the yard. They split us up, 2 working in 2 trucks on straightline backing and the other 2 working on pretrips with a 3rd truck. Great news is I was able to get through the pretrip without the cheat sheets 3 times tonight in about 20 mins each. Glad that is finally memorized.

They changed things up a bit on our straightlines, having us crank off to the left or right after the trailer tandoms got to the last cone. We start offset on Thursday so they wanted us to get used to getting back under the trailer and watching how the trailer tandoms pivot in our mirrors.

Did a fairly decent job on the first night. Hit a couple cones and had to use pull ups a couple times, but I'm happy with the performance. Defintely getting better at how the pivot points work and using visual cues. I can see why they say to park towards driver's side whenever possible. Seeing those cones in the convex mirror can get a bit difficult especially when it starts to get dark.