Abylex Truck Driving School in Sacramento, CA

I did not go to that school, but went to Easy Trucking in Sacramento instead, which I do recommend. They are all set up pretty much the same though. Abylex signs up as many students as possible and you will be fighting for drive and skills time between 30 students a day over two trucks. They run Freightliners with 24 foot flatbeds with 6 speed synchronized transmissions just like a normal car to make it as easy as possible to pass the test. You will only learn the minimum enough to pass the test to get your CDL, they know what the West Sac DMV examiners are looking for. You will learn at your own pace, there is really no set schedule or curriculum to follow, and most of your learning will be with your fellow students in class. If you learn at a faster pace than the others, you can always test out early. If you feel you aren't ready yet, they will let you take your time as it's "unlimited" training. They do charge a retest fee for taking the truck back out to the DMV. Your typical day will be practicing pre-trip with the other students, hop in the truck for 15-30 minutes, and practice pre-trip or stand around and wait until it's your turn again or leave when it's too busy. You get what you put in at these schools in Sacramento since they are so cheap (I only paid $1,600 at Easy Trucking for unlimited training time), they won't hold your hand through the whole process. Be serious about it, put in your effort and you will pass. It's a much cheaper and better alternative than taking out a loan for an expensive school or signing your life away to a mega company for a year or two.

 

No, I did not have any trouble getting hired. About 5-10 students passed a week, I was there for four weeks and passed my first try, but there were guys that passed with only 3 days of school at Easy Trucking. They have a pre-trip system they teach you that is super easy to pass with. I graduated back in April. I had all my endorsements, hazmat and TWIC. I got hired with Button Transportation out of Dixon driving double tankers hauling aqua ammonia (nasty stuff) to farm fields out in the middle of nowhere with a paper map, straight out of school as a seasonal driver. You were home daily, but the schedule was grueling, you came home tired and dirty and had no time for anything else. You were expected to work your 14 hours everyday, 16 hour exception weekly, for 6 days a week. You were only off for your 34 hour reset and they expected you to be in the yard right as your 10 hour reset hit. Including time for commute, shower, dinner, breakfast, laundry, etc. you were running on 5 hours of sleep if you're lucky and just caught up on sleep on your one day off. I'd wake up at 2AM and wouldn't fall asleep in my own bed til 9PM. I decided OTR was better for me..Going with Schneider as I only have to share a truck for 7-10 days out of the 18 days of orientation and then I'm out on my own. I wouldn't have to commute an hour each way and I'd get more sleep and be more relaxed than local believe it or not. I'm by myself and didn't need to put myself through this misery to be able to be home everyday. Hope that helps, local is not always a gravy job. You don't typically get the good local jobs without experience is what I found out.

 

If you want to stay local, a lot of the seasonal ag jobs out of Dixon will hire anybody straight out of school with no experience as harvest season is also coming up. There is Morning Star, Valley Farm Transport, Button, Mike Lowrie, etc...you will be expected to max out your hours every day and work 6 even 7 days a week. It's okay money ($1000 week or more avg.) for a rookie straight out of school if you can hang in there with the grueling schedule they run you on. My long term goal was to go LTL with Old Dominion, Estes, Saia, etc, but they all either wanted 1 or more years experience, were too picky with which school they wanted to hire from, and had tons of applications with drivers with experience already over a rookie like me and didn't have any luck through them FYI.

Abylex and Easy Trucking are both set up the same, I know this as students would jump from schools all the time and talk about it to us. Ali, the owner at Easy can tell as you walk into his office if you are serious about getting your CDL and put in the work to get it and he will motivate you and push you and cares about your success. From what I've seen from students at both schools, if you aren't serious, barely show up twice a week, and just play around and hope it gets handed to you and want them to hold your hand through the whole process, you will most likely fail. The pre-trip they teach you to pass at the West Sac DMV I know for a fact is much more structured and easier to remember than Abylex, guys have passed on their first try in as little as 3 days with hard work and practice. I recommend going down to the West Sac DMV and just watch the students testing from both schools and see for yourself and how it goes and talk to them as well. Good luck!