FCC--Fremont Contract Carriers

About auto vs manual


I had my manual in LA traffic. Never doing that #### ever again. The many positives of autos are far outweighed by its negatives in my opinion. Sure, they don't always select the correct gear for the situation and they kind of suck for backing, but the ease of use in traffic is just too much to pass up. Plus the autos in the Freightshakers are actually pretty good in my experience, and I've heard good things about the automatic Volvo's. I've heard horror stories about autos in Paccar products and other brands though.

Call me a lazy steering wheel holder but autos make my job a lot easier and actually a lot safer, as I can spend more time looking out for hazards and idiots on the road rather than spending that time figuring out what gear I should be in.

Or maybe it's just because I'm half the age of most people on this forum .

 

Especially with how long road crews take nowadays to repave a highway.

 

I’ve thought about seeing if they would hire me back if my gig I am doing now doesn’t start back up soon. I had 2.5 years there . I still see my old truck running around.

 

And they have gotten behind, so there is little hope they'll ever get caught up.

 

Gotta disagree with ya here, I drove an auto for about 3 years once, and never did like it, just feel weird. I'll take my manual any day even in traffic, don't use a clutch anyhow, so that never bothered me. Guess I'm an old f#@&er, but I prefer to shift my own gears!

 

I prefer geezer lol.

 

With the technology they keep coming out with in the new auto’s, like the creeper gear in reverse, no more slamming the king pin backing under trailers.

All the years I’ve driven manuals and now it’s all auto’s, I would never want to go back to manuals, although I don’t run any mountains or off road anymore, (flat lander if you will lol)

 

Local Freightliner salesman told me about an old fellow (40+ yrs driving) that's been buying his last truck for 6+ years now, always specced with a 13 speed. His last truck was ordered with a DT12 AMT. His truck went down for a couple weeks and his carrier loaned him one of theirs until his was out of the shop and it was an AMT. Told the salesman that was the easiest, most stress-free driving he had ever done and could kick himself for not jumping on board years ago, but his ego never allowed him to even road-test one.