Driving an automatic on icy roads and taking off on hills?

No kidding? I used to work for Doug Long in the summers when I was in high school. His farm was right at the top of the Harpster grade. His kids are Leland, Kevin, Annita, and Tony. Did you happen to know any of them? I was there in 74, 75, and 76.

 

Drove around in single axles empty and bobtail with various automatic transmissions for a few years during the winter. Only thing that ever stood out to me is how well an Allison 6 speed can power drift through the snow bobtail. Some autos are terrible, some are good, and they all go down the road in snow and ice just fine.

 

Humans are supposed to be smarter than computers, at least in this day and age, maybe next year that will change, try to be smarter than your Auto

You do have Manual mode, as others explained, it should also light up on your dash when in manual mode

Wait, so prior to auto's coming online, no manual trans truck ever spun out, ever got stuck, ever had an accident, good lord, what did all the crash investigators, cops, tow truck operators, etc., do prior to 1998?

Turn off the PERF mode, it's pretty much worthless, put over 500K miles on a similar setup, never had a problem running the Rockies ranging from empty to 79,000 lbs

Exactly, you just have to be smarter than the truck

I call that "self preservation mode", my first Mack M-Drive had it, it's also part of the rollover prevention programming, my last three trucks had it, the Macks were the easiest to work around, my T680 is a little more complicated but I can usually override it as will. First time I activated "SP" mode on my Mack was trying to take a 15 mph curve at 25 mph while loaded to 78,000 lbs going downhill on US 40 over Berthoud Pass. I knew it was safe, I knew I wouldn't roll, but the computer was scared to death. I just learned to tap the brakes right before the curve, it would fool the ECM into thinking I was slowing, then at the APEX of the curve I mashed the throttle, I'd still usually be going 20 mph, but I'd come out of the curve under hard acceleration. I swear if that computer had could, it was screaming "MOMMY". The T680 takes a little more work, but it's also not as sensitive as the Mack was. A few times I've managed to activate it on accident and it surprised me, other times I could feel that it was going to activate and I'd let off the throttle and it wouldn't activate. My boss hates me sometimes, as his PACCAR solutions computer program recognizes hard braking and "aggressive" driving that triggers certain modes and reports it to him, I then get nasty note with my time card.

Two different auto's: one M-Drive Mack, one PACCAR Auto, combined almost 1 million miles, have run every condition, plains, mountains, snow, rain, ice, wind, pestilence, angry wife and I'm still here as well. I think we're just smarter than the computer.

If your company has the ability, they can make changes to your collision avoidance system to reduce of those automatic braking situations, but at the same time you have to kind of learn to anticipate them. I know that on I 70 from Denver to GJ, mine will trip in Eisenhower tunnel and Hanging Lake tunnel. I anticipate and keep my foot hovering over the throttle. When I'm getting ready to pass someone and my cruise is on, I anticipate that the collision system is going to try to auto brake and kick me out of cruise, I just mash the pedal and keep going.

The first part of this is a quirk of the PACCAR system, it's stupid, my 2021 does the same thing, PACCAR has no solution for it. Many of the auto braking items can be adjusted if your company has the software and the mechanics are willing to override the bean counters. As my coworkers and I complained about various things on our T680's, the boss started to play with things, he'd also talk to service manager and the salesman at the dealer and see if there were things he could change, that's how he found he could change the distance on the collision avoidance, that he could turn the beep off, etc.. The dealer isn't going to change those setting until the company owner tells them to, but at the same time, as we've seen, some of these mechanics are dumber than the engineer that designed the truck. How exactly do you replace the turbo and forget to reattach the oil return line?

 

I was there ‘83/84, but not familiar with that family. Wish there was a way to make decent living there and I’d be back before the end of the year.

 

I guess the two oldest would have been a few years behind you. I do enjoy the area, and how close it is to a wide variety of country.

 

You're sorta on the right track.

An object that's at different temperature than the surrounding air will have a bubble of air around it that's between the temp of the object and the surrounding air. And because heat loss/gain is related to the difference between the temp of the surrounding air and the temp of the object, the surrounding air slows the heat transfer. What wind does is strip away the surrounding air, increasing the temperature gradiant, and thus the heat transfer rate.

BTW, it works both ways. A cold object in warmer air warms up faster if the wind is blowing, too.

 

Can you explain how just using 4 drive tires with the engine brake gives you better control and traction vs using all the brakes and all the tires. If you can explain that I will believe you. All you say is because your driving back roads or off road and at 105k.

You don’t need to put the automatic transmission in manual because it won’t try to shift unless you turn on the engine brake.

If you can explain how only using 4 drive tires give better traction and control vs all the brakes and all the tires. I will believe you. If you can also explain how having the trailer push you downhill is a good idea I would appreciate that also. I like to lean new thing.

 

I’m talking about 40/20 doubles. If the pass was bad the old timers would close the valve at the gladhand back to the pup so they didn’t have to worry about it. Most of the time the pup was loaded heavy to the rear to avoid being overweight on the axle 4 - 6 group.

 

Many of us have tried to explain it to you. Sometimes it is beneficial to carry more speed than riding your brakes at 10psi down an 6-8% grade with banked curves will allow. In the example you keep trying to bring up about the trailer pushing you because you’re not on the trailer brakes, if you carry some speed into a switchback you’re more likely to keep everything lined out going around the corner because you’re using the slope of the road. Creeping into it, even though you’ve been riding your brakes, your truck is likely to slide down slope into the inside bank. Also when you pick up an axle and are 38-40k on your drives and 14-15k on your steer axle the trailer isn’t going to push you anywhere. But if you’re just running a highway truck you wouldn’t think about stuff like that.

Let’s say you’re headed south on 93 grossed out at 80k. As is common the road is bare when you go past the chain area on the Montana side. After you get around the 25mph corner going up you’re into light snow. By the time you get to the top the road is covered. Parking area isn’t plowed out and you don’t want to block a lane so you drop off the Idaho side barefoot. How fast are you going while riding your brakes all the way down? Do you really plan on riding your brakes at 10psi for 9 miles or so?

Frankly, it doesn’t sound like you’ve done much on the roads we’re talking about at the weights we’re talking about. Nobody in the PNW is going to hold their foot on the brake for miles and miles and hope they hold back 105k. There’s a lot of stuff I haven’t done in my life and I sure wouldn’t tell someone who’s experienced in it that I read a book and they’re doing it wrong.