Studying for Pre-Trip (Arizona)

I mastered the pretrip and struggled early on with everything else and my working knowledge of engines was where the battery and oil resivoir was.

I was lucky that my roommate in driving school worked for GM building engines and taught me. Biggest thing is once you learn all the parts just keep practicing. Practice as much as you can on your school trucks. When you're not back pretrip. You will start memorizing everything quickly. I used to drive behind trucks on the way home and would pretrip the trailer and tractor as much as I could.

 

There's a few apps that drivers highly recommend.
Here's one of several:
Class A Pre-Trip Inspection Study App - CDL College

 

Find out what truck you will be testing on. That will start you on the right leg. I tested on a kenworth. Then went to work and have driven a peterbuilt and now a frieghtliner.
So its a little different I each truck. Good luck and welcome to the industry

 

There are dozens of complete pre-trip videos posted by trucking companies or truck driving schools on YouTube. Find one that uses any truck at all, watch it over and over and over and over until you can literally repeat the words EXACTLY as they are in the video. The Pre-Trip is a memory exercise. For each item you are expected to say something like "looking for broken, missing, damaged, etc.". Just memorize the items in the order the state CDL book has them listed, and add the phrase looking for broken, missing, damaged, etc. after each item. You aren't expected to be a mechanic, understand each item, know what it does. You are expected to say the words the test examiner must hear during your test so you pass.

The pre-trip is usually broken into under hood, outside truck, inside truck, trailer. You may have to do every item on all of those sections but more likely you will be assigned the in-cab section, under hood section, and one of the remaining section. You must understand they want the EXACT words in the CDL manual, not your interpretation of the material, not something that is almost as good or better. It's a govt test. They want the exact words. Practice the exact words like for a song, don't think about the meaning of the words in the song, just repeat the words in the song as they were written. Make sure every time you do the pre-trip at school, in your mind, or while watghing the video you use the exact words. Item #1, looking for missing, broken, etc. Item #2, looking for broken, missing, loose, etc. Item #3, looking for broken, missing, loose, etc." Whatever the exact words are in your state CDL manual use those words and practice until you almost go insane. Repeat it like a robot. You aren't there to build a truck, improve truck, etc. You are there to say the words the examiner needs to hear so you can start working. If you can repeat the words in order you pass. If you repeat other words you fail. How do you memorize the list of all US Presidents, 5 at a time. Practice or fail the test.

 

THIS............

 

Just name everything, followed by properly attached, not bent, broken cracked or leaking.

 

Update from OP L. I’m in my last week and definitely glad I chose this school. I like how they don’t just hand you your CDL. Pre trip was a bit tough the first time around but I finally got it be down . About to start my road test just waiting on my turn.