Skills learned after truck driver training & being out w/ trainer

And be prepared to maintain a bed out of the accumulating snow backing and forth several times a night. I don't think today's ELD's will appreciate that issue. But it will save you having to shovel out 2 feet or more come morning.

 

If you are coming in to park for the night and it’s rainy, with forecast to go below freezing then spray your drums with a 50/50 mix of antifreeze and water. Then drive back and forth a bit so it lines the drums.

If they do get a little stuck then backing up to break loose is your best bet. Almost never bust loose going forward. Something about the leverage.

If the parking lot is snow packed. Go ahead and park, then about 30 mins later pull forward or backward about 2 feet. The heat and weight of your tires will make little cups and then freeze back overnight. Come Morning your stuck in your own little cupped out ice rink.

Keep a bag of ice melt and a bag of sand in the sleeper. Also fuel treatment for anti gel and alcohol to thaw your trailer airlines.

Sounds simple but never go below 1/4 tank of fuel.

Don’t get stressed about cars behind you if you make a little mistake. They can wait. Do what you gotta do to be safe and easy on your equipment.

Don’t get too caught up on downshifting coming up to a stop or a turn. The book says to downshift and always be in gear but IMO run the gear down and before it lugs the engine kick it into neutral and focus on your braking, the turn ahead, and traffic. Get slowed down and sync the rpm and slide it back into the proper gear before coming to a stop or making that turn.

If you don’t already learn to float the gears. Double clutching is a waste of time and energy. Use the clutch to stop and start only.

Those were taught to me by someone in trucking since the old’n days. He calls them old Indian tricks. lol

 

Boots can restrict blood flow if they do not fit perfectly. Pair that with constant sitting and you have a recipe for sores.. Blisters.. Swelling.. All kinds of disgusting stuff that can cause pain and limit mobility. It's ignorant to wear tight ### boots all day especially steel toe driving a dry van no touch fright. I see these morons wearing biker gear and steel toes pulling a van and *SMH* harder than old school dinosaurs shake their head at millenials trust you me. Old ### truckers wearing steel toed boots and biker are more annoying and head shaking worthy than dumb ### millenials to us gen xers believe you me.

 

That place has fantastic food

 

Also to add to all this, in New York City, use expressways not parkways

 

Indeed. The jerk chicken hits the spot

 

Having learned the value of a quality boot in my beloved Marine Corps, There's a huge difference between cheap and good when it comes to boots.
Whites Danner, chippewa, Georgia, and red wing, all make good quality boots, if you stay in the high quality lines.
Cheap boots trash your feet, wear badly, and aren't worth what you invested into them.
You'll fork out 400 bucks for a pair of whites, but you'll get 20 times the mileage out of them, and they're rebuildable.
Once they're broke in, they're similar to wearing your slippers all day long.

All the info posted so far is excellent, across the board... Especially those places where you'll get the Hershey squirts after dining there... Nobody got time for bad chow that goes through you like a fat kid on a water slide...

 

1) never team

2) never go to work at a place where i need to go with another driver ever again,(excluding a road test)

3) do the job

4) retire

 

speeding, stopping too much, slobbery, smelly, taking too long at a stop (like at a truck stop, etc), and MY LIFE in another's hands.

i HAD to do team at a job i had as a newbie....

lesson learned...never trust a co-driver.