CROSSROADS IN LIFE

You could make $2500 per month after some time. Perhaps 6 months or so to get the first couple raises.
And if you can run hard enough, which depends on both you and your company.

But take home pay isn't your biggest concern where money is concerned.
It is, how much will be left over for your family after your own living expenses are taken out.
That first year will be a killer as you get set up in your truck. You will need things to cook with, possibly a GPS (a trucking unit, not one for a car), and a host of other things.
Living out here isn't usually really cheap, even if you cook most of your meals in the truck.
And cooking in the truck takes time, more than at home with a proper stove. Which takes away from sleep time if you are running hard.

At my company if you want a week off you will have to give up your truck. You are much better off taking 3 days a month than trying to get a week every 2 months. Generally it is 1 home day for every 6 worked, but you really can't take longer than 3 days or so at a time. And if you try to get home more than once a month you will lose too much pay in the process. Every home time means at least 1 very low paycheck.

 

So....the consensus is that $2500/month take home isn't doable for a newb?! Wow. It isn't any wonder why driver quality continues to go downhill.

 

OTR he should easily take home $4,000 a month after six months. Others may be posting local or regional wages.

 

Local wages are higher in my area. That doesn't seem to be the norm, but it's factual.

 

Total malarkey. I've got 7 months experience and I'm bringing home twice that and then some.

OP, you sound a lot like me. A strong work ethic and something to bust your tail for, i.e. your kids, will go a long way to make you stand out from the crowd. Get a refresher and find a smaller company, and you can do it also. NC is a great state for trucking...plenty more seats than butts, and a good chance to advance yourself.

 

Hey BDer, I was actually thinking about your thread when I read this post. I had assumed you were doing well, given your work ethic and what you've written. Good for you, perhaps you should post the link of your thread for this guy to see. It's definitely good reading. @Steelersjunkie should also chime in, he's another "newer" guy that seems to be doing well.

 

www.thetruckersreport.com/truckingindustryforum/threads/broke-down-69-the-adventure-continues

Not sure if it'll help, but it might be good for a chuckle or two.

We now return to your regularly scheduled thread.

 

You could look into something like Sysco or MBL. They pay real good but your doing restaurant food delivery and you have to unload the trailer at the pleases like Wendy's or McDonald's. Lots of stops and hard work. You would get home every day. They usually start like 4am and work till 2pm or something. It's hard work not something I would not want to do but good pay. OTR is good but I think people over rate their pay.

I'm now work for a company that has a guarantee minimum weekly pay. I like that because they can blame me or slow freight if I don't get the miles.

 

'There's plenty of jobs where you can "take home" a thousand a week as a new driver.

 

With all that said I have a few questions/concerns. I added -- to preface your questions, my answer is the next line down.

--What companies am I limited to with not driving and it being so long since I got my CDL?

There is no limit to any company.... CDL is National. It confers the ability to drive a vehicle over 26,001 pounds to 80,000 pounds generally (You can have a thousand ton over size under that CDL provided there are suffiicent permits, and a mountain of other considerations including axles...)

--Will I be required to take a refresher course?

You might be sent back to school. There is nothing wrong with school. For a old one like me I would go to refresher. But you seem never to have used that CDL, so back to school you might go.

--What are the best of the Mega or Big companies?

There is no best. JB Hunt for me was really good because I had a dispatcher worth keeping (Which was #### few industry wide over my life time... and there are people on these forums who would make awesome dispatchers if they can stand holding my tail long enough... without getting clawed...) and they paid the moment that 5th wheel clanked shut on a new load. Taxes out, netpay direct deposit and how much of that in cash would you like sir? Perfect. I can run it like a business. Wife and House (Paid for) gets a certain amount, I run on what is left for that load. A percentage always go to savings which approach 10 to 15K each year to be really good. 9-11 proved the soundness of that stragety when our Payroll people got destroyed that day and it was 6 weeks before we saw another penny in pay.

--Which companies have best training?

Training is what you get out of it. A monkey can drive that truck. It's the problems that come up, usually the ###### if you do and ###### if you dont that kills many people. And some really stupid people do things that they should have learned not to do at all. Then we laugh at em on you tube or something when they go hit a neon yellow painted low bridge marked for two miles in every direction.

Training is not a good prep for what you will face in your first year. It is a very dangerous time for new drivers. If you have enough training and eventually enough experience, something comes up and you will literally have to write a empty page into your book of solutions as you go along just before someone is about to be killed under your wheels. You might have to do things to that truck that NO one ever trains you for.

--I would ideally like to stay out a month or two and come home a week. Is that possible or just a dream?
Can I reasonably make $2500 a month take home?

