Choosing a gear for down hill

Same boat here, never went to school first job was tossed in a gravel truck and I taught my self everything. Second job was running Midwest to West Coast. Learned hill control very early on in the game. Honestly I think the make it or break it is the only way to learn. I knew what I wanted to do studied everything I could and jumped head first in, good thing I can swim.

 

This is true. I'm based out of LA and come down Cajon Pass every week. If I'm empty or light I can come down in 2nd highest gear and middle jake, controlling speed with high or low jake settings, and hold the 45 mph truck speed limit quite nicely. If I'm up to max heavy I need to drop another gear or two and get it down to 25-30 mph with the flashers on, sometimes snub braking in addition to working the jake settings. Same pass, different load weights.

This is why I don't pay attention to how fast other truckers are descending, it all depends on how heavy they are hauling at the moment. On the other hand, when I see a flatbed blasting down at 65 mph with steel coils on board, then that raises a red flag (not to mention the flashing blue lights of a friendly CHP officer... as I witnessed a few weeks ago).