Stupid, dumb, no excuse. But I made the mistake.

3 days solo on doubles graveyard shift in grape season....missed my field entrance I need to flip a U I misjudged the space neccesary and locked my trailers corner to corner truck tire spinning dust everywhere all alone 2am. Then I glanced at the dashboard saw the axle lock switch and hit it I powered thru it and bent the corners to crap. Never told no one delievered and left the set with in the other 100 and grabbed me a new one. Shshsh dont tell nobody.

 

Hahaha sssshhhh

 

Been there, done that. Never let it happen again. Was not fun cranking a trailer with 40k+ up from the ground. Paid out of pocket for the replacement air lines so the company wouldn't know. It happened in a dirt drop yard luckily rather than in the street.

 

Back in the "day" when tractor & trailer brakes released when the air leaked off, i was parked in a parking lot with my COE F model mack and 40' flatbed sitting in the drivers room with a local shipper, we all knew each other, we have met, my truck rolled into the shippers P/ U truck.........we still load there till this day!
Ever backed into a loaded chip trailer sitting on 6x6 blocks, cause the landing gear sucked and get it half way up the 5th wheel and have it take off backwards and on to the frame and rear axle wheels at 3am when you where 22? No air ride tractor to help get it up.... Just youth, time and a crummy landing gear.

 

We didnt have trainers just youth, determination, some common sense, and by do the grace of god go I.

 

The "old timers" thought us 20 somethings " the new breed" was has stupid as a box of rocks and the future of trucking was doomed. Seems not much has changed. Circa mid 1970's

 

I made a mistake in CDL school and I learned from it. In school the instructors made us drop and hook at the beginning and end of every day. I was taught to lower the air bags while pulling away and backing under. I was hooking back up and the opening of the collar was out of line with the kingpin and when I aired back up the kingpin was resting on top of the collar. I backed up and the kingpin rode the collar and dropped infront of the collar. I had to crank the trailer up about 8 inches because the collar tipped back and I couldnt get it to stay level. Empty trailer but it was still a workout. Couldnt imagine cranking a load of paper rolls that high. Lesson learned. Now I only use airbags when unhooking just to be sure that the landing gear can handle the weight. Not only that but in my experiences a lot of drivers will crank the landing gear all the way to the ground and just pull away. Ill leave the landing gear up about an inch and set it down with the airbags. Nothing is more annoying than cranking down a heavy trailer because the last guy dropped the trailer too high.

 

Oh yeah, jumping the fifth wheel is MUCH more annoying that just having to crank it down. I'd have thunked you'd have learned that when you had to crank one UP because of jumping it.

What is even more fun, is when the trailer is loaded, and you are working with a rib broken. BTDT & never want to do it again!

 

I couldnt imagine doing it with a broken rib. It was a learning experience and I was more upset with myself than annoyed. I pulled airlines off on my first solo run. Luckily the previous driver of the truck was a mentor and had spare lines under the bunk. Locked my keys in the truck on the fuel island. Had a loadlock handle break my nose. Brainless rookie mistakes. My first 6 months were pretty bumpy. Its been smooth lately. Changing companies now so hopefully that smooth ride continues.

 

Ft Leonard Wood, MO in 95 going through the 88M school(transportation/truck driver) and our first day on the range with the tractor trailers and a trainee drops a trailer cos she didn't make sure she was properly connected to it. This was about 15mins after the instructors got done "telling" us to make sure we were connected or we would hate cranking the landing gear to get it high enough to get back under it. Not to mention possible damage to the equipment.

After a few minutes of not-so-quiet "retraining", she started cranking...and cranking...and, you get the point. Needless to say, NOONE dropped another one after that.