2500 take home implies a 3800 gross pay, in 12 months that is 45600 Gross. In terms of .50 a mile 3800 gross is around 7600 miles for the month around 1900 a week. A full workweek in mileage terms at 45 mph average (Which never really happens unless you were a husband wife team) is roughly 3200 miles. Because of industry tension, pressures and other friction you cannot expect a full week every week. Which is why I stated you need savings to ride out the 1000 mile famine weeks.

Staying home a whole week loses that week's pay. Literally 25% of your earning power. Poof. Gone. What we did was to run chain season to chain season straight through meaning 1 March through to 1 November then sit home time off. Or did something local part time. In some jobs where winter is a problem such as for blacktop in dump trucking, unemployment provided half pay with the idea you stay fit and warm ready to go in the early spring. In our case savings carried the winter. No worries on the problems with storms, holidays etc.

--I may be different than most who want to be out on their own ASAP but I actually think training is important and feel it would help me. Here are some of my concerns.

You need to have motivation to be out ASAP. But you will NOT be allowed out of the nursery sand box until you are ready to play with the big kids. Understand?

--- Mountain Driving or Steep Grades

I made mountain work my ambition in life, a total opposite of what my trucking instructors had discovered I was fearful of downgrades. They turned it around and flipped it until I was bored when not on a mountain. I need that mountain to be happy. Sir Issac Newton demands a balance of forces in your 18 wheeler. There are ways to get it done. When everything is in balance REGARDLESS of how slow, stupid, fast or whatever trash talking you might get from other idiots... you are doing very well.

Fear is a mechanism that tries to freeze you, Turn your brain to mush moments before you die. Or someone else dies. What you learn instead is to put it aside, acknowledge it and then make rational decisions with the options you have left to get out of trouble. The very best thing is NEVER to get into trouble. If that means coming off Eagle Mountain in TN/GA at 8 mph loaded at 80K all the way down, that is what you do.

--- Dispatch forcing you to drive when you don't feel comfortable. (Weather)

Sir, if you can walk on that ice, your truck can run on that ice. The secret is not to go too fast and always build in room to stop. That is not always possible. Finally you will gain a knowledge if you have enough winter experience to actually sit a while int he truckstop until the sun is up and the ice starts breaking up and dripping all around. It's time to go driver. Times a wasting. There are rare weather storms that will require you to bypass via another interstate less impacted by it. Planning and knowledge helps. You might have been with us on these forums to remember a trucker asking if he wanted I 5 at Portland from Yakima last month or take 97 US on the east side of Sierras all the way down. Despite my best arguments and simple hard facts about the 84 Gorge icing (Which actually happened...) US97 was the best option. We even talked about Seattle but that required real time information online as to the status of 90 near seattle.

Dispatchers sit in a nice desk 2000 miles away Weather does not stop a big truck. Just be wise where possible. In my situation it's hurricanes usually. I have no problems finding a hole so deep as to make the qualcomm stop working for a few days until the howling storm goes by. Dispatch will just have to wait. Because they were not able to get me loaded and three states away in time. I expect certain things from them about 2 days prior to a landfalling storm. And they are good enough to get me clear with a load and rolling making money.

One year I asked my dispatcher in Indiana (EcKmiller Rockport flatbedding covered wagon) to be real simple from October to May the following spring. I-10 only and nothing further north. So Pipe east from Houston to Jax and chain-cable west from Jax to texas mutually supportive of the oil rig industry. I stayed down there so many months I actually accumulated enough DOT breakage to fix that required me to go back to Indiana around late may to spend a week in the shop to fix all of that. Nothing but rainy weather that time period. I loved it all. My parents did not, but it's not about them.

- -Repairs/Tolls/Expenses coming out of pocket.

Make sure you use prepass transponder given to you by the company, GWB (George Washington Bridge) on 95 in NYC is about 106 dollars for a big truck to cross Northbound. That is coming out of your pocket if you do not keep the reciept or have pre-pass. You will learn fast enough to make sure you get paid back that money.

Lumpers is where you will lose money if you are not careful. It's 300 dollars on the line to unload a truck these days. Maybe you DO IT yourself for half that much in cash. 8 hours should be enough to get it all out of there.

Repairs are paid comcheck. Make SURE YOU talk with the shop about it first. The old days of fixing something like a 1500 dollar replacement of a bad AC then calling to get a comcheck from a now very angry shop boss are over. YOU will be billed for that silly foolishness.

Tires... you hurt or cut a tire, you buy it. Be prepared for that. Otherwise company buys you set of tires for your tractor once a year around first frost. That is what I made my companies do. A set of 10 new virgin rubber ready for winter battle around each October. They hated it but tow charges run hundreds to thousands of dollars per hour in recovery because you did not spend 4000 dollars up front for good tires.

That is all I have for now.