Trailer swing while backing and position of tandems?

He was a rookie... Former dispatcher that had like 6 months driving experience.

He stopped real quick when I lit off my train horns. Nice kid, super apologetic... Just inexperienced.

 

"Heck Of A Way To "Garner Experience!!"
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How Many Drivers Pulling 57' Dry Vans?? Tandems Forward = 18' Swing.
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Got Nailed ONCE at the flying j, north end of I-81, VA., parked in middle of lot.
Scraped Left Side Tractor. Repositioned Mirrors = NO Breakage.
Last time I parked in Middle of ANY T.S., unless empty, briefly, daytime.

 

#### I'll take a few scraped up trucks if every dispatcher had to drive for 6months-1year. Industry might be a bit different

 

Obviously never heard of a spotter? Or to lazy to get out and take a look.

 

Just as long as we don’t have to go do there jobs in exchange.

 

Make it simple.
When your backing, you steer (guide) the rear corner of the trailer. don’t worry about the tandems. Yes it will require more input if the tandems are all the way back and lees if slid all the way forward.
I see a lot of drivers paying to much attention watching the tandems instead of the rear of the trailer.

 

Personally I think you should be looking at both. Tandems for offtrack and corner for swing/objects.

 

Try this:
(Assumptions are 53' van and standard sleeper tractor, adequate room to perform maneuver)

Backing with tandems fully forward: driving slowly past intended empty spot, go three spots past, turn hard right, when tractor reaches 90 degrees turn hard left, stop when tractor is again straight but trailer ~45 degrees across lane and tail (not tandems) is roughly in line with hole. Begin backing, keeping the corner of the rear of the trailer that you can see traveling along the pavement marking or where a marking should be. Once the tandems are in the hole your trailer should be close enough to in line that you are ready to get your tractor straight with the trailer. By the time your tractor and trailer are back in line, your trailer is halfway in the hole or more, might need one short pull up to correct any drift too close one side or the other.

Because it's the blind corner of the trailer that's at risk of hitting the hood of the truck on your right, not the tandems, you care more where the back of the trailer is tracking until the tandems are also in the hole. If the tandems are fully back, there's little to no tail swing so watching the tandems essentially IS watching the rear. Only modification is in the setup drive forward FOUR spaces past before the S maneuver so there's enough room for the longer wheelbase from kingpin to tandems.

Pulling out: little secret many people don't know, the midship marker lamp on the side of most trailers is located deliberately by the manufacturer to indicate the average radius point of the turn based on the length of the trailer and span of it's tandems slides. So once that light crosses a fixed point, begin turning your wheels and by the time the tandems reach that same point they will only just be changing course from the straight path to off-tracking into the turn. That's the distance it'll take for steering wheel input to translate back to the tandems.

 

Which way and how much you turn the steering wheel has no direct affect on where the trailer goes. It's the angle of the tractor's drive tires with respect to the trailer that steers the trailer. What's more important than how far you turn the steering wheel is how long you leave it turned while backing before you turn it back the other way to prevent the angle between the drives and the trailer from going too far. You only move your steering wheel to modify the angle of the drive tires to the trailer.

Most inexperienced drivers tend to steer too hard, moving the steering wheel from all of the way on one side to all the way on the other instead of steering just a small bit one way or the other, then holding that steering wheel position while the angle between the drives and trailer continues to change, then straightening the wheel and letting the drives continue to move with regard to the trailer, then turning just a bit the other way to maintain the same angle of the drives with the trailer.

In the end, it 's the drive axels that steer the trailer, whether backing or moving forward. The steer tires only steer the drive tires. The drive tires steer the trailer.

Additional tip for no additional charge: When you turn the steering wheel with the drive tires not rolling, you're flat spotting your tires. Anyone who has ever driven a class 8 truck without power steering knows how much weight is on the small contact patch where the steer tire touches the ground. Even with the larger steering wheels to give more leverage, you could barely turn the wheel. Instead of only getting 60-70-80 thousand miles out of a set of steers before they're unusable, you can get around 150,000-170,000 miles out of a set of steers if you will resist using the power steering to grind your steer tires in tiny circles on the pavement when you're backing or pulling out of a tight spot.

 

If the tandems are slid all the way up if there's enough room I will set the trailer up farther away from the two trucks that I'm backing between, kind of like if there was another tractor parked in front but it's imaginary but you're backing around that.

If there is enough room to do that by the time you turn the trailer it's actually going straight between the two trucks and you have no Danger of hitting the other truck.