Comments By TailGunner (Ken M)

Check out Tandem Transport Corp, www.tand.com They hire new drivers, and are a really good company.

When I started school, it was February. Eaton Roadranger Training Institute. Then by the time I finished, and started with an all flatbed company, the roads were good for a new driver. And I had all summer to get the load securement, tarping and un-tarping etc down. But don't give up on Modular just because of the weather, you'll get it down. And like Starcar said, there's nothing better than a nice low, heavy load. I've driven through winds and rain when all the vans were parked trying not to blow over, but 40,000 lbs of rebar from Kankakee let me drive instead of park and wait. Believe me, the securing, tarping, cold, rain, etc is worth not waiting at a grocery warehouse for hours on end.

If your company truck doesn't have weather radio, get a CB that does. It might be good to get it anyway in case you ever have a truck without weather radio, or if it doesn't work. It isn't that much more than the radios without.

There are actually 4.33 weeks in a month. Just divide by 52 to find the weekly.

Yeah, you wanna do it.

I have heard of people who had their own trailers who never unhooked, and in every case they were flatbedders, who never greased theirs and had to end up replacing the 5th wheel. Ours were greased every time we had service on the truck, so we did not worry about it.

One of our instructors in school told a funny story about how he never greased his for a while and on a turn, his tractor did went straight because the trailer hung up on the 5th wheel, and he took out a mailbox. The mailbox was one of those ones that the owner had fixed up to look special and was like a mini windmill. He talked to the owner and offered to pay right away of course, and the owner wanted 1000 bucks. He said every other mailbox on the road was just the old cheap type you can get from Walmart for less than 50. The important thing he was stressing though, is it can cause problems like that if it is never lubed.

Driving flatbed you get to unhook/hook quite often. A few shippers/receivers require you to unhook for safety reasons, and then there is dropping the trailer to drive the tractor home, and everytime the truck is in the shop, which is quite often for scheduled service, the mechanics unhook it also.

Nasim, you should have a fan switch on your control panel that will let you turn the cooling fan on for pulling up hills to keep the engine from overheating. It stays on until you turn the switch back off. I guess I am just going by my company trucks I've had. Others may not spec that option, but look for it or ask another driver from your company.

We have Teflon trailer aprons that do not require lube. And we keep the same trailer all the time.

Rand McNally has the 720 on their website factory refurb for 289.99 with lifetime updates included. Read at the bottom of the page, their factory refurbished units were never defective or damaged, just demo's or returned for no apparent reason.

Oh yeah, the MCDD, that's a fun course, sliding around in a big truck! That's Michigan Center for Decision Driving. I went there twice, both a while ago. The school I went to sent us there, and then Tandem Transport sent all their new drivers there.