Automatics or standard transmission.?

YEP. Expect a restriction against Autos. You will be stuck with Auto only.

If you want jobs in the future bring a Manual. Learn it then test it. NO stupid auto restrictions that kill or limit your hireability in future.

Ive done autos. It's cute. But I'll die with a manual in my hand.

 

I would say if you can test in a manual, do it... The less you limited yourself and licence the better it is.. Auto's are the way of the future I think, they are not going away.. But manuals will always be around as well and I don't think you should cut yourself short..

My thinking about manuals is... If you have a break down and all your company has is manuals for a spare or all the rental company has is manuals what are you going do??

I am split.. I love the 18 but I do have days where I wish I was auto... The traffic is the biggest time I wish I had a auto... Sure if your long haul and don't see as much traffic as a local guy going thru the city all day long I can see where a manual is great.. When your in traffic all day long and can't get away from it I think a auto is where it's at.. Again I have never had the benefit of a auto in a transport.. I do however have the experience of an auto in our roll off truck, and man is it nice going into the City and just hit fuel and go...

 

And the auto saves the truck in a tractor jack knife saving you the driver the extra mental worry about the drives. We had one one winter on thin ice when our tractor slipped out. That auto kept the power going as I commanded my spouse who was driving to absolute become a statue and steer this little bit and no more and freeze give it a moment she will come back straight.

Presto straight. Two scared people with number two with us while numbers 3 through 9 fell into the median canyons closing the interstate that bad day. If it was a manual... my spouse would have been first into the ditch because I had not yet had the chance to train her on manual transmission emergency recovery tactics. So there is that.

The other problem with autos is simple they brick if you don't shut off once every 3 days for at least 30 minutes to allow the truck computer to purge the working memory and then dump the buffer. It fills up bricks and leaves you and your JIT load stranded, busted appointment heavy rotater wrecker shows up with angry company VP poking through your stuff and logs to confirm bricked auto and tow you back to the company shop.

Why don't we ever stop? Why don't dispatch back off us and give us a hour to freaking stop? We do 1500 miles every 30 hours or less or 8000 miles every week on the ground. That #### thing does not stop for ####. Now do you understand?

Autos are nice. But learn the Manual too.

 

If possible you should take your test on a manual but there are jobs for you. Youll likely be restricted to bigger companies who can afford the new automatics but you will be able to find work with an auto. I know a couple people in my company that have the auto restriction.