Winter driving

I have a friend who hit snow melt that turned to ice near the top of a 6% grade a winter or two ago in Washington.

He was loaded pretty heavy, 78,000 or so. He passed two guys chaining on the shoulder, he wasn't chained. He broke traction near the top and started rolling backwards! Fortunately, he is proficient in backing and didn't panic. He started feathering his brakes and rolled in reverse right by those two guys chaining until he hit some sand and gain traction again.

He had to change his pants when it was all over

 

looking at the water splash from the tires works better then looking at the gauge. not all trucks have temp gauges. my 05 certainly didn't.

if' there's no spray coming from the tires. you can assume your on ice. or dry road if it hasn't rained or snowed.

my drives lock up all the time with jakes. i only use them when it's warm snow. if it's cold. switch stays off.

i came down that hill from idaho into montana on the 90 eastbound. the road was dry for the most part. but i did hit a spot where the truck wwent right while being in a left pointed direction. and the trailer coming around. becuase the jakes were on. and i was going half the speed of the trucks that flew by me.

 

I'm with you. Even if I'm running late, I still want to get to the receiver before my trailer does.

 

Best winter driving tip in addition to all the great ones so far is to bank snow days money in the busy freight times so you can sit in the truck stop with Moose and I while Snowy is getting towed out of the snow bank...

 

I so love winters.. must be since I'm from houston. Our most snowfall was like 3/4" in the past 10 years.
I'll quote as Mr. MNdriver said, Never drive out of your comfot zone!

I'd still chain up and get through the rough.. if it's more than 80 miles I'm calling it a day. Those 80 miles will be over 3 hours chained up and seeing accidents left and right, having 4 wheelers and other trucks trying to pass you or slowing you down, windy, windshield freezing, maybe even dark. not worth it.
if you don't know the area, take your time, you have to learn to do this sooner or later.
also, if I can do it, anybody can..

 

HAR HAR HAR. RRRRRRIGHT. i'm just not lazy to chain up. i'd get fired if my load was sitting at the bottom of a hill for days on end becuase it was snowing.

supertrucker. i don't think so. i know when to drive and when to park. snow don't bother me. and i also don't speed.

there's a time to chain and a time to park. and some of you prefer the parking method.

4 drivers go up to washington. one driver went and delivered. reloaded. went to albuquerque, reloaded. went to boise. and came home. the other 3 were still sitting and waiting for the chain law to lift. while one driver made money and is sitting in his nice warm house.

yep. that DID happen. cuz in the northwest. it's been known to SNOW SNOW SNOW for days.

i'm not a super trucker. i just don't like hanging around at the truck stops beyond taking a break.

 

Great thread ladies and gentlemen....very impressed ...hope to get my shot one day.

 

Mine To! I don't throw iron in slush and cold! No load is worth that.

This is all good advice!. Thanks.

 

great,....

Another thread that's going to vitiate into a napoleon pissin' match.

 

That it does. I don't have a temp gauge either. I still feel my mirrors if there's ice on the mirror there's bound to be ice in spots on the road. Watching for spray off the tires works during the day not so well at night and so at night feel the back of the mirror, your antenna, etc etc to check to see if it's icing up.

I will second jakes locking up wheels. On 3 it'll cause my truck to skid empty have not had that problem loaded yet...probably because I learned the first time it cause a skid to shut the stupid thing off in the winter.

I'm surprised nobody has talked about weight. It's nothing for a trailer to add a few 1000lbs of ice and snow during the winter when driving. That's something to watch out for. I bust ice when I stop yea I'm the idiot in the jacket and boots beating ice off his cross members, mud flaps, and DOT bumper during the winter. When it's snowing fairly hard I'll stop about every 100 miles or so and clean off my tail lights and all my other lights and bust a little more Ice and snow off my truck and trailer. theres a few reasons I do that.
1.Weight
2.Visibilty it's hard enough to see when it's snowing I want to make sure I give everybody a good chance to see me and that starts with your lights being clean.
3.Liability, if something falls off your trailer or truck including snow and ice and hits somebody's vehicle you're liable for it as the driver. It's just a way to protect yourself I realize it's kinda hard to get on top of a dryvan to clean the roof off but there's no excuse for Ice coming off the DOT bumper, mud flaps, or the crossmembers and hitting my truck or a car. Stop and bust it off.

And it's common sense for people that drive in it a lot bud don't use your cruise control in the winter. Also keep in the lower gears and keep the RPMs higher. Gives you more control. With the low rpm high torque motors we have now staying in that low RPM range will cause nothing but breaking loose when you get in the throttle, I try to keep it around the 1600-1800 range when shifting in the winter and I'll cruise 1 gear down if need be to keep the RPMs higher so I don't have as much chance to spin out.

MNdriver said you should never drive when you're not comfortable with conditions. I agree with that statement and disagree with it at the same time. Reason being is you should never be ''comfortable" when driving in the winter when you get comforatable is when you put the truck in the ditch. Just my opinion on the matter but that was good advise.