Knight Vs. CRST CDL Training/driving For
Topic 20221 | Page 2
Ok, another question...Knight, reefer or dry van? I know reefer earns a little more and potentially longer runs but the potential to sit more too.
Any thoughts?
I think you should consider what your future plans for trucking are. You have mentioned local gigs that Knight offers. Are you wanting to end up doing a local job, or are you interested in Over The Road?
If you ultimately would like to be local, I would focus on doing dry-van work. Learn to be efficient at that drop and hook work. Most of what you might do locally is going to be working from the ports or dry-van type stuff.
If you think you would like to pursue Over The Road then I might try to concentrate on refrigerated. Don't let the problems of waiting discourage you from refrigerated work. What you have to do is learn to manage your time in a way that works for your loads. So many reefer drivers learn to get their mandatory breaks in while they are waiting at a shipper or receiver. You just have to learn to make things work out to your advantage. Of course there is nothing wrong with doing dry-van as an OTR driver either.
Good to know about the physical, anything special i should be concerned about?
If you are over weight or have a neck circumference of 17" or larger you will probably be asked to do a sleep study.
They will do a lot of things that require a little exertion, and then they will be taking pulse measurements after the exertions just to get a feel for how your heart is functioning. As an example, they may make you pick up some weights, maybe 35 pounds or so and have you carry them down a hallway and back a few times. Then they will measure your pulse rate. They may ask you to rest a few minutes and then measure it again, just to see how quickly it goes back down. Basically they are trying to determine what kind of shape you are in.
They will probably have you do several different things that will simulate possible things you will be doing on the job. Things like squatting down into a duck walk to check that your fifth wheel jaws are properly engaged. Or they may have you pick up a weighted crate and see if you can set it up on a shelf above your head, simulating re-stacking a pallet of canned goods that toppled over in the back of your trailer.
It is nothing too difficult, just wanted you to be aware of it so that you didn't get blind-sided.
Shipper:
The customer who is shipping the freight. This is where the driver will pick up a load and then deliver it to the receiver or consignee.
OTR:
Over The Road
OTR driving normally means you'll be hauling freight to various customers throughout your company's hauling region. It often entails being gone from home for two to three weeks at a time.
Over The Road:
Over The Road
OTR driving normally means you'll be hauling freight to various customers throughout your company's hauling region. It often entails being gone from home for two to three weeks at a time.
Dry Van:
A trailer or truck that that requires no special attention, such as refrigeration, that hauls regular palletted, boxed, or floor-loaded freight. The most common type of trailer in trucking.Reefer:
A refrigerated trailer.
Drop And Hook:
Drop and hook means the driver will drop one trailer and hook to another one.
In order to speed up the pickup and delivery process a driver may be instructed to drop their empty trailer and hook to one that is already loaded, or drop their loaded trailer and hook to one that is already empty. That way the driver will not have to wait for a trailer to be loaded or unloaded.
Good to know, I'm 220 at about 6' but my necks gonna be close. The rest sounds pretty straight forward.
As far as Reefer vs dry van , I'm pretty flexible. I like to know what my options are if my family struggles with me being gone too long. Two teens at home keep life interesting and regional would be preferable over local, I hate LA driving enough as it is but it's good to know it's an option if necessary. OTR is my preference but running up and down the western 11 sounds pretty good too. Beautiful areas.
Silly as it sounds I do like that reefers trucks have fridges in them already and understand Reeder drivers can run dry van loads if necessary but not the other way around and around Holidays reefers keep moving more than dry. Sounds like I'm going with reefer
Regional:
Regional Route
Usually refers to a driver hauling freight within one particular region of the country. You might be in the "Southeast Regional Division" or "Midwest Regional". Regional route drivers often get home on the weekends which is one of the main appeals for this type of route.
OTR:
Over The Road
OTR driving normally means you'll be hauling freight to various customers throughout your company's hauling region. It often entails being gone from home for two to three weeks at a time.
Dry Van:
A trailer or truck that that requires no special attention, such as refrigeration, that hauls regular palletted, boxed, or floor-loaded freight. The most common type of trailer in trucking.Reefer:
A refrigerated trailer.
Nate wrote:
Good to know, I'm 220 at about 6' but my necks gonna be close. The rest sounds pretty straight forward.
As far as Reefer vs dry van , I'm pretty flexible. I like to know what my options are if my family struggles with me being gone too long. Two teens at home keep life interesting and regional would be preferable over local, I hate LA driving enough as it is but it's good to know it's an option if necessary. OTR is my preference but running up and down the western 11 sounds pretty good too. Beautiful areas.
Silly as it sounds I do like that reefers trucks have fridges in them already and understand Reeder drivers can run dry van loads if necessary but not the other way around and around Holidays reefers keep moving more than dry. Sounds like I'm going with reefer
Most of the time, you will be running freight that requires temperature control. Reefer trailers are more expensive to maintain and they are heavier (tare weight) than a garden variety dry van. The carriers want to maximize their return on total cost of ownership on these units, perishable loads command a higher freight rate, which they will attempt to get most of the time. Plus the weight of your lading is typically 5000-6000 pounds less in a reefer than a dry van. Case in point; I run both Walmart dry and reefer. Reefer loads are in the neighborhood of 37-39k, where as dry loads can and do exceed 45k.
Regional:
Regional Route
Usually refers to a driver hauling freight within one particular region of the country. You might be in the "Southeast Regional Division" or "Midwest Regional". Regional route drivers often get home on the weekends which is one of the main appeals for this type of route.
OTR:
Over The Road
OTR driving normally means you'll be hauling freight to various customers throughout your company's hauling region. It often entails being gone from home for two to three weeks at a time.
Dry Van:
A trailer or truck that that requires no special attention, such as refrigeration, that hauls regular palletted, boxed, or floor-loaded freight. The most common type of trailer in trucking.Reefer:
A refrigerated trailer.
Wasnt aware of that. Thanks for the info.
Regrettably had to push starting back another week but told the recruiter 31st and reefer. Looking forward to starting.
Reefer:
A refrigerated trailer.
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Good to know about the physical, anything special i should be concerned about?
Ok, another question...Knight, reefer or dry van? I know reefer earns a little more and potentially longer runs but the potential to sit more too.
Any thoughts?
Dry Van:
A trailer or truck that that requires no special attention, such as refrigeration, that hauls regular palletted, boxed, or floor-loaded freight. The most common type of trailer in trucking.Reefer:
A refrigerated trailer.