Doesn't it get confusing sometimes bobtailing and trailer switching

I know youre knew and all......

But still.....

 

WOW!

 

Chances are you won't be doing a lot of bobtailing. Most of your mega-carriers don't allow it due to insurance. Bobtailing is dangerous. Companies like Swift and the other mega's have a policy that you can't leave the terminal unless you are hooked to a trailer. If you see a mega company truck bobtailing it is an owner operator and chances are they are going to the store or going home.

 

correct.

I am with a megacarrier (the name rymes with spam) and I find myself bobtailing quite often. I get drops at receivers and told to pick up empty, but they have no empty trailers of ours so I can bobtail anywhere from 20-150 miles for one. Plus when on hometime I generally drop my trailer at our yard and bobtail 160 miles home to park in my driveway as there is nowhere close, safe, and legal to park with a trailer and I am too far away from the yard to park and drive home.

When bobtail I call my truck Teddy, as in Teddy Roosevelt because it's one rough riding SOB.

As for confusion. I have hauled a backhoe on a trailer with a dumptruck ever since I started driving so switching steering is second nature for me. I always know there is a trailer behind me. Though when at home I do pull out straight and turn wide in my little rav 4.

 

A lot of drivers are confused even when they have a trailer as evidenced by the muddy areas next to curbs (where the trailer rides up on the grass) or fuel island concrete posts which look like they been blasted by howitzers. What happens is they line up their tractor for perfectly for the island center then drag the trailer over the post, when they should really be aiming for the post then diverge into the island so the trailer is lined up in the island before they enter.

Recently was at a truckstop getting some lights fixed on the trailer, anyway I see the guy ahead of me is done and leaving but a tired trucker had parked behind the shop area but courteously left about 12 feet of space between his trailer rear and a dumpster. The guy leaving got his trailer hung up in there and had to wake the tired guy up to move. When I left, the tired guy was re-parked where he was and motioned if I wanted him to move, I told him no. I just aimed my tractor for about halfway on his trailer then smoothly turned into the hole and snaked out of there no problems.

When you live in the truck 24 hours a day it becomes second nature. Your question to me is like me asking you if it gets confusing sometimes when you switch from walking to running to walking again.

 

Drive the trailers not the tractor. How anyone could forget they are pulling a trailer is beyond me. There are 2 kinds of truckers it your choice which kind you will be.

 

More truth in that than most care to admit. I had to learn the proper way to setup for a back, but the actual mechanics, which way to turn the wheel, comes as natural as going forward. You simply drive the trailer where you want it to go. Is it because I pushed and pulled a little red wagon all over as a kid? Could be. I just know that from the first time I backed a boat, which way to turn has never been part of the conscious thought process.

What he said!

 

When I was in school my instructor drilled into my head that I was a "trailer driver" not a truck driver......so now I have problems driving my car...LOL