Is it loud in a sleeper?

Sleeping in a bunk while someone else is driving takes a good amount of trust and time to get used to. I used to go with my grandfather and father all the time in the summer as a kid, but it took a couple days to really be able to get some decent sleep. I never thought it was very loud in the sleeper. No different than if you have a quiet AC unit in your bedroom window. If you park beside some reefers and have your vents open, you may get some noise that wakes you up. Those are my experiences anyway...I'm a light sleeper too.

 

I'm a light sleeper and had to wear ear plugs to sleep. I would still get woken up every now an then by some super trucker jaking throught the truck stop at 3am. I always tried to stay away from the reefers just because they are extremely noisy when they fire up. I also team drove, an let me tell ya there are days when you only get a couple hours of sleep. One instance was I think I-15 heading to vegas from cali, there was huge bumps every 1.5 miles. My team partner jumped out says what the hecks going on. I "had" to stop in vegas lol, and he slept for about 5 hours parked while I gambled. Then you have to try an sleep during the day, while getting unloaded (nearly impossible), hookin to new trailers, driver decides to crank up the cb. When teaming you have to think about every little thing you do while trying to be quiet. I hated teamin just cause I like to jam the radio sometimes. If we had smooth smooth roads across the whole us then teaming would be really easy.

 

I can imagine how hard team driving would be. My grandfather (who I rode the most with) would drive from Fort Wayne, IN to Dayton, OH and I would always try to sleep for a couple of hours because I thought it was cool to sleep in the truck. I could barely take a nap so I couldn't fathom trying to get 6 or more hours of sleep.

Super truckers jaking through the lot...gotta love the common courtesy afforded to the average joe trying to catch a few z's so he doesn't fall asleep driving and kill that "super trucker" and others. I bet they'd be the first to start a fight if someone woke them up by doing it, though.

 

Yeh you really need that jake to slow you down when you're going what 10 mph. Just gotta wonder where peoples common sense is. The worst part about teaming is when the drivers gotta get on the brakes hard, I whacked my head on the desk a couple times. Even though I was strapped in you still bounce around. I think companies that have teams should have dedicated team trucks. Ones with memory foam mattress, quieter sleepers(to muffle the jakes in the mountains), and also have a fridge and cooker some how installed.

 

I hear ya with the jakes in the parking lot when your trying to sleep, after a long 11hrs on the road. I had this one guy come threw a TA in bloomsburg PA with no mufflers on the truck and he is jakeing all the way threw the parking lot, what an idoit!

 

I think I'm one of those poor slobs with the black cloud always over his head, where getting sleep is concerned. I can pick a spot between a couple of flatbeed or dry vans. Shortly after I've fallen asleep, they pull out, and two refers back in, one on either side. I can't win.

And they are never running in sync. The reverbs drive me nuts.

 

I always had trouble sleeping with the truck moving, I probably would suck as a full time team driver, lol.

But I had no problem sleeping around reefers. Since I pulled one, I got used to it. The cycling never bothered me, however I was awakened one night at a truckstop somewhere in Louisiana when I was pulling an ice cream load (-20F/reefer running full blast non-stop) and noticed that the reefer unit kept switching into defrost after only a few minutes. Went to a TK dealer and it ended up being an ice blockage in the condensate drain. I was glad that I slept light enough to notice that there was a problem.

Whats wierd is that engines, jakes and reefers didn't wake me up but lot lizards knocking on the truck next door did.

 

The cure for the lot lizard knocking on the door. Yell out "To whoever is knocking; this truck better be on fire or I'm calling DOT to report you for harassing a driver on mandatory crew rest".

It's BS, for sure. But THEY don't know it.

 

I heard a funny story from a female driver. She was parked at the West Memphis Pilot (first mistake). Some lot lizard came knocking on the door. The driver opened the window and told the skank "I've already taken care of this driver." The lot lizard started yelling and cussing and walked off.