Driving the speed limit... does anyone?

As far as the tailgaiting....could you please remove your car from my DOT bumper? Most of the time it looks like my trailer is giving birth to your car!
There are times when we can't pass you guys too....sorry if I ever tailgaited you...I avoid your bumper like the plague! If I ever contact your bumper it messes my life up, you hit mine...it still messes my life up!
Its always the truck driver's fault...never fails!

 

Guess I'm one of the fast moving trucks....sorry my rig doesn't go 55 nor will it do 60. She cruises best at about 70 to 75 and actually I get some decent mileage out of her if I keep her in the range somewhere.

Don't worry I don't cross over into OH that's considered East coast and no longer run that area...paid my dues.

My only pet peeve is two trucks going about the same speed trying to pass each other. You know if you haven't pass that truck in a mile it's not happening get behind them. Texas kind of frowns on me taking the third land (the brakedown lane) but I've done it more than once.

 

Had the trucks racing just yesterday. Truck behind me right on my ###, another truck right next to him. The 4-wheeler just happened to be an escort with a CB and came on the radio asking if they were racing. I took it upon myself to slow my truck down (they'd been doing this almost 5 minutes, right next to eachother), forcing the red truck to slow down, letting the truck hanging in the left lane passed. Sure enough, pedal to the floor again and the red truck decides to pass me--but has no problem doing so. All he had to do was slow down for 10 seconds and he could've let the other truck between us, then passed us both, and I wouldn't have had to pass the truck that was originally hanging in the left lane 10 miles down the road. Common sense? Where?!

 

I will do 10 km/h over the limit and that is all. I see no need to go any faster plus with my truck having 4.33 gears, 60mph is 1500 rpm and 70mph is 1700rpm so I like to stay at 60mph.

I should add that loaded I will do the speed limit except for long straight stretches.

 

I'm an hourly-paid local driver for a grocery supermarket chain. When you're paid by the hour, the object is to go beyond your 8 hour shift, where you earn more $$$ when time and a half overtime pay begins. I drive between 50 to 55 MPH, which most other drivers find annoying. I'm in California, where state labor laws mandate double-time pay over 12 hours. Overtime pay is where I make the most $$$, which gives me an incentive to drive slow, or ask the forklift operator to delay loading/unloading me, and instead concentrate on working with the OTR drivers who are paid by the mile.

You may find others who claim they tried local, and were making less $$ than OTR. The trick is overtime; if you can't squeeze at least 60 hours a week (20 hours overtime), then local trucking may not pay as well, unless you subsidize your earning with a 2nd job. The people who claim earning less $$ doing local were only getting 10 hours or less of overtime work per week.

 

The other drivers find it more than annoying when you're going 50-55 just because you're paid by the hour. They're still paid by the mile and want to drive as such. They have to slow down, wait for an opportunity to pass, then waste a bunch of fuel if the opportunity does arise. Not to mention, it's really great when we miss an appointment.

 

I always push it that legal 5 miles over!!




American only truck crazy girl, cause nothing else will do!!!

 

OK, I'll be the odd man out here. I always try to drive the speed limit. Of course sometimes schidt happens and I screw up.

But my reasons are as follows:


1) Who is going to get the ticket?

2) Who is going to get the points on their license?

3) Who is going to pay the ticket, or pay to fight it?

4) In the event of an accident, who is going to get their nuts nailed to a fence pole for any traffic violation they can tag on you.

5) Who is going to have to live the rest of their life knowing they killed someone.

Before trucking, I was in law enforcement, EMS and fire services. I've seen too much to even think of being the cause of an accident.

If my driving legally, causes somebody else to become impatient and drive unsafely, then that is on their shoulders.

Ok, guys and gals, bring it on. . .

 

Lets use critical thinking, and analyze if maybe there are hidden ulterior motives as to why dispatch purposely over-scheduled you, forcing you to violate posted speed limits.

Local hourly-paid positions require a clean MV record, so when you get a speeding violation, you're stuck as an OTR for the next 3 years, until that violation comes off your record. If you've been with the company for 2 or more years, your employment terms clearly say they can terminate you if they feel you have too many moving violations. When you exceed your 5-year anniversary with an OTR company, you become a liability; you're making too much $$$. It's cheaper to get rid of you so they can hire a newbie to drive your truck. When you call dispatch to explain you were held up in traffic because of construction, accidents, or rush-hour gridlock, they put you through a guilt trip, claiming they may loose this account, and all your fellow drivers will be sitting idle at some remote truck stop, waiting for a load, because you F**ked-up and delivered late. What dispatch refuses to admit, is that the contract between carriers and clients stipulate we're not responsible for late loads due to circumstances beyond our control, such as inclement weather, traffic delays, equipment breakdowns, etc.... So dispatch is using guilt-trip psychology to condition you to violate posted speed limits. To further enforce this mind game, you arrive late at the receiver, and he puts you on the end of the line, where they don't unload you until everyone had arrived to meet their delivery schedule. Thus, the receiver is using psychology to condition you to violate posted speed limit as well.

In contrast, I make more $$ when I drive slow-as-molasses, and it tickles me pink when I arrive late, and the receiver says I have to wait longer before they can't load/unload me. Because this means more $$$ in overtime for me, I use reverse-psychology and tell the receiver "I feel real guilty for arriving late, and throwing off your schedule. To redeem myself, maybe you should let me wait until the next shift to load me." I drive a daycab, so I carry a board to lay across the driver & passenger seat, and form an improvised sleeper bunk. I carry a fiction novel and a Playstation portable to entertain myself. Some of you reading this may feel I'm cheating my company, getting paid overtime while reading a book or playing a video game, but this is the advantage of being a Teamster driver.

Most of you OTR drivers are strongly anti-union, but you fail to see your logic is only making the rich into filthy-rich. You're putting in 70+ hours a week, being gone from home & family, all for around or slightly over $1,000 a week after taxes & travel expenses. I net $1,300 to $1,500 per week, come home every night, and my Teamsters contract says I have the right to exploit my employer. Furthermore, my overtime pay is covered by all the people who do their weekly grocery shopping. I'd guess each shopper pays an extra 5 to 10 percent in higher grocery bills, to subsidize my insatiable appetite for working overtime.

Unlike some people who send 15 to 40 percent of their $$$ to loved ones in Mexico (or further south), I spend all my $$ back into the US economy. Thus, the $$$ I earn & spend helps to fuel this nation's economy, which justifies all the $$$ I earn from overtime pay. In contrast, the federal government passed NAFTA, using guilt-trip psychology to send a subtle message to American truckers; "These Mexicans can do the job for less, so why do you insist on more $$$ ?? If they can work cheap, why can't you ??"

So please refrain from admonishing me for driving too slow; because if you were in my shoes, you'd probably do the same thing !!

 

I don't understand how your milking the system for more money in your pocket, at the expense of others, is any different than the Big trucking companies pushing their drivers for the same reason.

You have a higher paying union gig, but that isn't enough? Instead you take your time and delight in arriving late to receive overtime pay.
Hmmmmmmmm
Some might consider that a tad dishonest.
Like maybe the customers who are paying 5% to 10% extra so you can enjoy a bigger paycheck.
Ya reckon.