Schneider orientation from day 1 at Charlotte, NC

Here is the update so far, I won't go into much detail about what we are doing with the trainer because everyone's experience will be different... here is what I will say though:

Getting assigned 2 people to 1 trainer in the winter months is ridiculous - by the time you take into account 3 people crammed into a truck all day long with sleeping bags, coats, anything "extra" needed for winter... there is not enough room to think, let alone move around in this truck. The trainer is staying in the motel room so me and the other student are sleeping in the truck. Last night we stayed in Charlotte and the battery protection cut on real early so the heat didn't last long. We tried to start the truck to idle it and charge the batteries for a bit but it wasn't cold enough to keep it idling. So we got ourselves about another 15 minutes of running the bunk heater then it cut out again. Luckily I have a sleeping bag so I stayed pretty warm as long as I stayed inside the bag. My fellow student was sure to pile on some extra blankets the trainer brought tonight, without a sleeping bag I imagine its pretty darn cold.

We're headed up north with a load and made it most of the way there today. Ice covered parking lot that the motel clerk told us "sure there is truck parking out back". LOL YEAH RIGHT. Needless to say it took a good 15 minutes to get all turned around with the TE driving and us guiding him within inches of parked cars, it was either that or drive through the swimming pool.

Hopefully the batteries will hang in there for a bit longer tonight, or it'll drop low enough that we can idle. Who knows though.

I like my trainer and as I said earlier I get along great with the other student. I realize that they put us 2 to 1 trainer because we were probably some of the quickest to learn, HOWEVER I still don't like the fact that I'm only getting 1/2 of the driving time, 1/2 of the practice docking, 1/2 of the practice in the mountains, etc. But, I've just go to look on the bright side, if all goes as planned in a few more days I'll have a truck of my own with plenty of space to move around in.

Well, my arms are starting to get cold so that's my sign its time to burrow into the sleeping bag and get some sleep. Hopefully we can get this thing moving in the parking lot tomorrow.

 

So, update on the week with with the TE:

Its been a frustrating week so far. Unfortunately when I get back to Charlotte I'm probably going to request another week out with a different TE solo.

Don't get me wrong, as I said earlier I like my TE and the other student that I'm on the road with. The problem is that there is just no way that in a one week period two people can have enough experiences to be ready to go out on the road by themselves. There is also an issue with the Qualcomm not being able to have 3 people logged on at the same time, so it ends up with lots of editing and changing and this and that, which adds to the confusion of trying to actually learn the Qualcomm in the first place.

My trainer has plenty of his "own" tips and tricks to share with everything from backing, driving, the Qualcomm, etc., but unfortunately at the moment I'm more comfortable learning it the "Schneider" way first go-round.

I'm proud of my shifting. I can do that fine. Anyone can sit and hold the steering wheel for hours on end on the highway, no problem. But at the rate we're going now, by the time we get back to Charlotte at the end of this week I will have had a chance to dock up once, twice... maybe 3 times. That's just not enough for me to feel comfortable with. Today I managed to get the TE to let me try docking for the first time, the other student was going to do it, but he had already done one earlier in the day and I hadn't tried at all yet. I felt like an idiot. I can back up in the practice yard all day, 45, 90, straight line, no problem. But this was just a simple set-up for a straight line back-up into a somewhat tight dock, there were other trucks waiting so my trainer was working on guiding me in because I didn't get my initial setup right, and during that, it hit me - am I REALLY going to be ready to do this on my own with the amount of practice I'm getting? 3 days in and this is the first time I'm attempting to dock, no lines to guide me... I've still got a LOT to learn. It was very humbling to say the least. It makes you realize that every situation is going to be different and you need to be ready for that. My trainer said that we'd practice this more in the yard this weekend, but like I said to him, the yard is one thing, actually backing up to a tight dock without all the extra room and 2 perfectly placed trailers to guide you in is another.

Sorry for the rant, just a little frustrated that I didn't say something at the beginning when I was first told we would be paired 2 students to 1 trainer. I KNEW I should have requested to wait until a trainer showed up that I could go out alone with, but I didn't. I just want to feel comfortable so that when I'm out on my own although I may look like a rookie driver and be a little slow, I don't look like an IDIOT.

Well, its only Wednesday so there is still some time left, but unless things change real quick and I get some more practice with docking, then I'll probably be looking at spending another week out with a trainer, hopefully Schneider will be willing to arrange that.

