Co road tests for new drivers? How are we supposed to pass them?

CDL schools are teaching students only how to straight back from 3 counties away from the parking spot.

 

Interesting to go to trucking school, and not learn how to back up...

Seems rather pointless...

 

Can confirm, it seems most schools only teach the maneuvers you need to pass the CDL test. Even then, they have the students follow a specific procedure using visual markers so that they really don’t understand what they’re doing or how to back. They just know they follow that procedure that works with that truck and maneuver and they’ll get it in. That’s what my school did and the same for most other drivers I’ve talked to that went through a school that wasn’t run by a carrier.

 

Well, since the OP's question was thoroughly answered, time to take this thread off to another direction. When I took my Class A test, I just took the farm semi to the testing site. I had NO idea what testing was going to be. I'd had NO training of any kind, other than someone showed me how to shift a super 10, once. Just a farm kid tossed into a semi truck, studied the manual, studied the inspecition thing, made the appointment, off I went. Had to pull up twice, since I'd never backed into a dock, ever, but horsed her in there. Passed.

Today, my son has to go through an "official" school, pay a zillion dollars for no benefit at all, while others come out of that school and still can't back up?

This industry is getting to be SOOOOO messed up, it's truly bizarre. We have to have ELD's for safety (negative effect). We have to have a 14 hour rule (negative safety effect). We have to have more driving schools -- NEGATIVE net effect, if it keeps guys like my son from ever getting their license.

Is anybody ever going to say "this is dumb, let's quit doing dumb"?

 

Driver "training" school I did in '98 had us doing maneuvers on the training grounds, with road courses after a while. They had 10 wheel Day Cabs and Sleeper Tractors with 45" and 53" Trailers.
Of course trucks had 10 and 13 speeds.
Backing activities with Cones as well straight backs, 45's and 90's.
I thot it was FUN.

Driver Training: It's ALL small stuff.

DO NOT HIT A PERSON, vehicle, wall, restaurant, fuel island, full grown bear, city kitty, county mounty.

CHEERS!!​

 

I'm in school right now in Texas. Our instructors aren't shy at all about saying they're only teaching us how to pass the test.

We parallel parked all day today after a little morning driving. The instructions were simple, and getting the truck inside the box is simple, but the instructions I was given, "cut the wheel until you see the sticker in your mirror" left a lot to be desired. So instead of blindly doing that, I got out and looked at the orientation of my truck and trailer, looked for visual cues without that ###### sticker, and watched from different angles as everyone else performed it.

I don't want to just be able to parallel park and pass a test. I want to understand how and why the truck and trailer react the way they do, and I think I have that aspect down now. Sadly, most of my class don't seem to care. They got it in the box, pulled the horn, and got out celebrating.

I paid $6k for this class and I don't feel bad about asking questions.

 

Don’t hit anything.
I had 9 years experience class b and 13 speed. Upgraded to class a. Never drove a ten speed before. First job driving test. Had me drive through downtown Denver during rush hour. Never did that before either. Kept trying to skip 6th gear. That’s what you do with a 13 speed. The idiot Terminal Manager was watching the drive cam. He was supposed to have a CDL but didn’t. Didn’t know diddly about driving. Got in. He told me I didn’t know how to shift. From my skipping 6th. Which I did with difficulty in the middle of rush hour in a major metropolitan city. All I needed was the mechanic in the passenger seat to remind me that it’s a ten speed.
You will constantly run into problems like this in this job. People rationalizing to make it easy for themselves. Make it harder for you or impossible. Don’t believe any of them. You rely only on yourself and common horse sense.

 

MVT? I hope you like Internationals and 62 mph. Just about anywhere is better for a rookie in the SW, like Swift/Knight or WDT. The only ones I would put below them is England.

 

I worked for a company and I was the person that did the road tests. Let me tell you, it doesn’t matter. I failed about half of the drivers and about 98% were hired anyway.

Highlights:

1. Refused to turn every time I asked him to turn because it “looked too sharp”
2. Didn’t know how to connect glad hands. Seriously I waited 5 minutes
3. Had no idea what a tandem was or how to slide it

As for backing up into a spot the average test ride took over 10 pull ups and about 20% of the time I said never mind and just told them to leave the truck where it is. This is with a day cab and my company required 6 months of experience.