With the new CSA laws.

http://ai.fmcsa.dot.gov/SMS/Data/carrier.aspx?enc=MnUFdWQvqwJK/0m+TW+zd4/q6+i3cudymkhzuRygZVk=


Unsafe Driving 66.9%
Fatigued Driving (Hours-of-Service) 99.3%
Driver Fitness 77.3%
Controlled Substances and Alcohol No Violations
Vehicle Maintenance 100%
Cargo-Related Not
Public
Crash Indicator Not
Public

 

I agree with you mick,but back to the topic.Im an o/o and ive just had to bow down to csa 2010.I slowed way down (if the speed limits 65 i run 61),took some real getting used to but the fuel savings im putting in my pocket are making me real happy.I used to haul ### from ld to ld,run my logs a little suspect,and wasnt happy unless i got at least 3500 miles/week.Now i take it easy,run legal logs,and only running 2300-2700 miles/week.Funny thing,i feel alot better(no stress all day),and am making the same amount of money.I dont take lds i cant run legal and im loving it.Lot less maint. on my truck too.Bottom line csa is designed to weed out bad drivers and its going to do that,slowly but surely.I believe the future for good,legal,safe drivers is bright!Because like mick said theres only so many of us that like what we do and do it right.

 

I am glad you have learned the smart way of running the truck. Like I tell guys is not who gets there first but to get there the cheapest. Like the old saying goes a penny saved is a penny earned.

 

There are some good ones in the new breed . Not many , maybe 10% that start with training companies and others that get in with smaller carriers by knowing somebody and showing they have potential . We have a few examples . Injun and JimTheHut come to mind right away . There are far too many exploited by BFI's and CDL mills . I believe there is a special place in Hell for those whose greed leads them to take a disadvantaged person with a family to support and put them further in debt while gaining nothing .

 

Not sure about you. But for myself, I'm seeing TWO types of newbreeds.

The noobs, and the brainwashed. The noobs I understand. The brainwashed.....I'll never understand.

By brainwashed I mean "old school" that no longer give a ####. They are getting as bad as the noobs. Parking on fuel pumps, blocking driveways, and just being an all around pain in the ###.

In my book. The guys just starting out, have an excuse. But for somebody that has been driving for 20 years....there is NO excuse.

At least "some" of the newbs want to learn. And they'll suck up any information you'll give them, good or bad.

The "old guys". Bitter smart ##### who refuse to learn something new. Because they "know it all". They've been doing it for years.

There's a whole lot of difference between an educated dumb ###, an ignorant dumb ###, and an old fool.

Feel free to stick me in all 3 categories, or any combination thereof.

 

What's wrong with treating truck driving as a way to earn a pay check? It doesn't make you any less of a driver. Is it compulsory for a wage unit to brainwash itself into "loving" whatever damaging, brain numbing, peanut paying, degrading etc., etc., wage job it does at any given time? Is it even possible for a mentally stable person with an ounce of dignity & self-preservation to love most of the wage jobs out there? Sure, trucking is so much different than gutting fish, pet #### scooping, debt collection or cleaning toilets. Yet there is no push to make fish gutters to "love" their job.


I know I'll offend some sensibilities but trucking is not rocket science (it doesn't mean every rocket scientist can do it though), If you have little bit of driving "genetics" (this can't be learned), modest RRR, common sense, iron butt, certain type of personality tolerating isolation and routine, some luck (can't be a driver for too long without that) to learn from your non career ending mistakes, in and outs of trucking (from standpoint of a company guy) can be learned at a cosmic speed. Big companies and their insurance providers figured out that 3 weeks of training is more than enough to achieve acceptable risks, and they are in business to prove that they are right.

"Genetics", luck, personality - three things that make a good driver are beyond of "education" and training. A modestly intelligent person having those traits can pick up trucking in a heartbeat, and if you don't have those, it doesn't matter whether or not you treat trucking as a job or you "reinvent" yourself as a Billy Bigrigger who bleeds trucking.

Owner Operators is a different game, I guess you have to be born to drive to be successful and some business aptitude is a must. However, if you are just born to drive, you'll not go far except earning yourself a good sized hemorrhoid at the end, you must have a talent to put others to work for ya, if you want a "success".


My guess what people lament in connection with trucking, it's a general lack of consideration of one for another, but what it does have to do with the way you treat trucking? If you are a competitive, self-centered jerk, that's what you are regardless of your love for trucking.

 

.

Old timers where saying the same things back when I started driving. It's just like people my age saying how much better it was back in the 80's then now, because that is human nature to identify with the better periods in ones life.

Some newbie 20 years from now will be saying back when I started we actually had to be a steering wheel holder. Now you just tell the truck to go and it drives itself.

 

the company dictates how it gets fixed,it isnt possible to just abandon equipment and just quit,you are unlikely to be able to obtain quality employment afterwards. quitting and standing on my tree stump and yelling " I DID THE RIGHT THING" wont get you very far in paying your bills and feeding your family and the company knows this. when a company DAC's you with something like that youre blacklisted.

management plays a direct role in safety in how the operation is run, maintenance department,safety department and your dispatcher/manager,everything.

#### slides downhill,but we know where it came from, and we can even try to (at the right time) throw some back up.

 

thats not true, csa means alot to them, which is a big reason why they run their training program, they get people new to the industry that can be trained in that specific companies "system". most of the time it doesnt work out for the new driver, but overall if you look at the csa scores of training companies and their scores are pretty decent,especially considering the size of the company.

those same companies have some of the most strict legal routing,they simply DO NOT dispatch people on runs that they cant legally do. its against company policy,same with speeding and they actually enforce it (via qualcomm tracking and avg speed)

those same companies are pretty strict on requirements for experienced drivers and have some of the most extensive backround searches of any employer.

 

I wish my husband would run at 65. I showed him the fuel mileage, he agreed and still runs 75. Just because we can. I'm about to harp on him. We run 55 in CA. 65 seems like a happy medium, even if I really hate CA.