Backing practice

Why not ask a friend, or family friend, or even a family member who drives a semi, and ask if he could take you out to an empty lot, set up a few (miss-places council cones); and go for your life... could even turn it into a bbq if your not too shy about hitting cones..

 

I have found out that it is much harder to back when I have a trailer. So, backing without a trailer doesn't help all that much.


(Sorry, sorry, I'm in that kind of mood today.)

 

I remember back in the school days. There was one woman that couldn't back and didn't have any clue. Her husband was a driver and she was going to join him. She passed all her test but the obstacle course. She failed it twice and was on her last straw.

Since I had zero errors on the obstacle course, the instructor asked me to work with her. I did and she seemed like a lost cause. After class we went to Walmart and bought a toy 18 wheeler and a walkie talkie set.

I showed her back in the motel room the basics on a table with the toy truck of course . She was starting to get the picture after playing with it, the toy fool. The next morning we went back out on the course and she was showing improvements.

Then come test time and I used my ace in the hole. I had her put one walkie talkie in her purse and I hid in the woodline and talked her through it. She passed with flying colors and then we returned the walkie talkies. The instructor never had a clue. He even thanked me for working with her.

We stay in touch and she is still driving team with her husband. She can back with the best of them now after some experience.

 

Backing is something you never get good enough at.
It's an aquired skill that will leave you if you don't keep practicing. Just like playing a musical instrument.
So the more practice you can get in the beginning, the better.
It's a good question to ask a potential employer: Do you provide any skill time during orientation/training?
When you go out with your trainer, try and get a chance to practice whenever you can. Usually, you'll spend your downtime or waiting time at a truck stop. Ask him/her to allow you to practice. Usually they will and you have an somewhat empty lot to practice in during the day.
You'll aquire your best skills after the first 100 hours of practice.

 

Even once you have been out there for awhile, there will be days where your backing seems like you are still in school! You will have good days and bad days with backing even once you have experience.


Also remember each truck and trailer is different, and just having your trailer tandems in a different spot will change things on you.

 

There's an old saying in this business: "God gives you one good back per day. After that, it's all luck."

 

If its a real tight space, i slide the tandems forward. There will be some places where it's gonna seem impossible, and it might take 45 minutes to do it. In some cases i have asked the driver next to me if he could uncouple his tractor from his trailer, to make it easier. One time i gave a yard dog twenty dollars to put it in the hole for me, cause it was just to tight.:smt017

 

Just one of those things that require a lot of practice.Think of backing a trailer as pushing a wheelbarrow.