Getting 1yr experience on automatics

personally I'd rather get a year with manuals before going to autoshifts. I've driven primarily autoshifts for almost 10yrs, but if I need to use one of our freightshakers, which are manuals, it only takes me 15 or 20 minutes to re-learn the pattern. But coming into it without exp. would be a pain. That said, a lot of companies are going to autoshifts.

 

Save your knee autos dont make you less of a driver I love my auto!!!!

 

id start by driving a manual transmission first as most companies run them and if you have no prior experience driving one it can be painful, espically when you take your road test and have none/limited driving experince with one might be a rough way of going

 

Are you just out of school? Driving up and down the street with an empty truck for a few weeks won't show you any more about shifting than you need to know to get by the DMV. You'll learn more if you get some real world experience with a stick. An Autoshift truck will deprive you of opportunities to learn certain things that set a guy just out of school apart from someone who's been there and done that.

Lets say you got your year done with USX and you go do a test drive for a local job. More than likely, You'll have to drive a stick. The problem is you'd be competing with drivers that'll ,if you somehow managed to retain all your shifting ability, make you look like you're straight out of school at best. More than likely you will have lost your touch, having not shifted in a year, and it will take the examiners focus off all your other abilities. Chances are nobody hireing experienced drivers wants to take time to teach you to shift. Thats why they want experience.

But on the other hand, I'm sure there are people that have gotten good jobs after getting thier experience at USX. I just don't think the odds would be in your favor.

 

When I graduated from school, I was uncertain if I wanted to get into flatbeds, I had always been drawn to flatbeds, but I also heard it was hard work and people either love it or hate it. Also, being a female and only 120lbs, I knew there were tarps that weighed that much.
Anyway, I wanted to know before I signed on with a flatbed company. So after I graduated, I hung out at a truck stop and found a flatbed O/O who let me ride along and find out how it was. I got to help tie down, tarp loads, and all of it. Of course he didn't show me how to get the fork lift driver to help with the tarps until after I got good at lifting it onto the truck. LOL But, that was good because I wanted to know if I could.
Anyway, my point to you is, if you drive an auto for a year all is not lost, I am sure you can get someone to teach or re-teach you how to shift and get ready for the road test.
However, I do agree with the previous poster, that there is more to driving a manual over the road than just shifting, and only experience can give you that. I am glad I was with a trainer when going through the mountains for the first time, not so much for the maneuverig of the truck, but for the shifting and picking gears. In school I learned to shift without grinding the gears, and how to find a gear if I missed. But, out on the road I learned to drive a manual truck.

 

just so you know, a lot of the fleets are heading towards autoshifts, slowly but it is happening. The Eaton rep was at our shop on Weds. updating some software on mine, he said that Werner, SWIFT, CR England and a couple of others are exp. with a few auto shifts to see how it works out. He also said that Wal-Mart may be going that way in the future as well.