Power Divider/Inter Axle on Ice

Yet again another wrong person

 

You become a hazard driving really really slow in bad weather... Not to mention cause road rage if your driving really slow and no one can pass.

 

It truly baffles me that no one can agree on a true way to drive on slick roads. Luckily I am here in Michigan where I drive on my fair share of snow and ice.(admittedly only few times in the truck) It seems every one of these threads just becomes an argument and pi$$ing contest between super truckers and the opposites. I started reading a lot on this sight to learn and gain knowledge. One thing I have learned is that some can be old fools. It has become obvious to me that you guys don't know proper ways to do things. Everyone just does what works for them and obviously have lived to post about it. That is why I took an hourly job so when I do go slow I won't have to worry about one of you super truckers ridding my arse and killing me.
Sherrod

 

There are posts after posts about the dangers of driving too slowly. There are quite a few posts on how to drive in the winter time. But yet, everyone thinks, "If I go slow enough, I won't have any trouble."

Everyone in the US heard about the huge fiasco that happened last winter in Atlanta,GA. I had loaded in Chattanooga and was rolling to Texas. Got to Birmingham, and everyone was doing the southern winter driving thing. Put your hazards on and creep around at 5 mph. That's their idea of safe driving. But see, Birmingham and Atlanta has rolling hills, and banked roads. If you think that you can climb a hill, or cross a banked bridge at super slow speeds, you are deceiving yourself. You are not going to make it. Want to know what happens to drivers who try to creep up an incline? They get almost to the top, then slide backwards down the hill. There is nothing scarier in the whole industry than being in a semi that's sliding backwards downhill. You go from driver to frightened spectator instantly.

Dallas got hit this past week. Sleet and snow. It looked much worse than what it was. I'm running 60 mph up I35e and suddenly traffic stops at I20. I see a McGregor truck on the bridge to 20 west, creeping along. A driver comes on the radio and says, "hand, the roads aren't slick. If they were slick, you would slide off that bridge. Get a move on!"

I didn't say stay parked until you learn how to drive in bad, I said stay parked until you learn that's not the way to drive in bad weather. There is a difference.

 

It seems futile. But if one driver learns, and betters his skill, his trade, his money...it's worth it.

 

They do it all the time in the northern states too, run 25 MPH in light snow when there is no ryhme or reason for it, then call you reckless because you choose to pass at 50 MPH and not drive behind the bumper to bumper line of cars and trucks that is too chicken to pass the snow plow.

It takes experience to learn that there are different types of slippery too, as in heavy snow at 5 degrees is way different than heavy snow at 28 degrees, or freezing rain directly on dry pavement at 30 degrees.

From now on I'm just going to assume that no matter what part of the country I'm in, if it snows more than an inch there will just be a massive pileup that will shut the road down. That way I won't be disappointed.

 

http://youtu.be/W9fI5M6_XVk
Was it too fast or too slow?

 

Well, there was already a pile up twisted metal before the video started...When you are doing 50 or 60 and traffic 500ft in front of you is doing 0, my spidey sense tells me that this example would be too fast...

 

That's why the worse the road conditions are, the farther ahead of yourself you drive..... Looking just past the end o the hood can buy a lot of trouble....

 

A few years back, we were running 50m blades out of Grand Forks, ND. Had a front escort with a 4wd Dodge. Typical pilot car, walks up bragging about how many years he's been piloting, and the size of the loads...hear the stuff all the time. We were running US 2 east towards I29. Had a red light ahead of us. I lift off the throttle. My pilot car runs up to the light and applies the brakes. Sliiiiiiiiiiiide! Light turns green, and he guns it, spins the tires and starts fish tailing. He says, "Man, it's slick out here...to dangerous to be driving." 'I have a job to do. Do you need to come off this job?' "Ummm, no...it's just slick out here."
I really wanted to say, 'Guy, you're driving like an idiot. You can't hammer on the brakes, and hammer on the gas and then wonder why you're having traction problems and sliding...get a clue!' But I didn't. I just replaced him for the next run. What's the point, right? In his mind, he knows how to drive. It's the weathers fault. Why can't you adjust your driving?

If you're bobtailing down the bigroad, you zip through traffic, you left lane it up hills, do all the things you've always wanted to do in a truck. If you're bobtailing in bad weather, you adjust your driving or you wipe out.
If you're pulling a light load through the mountains, you don't pay much attention to those steep grade signs. But if you're 140000lbs, you adjust your driving to cover that load.
Most of the time in the winter weather, it's the bottom feeders, the wiggle wagons and the tanker yankers that wipe out. Bottom feeders because they're new. The wiggle wagons and the tanker yankers because that particular driver did not or was unable to make adjustments. You don't pull wiggle wagons and tankers the same way you do a box. It may not get you in dry weather, but in in bad weather IT WILL.