Convoys

I agree whole heartedly with Tazz the first post is a clear proof of irresponsible behavior on the part of a PROFESSIONAL DRIVER.

The person with the uhaul pissing you off is not a professional driver. He is not paid to drive. He may have NEVER driven a rig of that type in his life. They could have EASILY been a person off to college first time away from home, in a strange giant weird handling machine. Or it was a pull along Uhaul it may have been their first trailer pulled. They were scared. They were doing the CORRECT THING when unsure about a situation. The thing that every #### school for trucking and ever #### company states is the CORRECT THING TO DO when you feel uneasy about driving be it due to weather, or traffic conditions or whatever. Slow the #### down.

I bet you or your 'convoy buddies' were tailgating him all through that construction too weren't you. Using your rig like a weapon to try and force this poor person to go the speed YOU felt was right. You aren't driving his vehicle. You do not determine his safe speed, he does.

Following to closely is a major cause of accidents, it wasn't two long ago two IDIOTS in a 'convoy' together following too closely and speeding on a two lane backroad crashed into a man's horse drawn carriage killing the horse and nearly killing the man. This sort of stupid move happens every day due to drivers that think like you who think the gas pedal must be to the floor at all times. Had they at the VERY LEAST been following at a safe distance the incident would have NEVER happened. Speeding and tailgating is a recipe for disaster. You are the professional. You have been trained for your job, you have experience, you are driving a machine that is capable of killing MANY PEOPLE if you screw up. You have the lives of everyone around you in your hands, you have to act professionally. If you hit a car, if you hit another truck, if you misjudge and clip that median, or guardrail you could kill people. Children, parents, grandparents, babies. Do you not understand that?

This is not about image, to hell with image or laws. This is more important. This is about LIVES. How would you feel if that Uhaul drivers was your daughter, scared and away from home for the first time trying to be careful and some ####### did that to her? I bet you'd sing a different tune. Every person on the road has the potential to be someone you care about. You never know when your mom, aunt, brother, uncle, or child has taken a ride with someone, rented a car, got a new car, maybe borrowing a car... get it?

I do not care about the convey part, if you want to run together at safe speeds and distances thats fine. But this idea that it is funny, makes you big and bad to bully a car or other trucks that go too slow for you is unacceptable. I only see ONE person acting like a steering wheel holder in this thread, need me to hold the mirror for you?

And for the record, I have been in pretty fast trucks, but there is a time a place for that, and a construction area with a person whom is obviously unsure of what he is doing is NOT the time. That person could have easily done something panicked when you guys decided to practice road rage, you could have caused a wreck and just because it did not happen does not make you right, or diminish the fact your actions could have easily caused it.

So call me uptight. Because on this speed demon forcing people off the road bs yes I am uptight. It could have been me 10 years ago you did that to, it could be my son in a few years, it could be my mom, whatever. It doesn't matter who it was, it was not okay. Not to me, and apparently not to several others on the forum whom have been driving far longer then I.

 

there is no way to support they claim that your 10x safer if no one has an incident you are both just as safe and going slow doesn't make one safe courtesy and some thinkin will do more for safety than a castrated truck ever will
you see idiots in slow trucks and idiots in fast trucks and idiots in no trucks

 

I will only run with a few select people and even then I'm very picky because being a female you constantly get those perverts on the radio that want to be stupid with ya when they hear you talk.....so I am highly picky about who I run with and I make sure its drivers I know and trust to be around me. and when I am running with them I keep distance between me and their back door and such just incase something were to happen I have an excape route to avoid a major mess

 

The governed truck guys alway seem to claim that they are safer in a slow truck than someone in a faster truck...But it seem to always be the governed fleet trucks that you see smashed up on the side of the highway and layin' on their side in a ditch!

Going slow does not make up for not knowing how to drive, It just makes the wreck a little less severe!

Look around you at the truckstop...Not too many of them are capable of thinkin'!

I was chattin' with a driver yesterday that was telling me all the benifits of driving a governed truck...

FUEL MILEAGE: He was braggin' because his truck gets 6 1/2 MPG! He refused to believe me when I told him that I average between 6 1/2 and 7 1/2 MPG consistantly.

Till I showed him my fuel mileage book!

TIRE MILAGE: But he had no idea how many miles were on the tires on his truck so we couldn't compare! But he obviously had no idea what he was talkin' about.
My steers are at 90,000 miles and still have about 70% and my drives are at 110,000 and have about the same left in them.
My trailer tires are all pretty new so I didn't include them in the conversation.

SAFTEY: He told me that he had a whole year (105,000 miles) of safe driving behind him without any tickets or accidents and only 1 incident. (He backed into a dropped trailer at a reciever)

I told him I had over 4,000,000 miles and 38 years with no chargeable accidents and no tickets in over 20 years and that it was all in "fast" trucks and that I had never even scratched a truck much less backed into someone elses parked trailer in my life!

Safety and fuel milege has less to do with speed than it does with focus...If you're not focused on what you're doing, You're gonna have a problem!


CONVOYS: These days I pretty much like to run alone unless I'm with someone I know. I don't even like running with other trucks from the company I'm leased to because it's just too much hassle to deal with another guys working style.
I keep the left door shut and run while most of the drivers that I know want to stop and trash around at every truckstop they see!

The whole "convoy" thing was pretty much a myth anyway, Guys used to run together a lot more than they do now but most of the convoy stuff was reserved for the movies and for lameassed country songs!

If you've been driving for less than 20 years....You missed the "old days" by a long ways!

Having said that...The old days weren't that different from the "new days" except that drivers were a lot more decent to each other for the most part and if there was a disagreement you could always take it outside and settle it and no one would dial 911!
Trucks were not as comfy as they are now and the industry didn't attract as many weaklings as it does now because the trucks required physical strength to drive.
Cops were cops, There were some good ones and there were some ######## but the ######## weren't as plentiful then as they are now.
Freight rates were usually better than they tend to be now, But they were never "great" unless you did heavy haul or something along those lines.
Driver pay was not as good as it should have been, In 1976 when I was hiring drivers for my other 2 trucks I was paying 13 cents a mile for all odometer miles and I expected a driver to get a minimum of 3,500 miles a week running flatbeds and most of my loads were tarped and tarping was included in the mileage rate! That was $455 a week before taxes.

$23,660 a year.

I rambled a little bit in this post but I hear a lot of nonsense about the "old days" from guys that weren't there so I thought I'd take you all on a trip down memory lane with someone that has been doing this since the 70's (The supposed "golden years" of trucking)
It was a hard thankless job then and it's a hard thankless job now and it isn't for everyone!