Question About Pre-trip Exam.

When you take the exam for the pre-trip, do they say, "Show me what you know". And then it's up to you where to start. Or will the examiner ask for you to show them each item ( example: show me the dip stick, now show me the alternator.)

I've heard everyone has to explain certain areas of the truck, and then the examiner will ask you 1 of 3 areas of the truck.

Much thanks for any advise. ( I'm in SLC, 1st day of orientation tomorrow at 7am)

Kenny

When you take the exam for the pre-trip, do they say, "Show me what you know". And then it's up to you where to start. Or will the examiner ask for you to show them each item ( example: show me the dip stick, now show me the alternator.)

I've heard everyone has to explain certain areas of the truck, and then the examiner will ask you 1 of 3 areas of the truck.

Much thanks for any advise. ( I'm in SLC, 1st day of orientation tomorrow at 7am)

Kenny

They will have you go section by section and tell you what section to do next. Good luck at orientation!

At our school, we start at the front of the vehicle, and then work our way to the back of the trailer. Then we start our in cab portion. The only thing the instructor tells us, once we start, is how many we got wrong, at the very end. We do the same thing for the state test. It differs from school to school.

My examiner really didn't say a word. She just followed me around to the different parts that was on the pre trip. She did give me a hint on what she wanted by saying, "point to the item and tell me why". She wanted the "no more than 90 degree angle when brakes are applied". She was also nice by not moving on to the next section, when she didn't move with me I knew right away that I missed something, thankfully I caught my mistake.

When I tested in Kentucky, The DOT officer had us do our incab first. If you miss anything on your incab.. specifically on testing your brakes, and the proper sequence for checking them, it's an automatic fail. After passing the incab we were told which form to do.. truck, trailer, or the whole shebang. Coupling is always included in every form.

We were not prompted for anything and they don't allow a pretrip sheet or list in Kentucky. You either know it or you don't.

The examiner just stood there and took notes/scored us as we did our pretrip.

Here is a link to an instructor that I think does a nice job of demonstrating a pre-trip. There are probably some small differences in what is required by the various states and the companies...this instructor is licensed in Michigan:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nlkiQmrTU-o

When you take the exam for the pre-trip, do they say, "Show me what you know". And then it's up to you where to start. Or will the examiner ask for you to show them each item ( example: show me the dip stick, now show me the alternator.)

I've heard everyone has to explain certain areas of the truck, and then the examiner will ask you 1 of 3 areas of the truck.

Much thanks for any advise. ( I'm in SLC, 1st day of orientation tomorrow at 7am)

Kenny

We were not prompted for anything and they don't allow a pretrip sheet or list in Kentucky. You either know it or you don't.

The examiner just stood there and took notes/scored us as we did our pretrip.

This is exactly how I was tested by our company's examiner, and we are a third party tester. He simply read me the rules, and got silent. He even seemed agitated when I asked should I start? It was MY pretrip after all.

After I finished he said "you did great, but you didn't point to or touch the pushrod on the slack adjuster."

Thinking back on that, I can't recommend strongly enough the importance of study, study and study pretrip.

Oh, and I forgot to mention one thing that might help, Kenny. If you can, find the person in orientation who seems to have the same motivation to succeed as you do and begin a conversation. I did, and although awkward at first, he stood in pouring rain late at night scoring me on pretrip while everyone else was tucked away sleeping comfortably, lol. Mason was his name, and I never properly thanked him for his time and consideration.

When I took my test in Illinois a few months ago you sat in the truck with the examiner and he would say " tell me about the brakes" or "tell me what to look for in the cab." For the brake tests you would just tell him step by step how to do them he may ask you to continue from one test to another or start at the top for each one. But if he asked you to actually do them it was a bad sign, usually it mean he thought you memorized them and didn't really know what you where doing and why,