 

Sorry its been a while since I posted, but since I got back from the week with the training engineer I haven't found any time to update this.

When we got back to the Charlotte OC with the training engineer I talked to one of the instructors there about the issues that me and the other student had with the lack of practice docking, etc. This 3rd week was mostly classroom and paperwork (so much its almost to the point of being overwhelming) but they found some time to let us drive a bit before the skills qualification test which we did on Thursday. One of the instructors there took us out to an abandoned dock and just let us loose. This was really helpful because I learn best by just trying myself, so I was able to just get a lot of the practice that I didn't get a chance to do while we were on the road with the training engineer. I felt a lot more confident after this.

This week we also did a lot of classroom stuff such as trip planning and learning the Qualcomm. As I said above, its a TON of information to take in and to be honest I was pretty overwhelmed. One of the instructors offered to stay after one day and help anyone that needed with a worksheet that we would be tested on the following day when it came to calculating NAT, ETAs, etc. I took advantage of this and it helped a lot as well.

The SQT tests were on Thursday. We started out in the classroom and were given a worksheet just like the ones we practiced on previously that had to be filled out. I did OK on this part, but when it came time to putting information into the Qualcomm I did make a couple mistakes, and with the Qualcomm on some entries you can't go back and fix stuff even if you just entered it... so I lost a couple points there. After that I went out with another instructor for the driving portion. You are supposed to use the Qualcomm and receive a load assignment, etc., and go through everything just like a real load, but unfortunately it wasn't working... so the confusion starts there. Batteries were dead on the tractor so then I had to wait around for a jump.

Finally they got the tractor going and I drove down to couple to a trailer in the yard that was my simulated load. You can use your checklists/books/etc during all of this, so for this part there is really no reason to lose points... just follow the lists, take your time. Coupling went fine, next up we started with the pre-trip, which basically consisted of me showing and naming components on one side of the engine, at which point I guess the instructor could tell I had no trouble with this and cut that part short. We got in the truck and drove out of the OC, normally the student is expected to follow the Qualcomm directions, but since that wasn't working, the instructor just told me where to go.

After that we went back to the yard, and went through the uncoupling procedure. At this point I would have normally finished up my work assignment on the Qualcomm, but instead since it was broken I had to do it inside. Well, when you are inside the building, you can't exactly look in your mirror and see the number on your trailer. So, I didn't have all the information I needed and I lost a couple more points there.

So yeah, I could complain and say that the Qualcomm didn't work, I didn't get to do my full pre-trip, I didn't get to finish my work assignment in the truck where I had all the numbers needed right in my mirrors and plastered on the side of my truck... but... who cares, I PASSED with plenty of room.

On Friday I got assigned my first truck, on the outside its beat to hell and back but the inside was cleaner than I expected, didn't have much cigarette smell and started right up. 750,000+ miles, Series 60 Detroit, 10spd. It was just PM'd on the 13th too. I found a few more issues with it (broken hose/cord hangar on the back and a side signal lamp filled up with water when I went through the washbay and cut out), so I got those fixed. When we were back in class one of the instructors asked about the truck assignments... the amount of crybabies in that room was unbelievable "I WANTED AN AUTOSHIFT, MY TRUCK STINKS, MINE HAS CRACKS ON THE HOOD" etc... when he asked me I laughed and told him it was the most beautiful truck I had ever seen and that I wasn't interested in trading with anyone else.

After checking out my truck there was more classroom stuff, meeting people, getting the handshakes and congratulations, etc. The person that would normally be assigning our first loads was out, and they didn't want us to end up with loads to NY/Chicago as our first run, so I won't be starting until Monday. We weren't allowed to bobtail home for the weekend, luckily I had driven my pickup down there, but several others that lived further away and didn't have a vehicle probably had a bit harder time getting home.

So, I'm back home for the weekend and it sure was nice to sleep in my own bed and just slow down from the absoulte gong show that was last week.

I wanted to order a Dometic compressor-cooler and Garmin Dezl GPS as "congradulations-to-myself-presents", but I guess its a little too late now for stuff to get shipped, I'll be headed down to Charlotte Monday morning to hopefully meet my DBL and get my first load. I'll probably take some cleaning supplies down and really clean up the inside of my truck before I head out too.

So... until Monday...