downshifting

Miss Moose, I think all our senses should be employed as drivers! Our nose can tell the difference between a wheel seal leaking, coolant, a hot rubber smell, engine oil and certainly diesel fuel! If we smell any of those, there's something amiss! Tried to teach all my drivers that back when I had drivers, but driving someone else's truck all day, some of them couldn't care less about that kind of minutia! Let the boss worry about all that, right???

 

And BTW, so sorry to hear about your health issues...they sound serious! And I have my long list of problems as well...I guess that's where the phrase ''keep on trucking'' comes to mind! Hope you are doing well today at least! God bless you Miss Moose!

 

If you're trying to "strong-arm shift...this is a problem.I figure...you're all tensed up and "panicky".OMG what happens if I can't grab a gear? THERE'S a long nose Pete,,Running up on me Yikes!. I thought like this,most new drivers have this fear. This is further aggravated in schools."Pull the Splitter",or what are you doing"? It shouldn't take over "2 Fingaz", to shift.No jamming gears.They're not synchronized like a Subaru.Still spinning not lined up to "mesh" or synchronize if you will.Only double clutch to top of brake pedal (not to the floor).If you can't grab a gear on downshift...Rev it again.Super trucker can flip you the bird and go around.You eventually get really good at upshift and downshifting.Don't even look at any guages.Can kind of "listen to engine" and know what it wants.JMO

 

I had a habit of winding down the drivers window every time I come off the interstate, especially if I have been on one a few hundred miles. I don't recall who taught me that but if something was going on noise wise and she's hurting somewhere back there it will become apparent soon enough with that window down to me.

To Moose, the air stream by the frame of the plane was something I could not really pick up on but at near stall with a say Archer Warrior she gets slushy on the column. But my hands are like really heavy, I needed to have like a 120 ton airplane for them to be any use to me. Every time I tried to hold a little 1500 pound plane that is more sensitive than say a child's ten speed, the altitude gauge gets to be chasing 200 feet of assigned either way. It's too much. Ive thought about tying bowling balls to the thing. Heh.... Does that drivel even make sense? At any rate I was a better with the maps and radio stack dme etc than I was with the ham hands anyhow.

 

First off I am a male. That photo is a young lady named Cynthia Garris whom played the bathroom lady in The Shining Miniseries. I had a chance to meet her about 12 years ago.

I also agree about the total senses. I would also add the sense of feel too. However I would hope the sense of taste would never happen. Yes though sight, sound, feel/touch and smell are very important. It is also correct that way too many drivers today have no respect for the people that own the equipment. This also is one of the reasons these same people have no respect for today's drivers either.

 

Something about a TWA PILOT? Na,I think I understood the Comparisons.

 

Epilepsy can be life threatening. Thankfully mine seems to be under control and most of my seizures are brief. However I do have scars over my body from my toes to my head from hitting things as I pass out. I am just thankful I have a Doc at the VA that has experience with epileptics.

 

Hold on to that doctor as much as you can.

It is our experience that any doctor with any kind of light and motivation in him or her ended being shipped or reassigned away from Little Rock VA. We lost three very very good doctors this way over the years. One of whom was probably the best we have ever seen at the time of Cancer battle. I suppose Cleveland had more need of him than Little Rock did. But what a way to go.

If that wasnt all, 5 pharmacists were fired and then prosecuted for diversion of enormous amounts of pain killers from the same VA not long ago. It's NOT a bad place, but some of the people were really bad in some ways there.

I for one cannot imagine a life of passing out and breaking stuff all over the body, I hope that you are doing well in spite of it.

 

Depending on the truck its not that big of a deal - with no coasting and very little lugging. Not something I like doing, but there are times when it makes sense.

Our trucks are spec'd so 10th gear at 1400 RPM is 63 MPH. 7th gear at 1500 RPM is 33 MPH. Stand on the brakes until rpms hit 750, start the shift, brake lag will keep dropping speed, so by the time you've double clutched it slids right in. Key is how quickly you slow down and punching the throttle hard enough to get the rpms to 1500. Slow down to slowly and its a crummy shift. Get the timming right and you can get stopped in a remarkably short distance without tripping the "safety" sensors.

 

I had such high hopes of the VA getting ''cleaned up'' when the scandal about it was revealed several years back. I guess not. Turns out it's a lot harder to drain the swamp than we thought. Our VETS should come first before just about anything else! Infuriating!!! ''Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for another''. That is the sum total of what our military has done for us and a good share of the world for a long, long time. Hope you rest well tonight warriors of the highway or of the battle fields.