Any Questions about Roehl??

Feeling ok? Probably just a stomach bug.

 

Thanks Doc. I think I'm just having a bad reaction to the BS injection I just got.

 

hey moriarti reefers don't suck...they are COOL!......the only time they suck is when they run out of fuel...then :they start sucking cause ya got to bleed all that air out of the system......which takes about 2 hours and getting coated in diesel....
The miles are not too bad...but they are not great...and you will see a lot of new england and wisconsin....I80 is your friend...the nicest thing about reefers....no canada...can't even transit through ontario on /your way back across the country..lol

 

As the designated Doc here I have to caution you that intravenous BS injections are now listed as a controlled substance. You wouldn't want traces of it showing up if you need to give a blood sample.lol

 

Well i finally had enough and spoke out and started asking all sorts of question. Like why r we running like this, i said i feel lime ur cheating me out of some good training informaton. Also told him ur doing this to inflate ur paycheck. How else do you run 3200 mi les in seven days while training someone. I did my trip planing and log books the time i waz sitting shotgun. While he drove, sucked just got my third shower in13 days i understa.d that u r not vonna shower everyday but once a week come on. Tuesday i got breakfast and that was the last time i ate till the next morning, trainer said thats gonna happen BS you just wanted to drive drive. Ob well now were sitting thank goodness get me off of here. Not what i was expecting at all. Anyways sorry to complain lake of food sleep makes me grumpy

 

From what I've heard on other threads you don't have to put up with that kind of dreck Talk to dispatch and request another trainer. What you learn now is going to help you the rest of your career so make the trainer teach you or get one who will.

 

leather and lace,

I ran national but wanted more home time or at least home weekly, Now I run van with MidWest Regional out of the St Paul yard and am dispatched out of of Gary IN. Home weekends, usually Fri night or Sat am/afternoon. I go back out Sunday nights or early Mon AM. Average 2200 - 2500 mi a week. Have got as little as 1100 due to truck issues, but made close to 3000 once in 6 days and shutdown in St Paul with 5 hours left on my 70!. Weekends for me usually consist of doing a 34 hour reset, but officially they list the home time as 24-48 hours. Occasionally I have got over 48 hours off just due to load scheduling. It pays .02 / mi less than van national, but they matched my national pay so I was happy. But if more frequent and consistent home time is needed, this is an option. 80% is regional, occasional Canada and east coast. Even with being regional, I can request to stay out longer to get some miles or take an extra day off for family stuff ( I have done this). My FM's have been excellent in working with me on home time and getting miles.

 

Thanks, CoupeRider! I think we've almost decided to start out with a national van fleet ... the 11/3 if they'll switch him at this point. Figure better to start with too much time away and then whittle it down --- know that we have some way to make changes if need be. So he's going to call his recruiter on Tuesday and get switched from flatbeds to vans and from the 7/4-7/3 Hometime fleet to the 11/3 National fleet. And the only way we'll move is if a house we're considering in Wausau works out --- it's about $600 less per month in rent than what we're paying now and is an hour from Marshfield.

Thanks to EVERYONE for their input!! Looking forward to talking to you guys more and maybe even seeing you out on the road if I get to take advantage of the ride-along program at some point!

 

Dude. Honestly. Suck it up. The on the road training time is a third of what it used be. It used to be 20-30 days with a trainer where it was pretty much a team operation. I drove all day and then my trainer drove most of the night. He used to stop for about 2-3 hours before we delivered in the morning. Then they stuck you with another student and ran you as a team for 20-30 days. 3200 miles in seven days was a pretty slow week when I trained. We usually ran about 600 miles a day. The student drives 150, I drive 150, the student drives 150, and I drive 150. If a guy can't handle 6 hours of work with a three hour break he shouldn't be in the truck. At the end of training if he had the hours he drove 400 miles and I drove 200. The student better be doing something in the jump seat besides twiddling his thumbs. He should be looking at the map, or QC, or workbook if they still have that, or asking questions. Like it or not most truckers only stop once a day to eat. 99% of truck stops have some kind of fast food. Usually I had to fuel once a day and sometimes it means the 2 for 1 hot dog special at the crappy Pilot. Sometimes you have to get unloaded in the morning and rush to the shipper before they close or you will lose a whole day. You do have a beef about the showers though. You should be getting one at least every other day. If someone would have asked me if I was running hard to inflate my paycheck I would have said, "Hell, Yes!" No one is going to be a trainer for free. The little bit of extra money that Roehl pays their trainers is a joke. Being able to run a couple of hundred extra miles and some log book flexibility makes it somewhat doable.

 

That sounds like how I ran when I was a trainer at CRE. I had a dedicated account from Salinas, CA to Chicago, IL. We ran produce one way and Conway freight then other. I was expected to run the truck as a team. I ran hard, but because I had a predictable schedule I was able to set my students up driving while I slept. Usually in the morning and early afternoon. My students would drive for 8 - 10 hours, then I would drive for 6 - 8 hours. That's how our days worked. I had my students on the truck for between 21 and 28 days. I usually got two trips on a pay check, for about 5300 miles a week. I didn't get any extra pay for training, but I got paid .33 cpm for all the miles and the student got $60 per day. This was back in 2007. I did be sure we got showers at least once every 3rd day. I couldn't imagine being in a team situation and have them any less often. We also ran paper logs, so as long as I felt we were safe and neither of us was driving tired, we could do some pretty serious driving.

My advice. Be cool with your trainer and just get the rest you need. If you are tired, take your 10 in the sleeper. Just explain that you are just getting used to the driving thing and want to be safe.

You will be able to run your truck how you want soon enough. Just tough it out and above all, be safe.