Comments By Justin (Jakebrake)

Does anyone know if jordan carriers do a **** test or hair follicles test

Look man I'm going to go ahead and be the mean one hear if your worried about passing a drug test than wait your happy ass before you go take that test and end up finding out its a hair follicle test and if or when you do fail it you will have just ****ed away your cdl. Another thought here but if you do any kind of drugs you may want to think of a different career because out here if your in an accident and it's not even your fault guess what you get a random drug test and if you end up popping hot your off to prison. So if you know you have done something you shouldn't have in the last year than i would wait for the 1 year mark before doing it because a lot of places can track back up to a year even farther if you used it frequently so if you know you can't pass than don't risk it and if you are still using something than don't get in a semi truck.

Any day now I'm waiting on dot to outlaw night time truck driving....

Ha, good luck passing that legislation. No more team driving or expedited loads. Everyone from the trucking companies to the shippers and receivers would have an absolute fit.

Glad no one was hurt in the wreck, it could have been a lot worse. He probably saw the lights but did not move into the left lane or slow down, assuming that the accident was on the shoulder. Sounds like he hit the fire truck in the right lane. States have laws like that for a reason, slowing down significantly or moving over probably would have prevented this wreck.

Sounds about right to me. Drivers now a days are just getting out here and forget to use commons sense anymore glad no one was seriously hurt in this.

I personally won't drive an automatic but that's me everyone is different but i would make sure you learn a manual because my understanding coming here pretty soon they are going to start putting that as a restriction on people's license if they only drove an auto in school. I could be wrong but that's what I've been hearing from some of my dmv peeps I know. Now to answer the question at hand no it's not like one in a four wheeler but it's simple enough to get the hang of. Also you don't have to use the throttle to get the truck moving from a dead stop it'll roll on its own just from releasing the clutch.

Don't want to sound mean here but you really have no choice if you want to drive truck you have to know how to drive mountains if you refuse to do them ever you might as well hand in your cdl because you won't make it in this industry without that knowledge, the best thing you can do is take this challenge head on and push through it and you'll be ok. Ask your trainer to teach you your recovery gears and you'll be all right. Take a deep breath i know what your feeling I work in Utah and live in Colorado but I'm originally from Missouri and look at me I'm still alive and I've drove through some pretty steep stuff with 13% grades I always remember it this way what ever gear I climbed it in I drop 2 gears down from that when loaded and kick the jakes on high and let her roll. It'll be nerve wrecking at first but in the end you'll be proud of yourself so knuckle up driver and go for it.

So I was driving westbout on I 80 yesterday and got through the storm. Stopped in Cheyenne for a minute and there were some people shutting down I think from the eastbound closure. Made it through to Rawlins to stop for the night and now everything is frozen.

Gotta make it to salt lake city by 4pm and have about 330 miles to make. Hoping I'll make it in time but I don't feel safe driving when it's dark in these conditions.

Sure was scary though. My windshield kept freezing up along with my wipers . That combined with the already low visibility and wind scared the crap outta me. Saw one rolled over Werner truck, and hope the driver is ok.

If I stopped in Cheyenne any longer I feel like I would of been stuck there. And sure enough road conditions are closed. I was going about 25mph down on that Lincoln monument and got passed by trucks going at least 60. Scary times, I'm sure it won't be the last scare out here just the first.

Feel pretty good about getting out of Cheyenne though once I got near rawlins the elevation dropped and everything cleared up.

Someone told me to use rubbing alcohol on windshield wiper blades to stop them from freezing but I'm sure we are not allowed to have alcohol on the trucks. Anyone have any reccomendations? Like using heat on them or something similar? Had to pull over 3 times in an hour to knock the ice off of them.

Welcome to Wyoming don't want to sound like an ******* brother but that's going to be life this time of year on I80 just go where you feel comfortable and don't let others pressure you into going past your comfort level if they want to go fast let them if your comfortable at 25 that's your speed go it. Wyoming won't get much better until summer so you'll have to just knuckle under and take it for what it is with that. Remember this saying I used to tell my guys in the Army and it works out here in trucking as well SLOW IS SMOOTH AND SMOOTH IS FAST.

As a vet myself i would say have him go to a private school he can use his GI bill to pay for the school and they will also pay him a prorated amount of BAH while he is in school so he can still get some cash flow while he is training. He can email me at pv2garver@gmail.com or can get ahold of me on here if he has any questions and I'll help him with any info I can and from one vet to another tell him I said thank you for his service.

Thanks Justin. I will forward your email to him. He's been in for 12 years and deployed 3 times. It's time for something new and safer. I can imagine navigating the civilian world can be daunting so having a fellow vet to talk with will be more than helpful. And thank you for your service as well.

As a former Infantrymen and having completed 2 deployments to both Iraq and Afghanistan it is fairly rough to navigate the civilian world, it's somewhat of a culture shock in a manner of speaking but it gets much easier. I'm sure your son will excel in every way possible. Like I said before if he needs advice or someone to talk to he can contact me anytime vets have it rough today so we have to stick with each other.

My son-in-law is getting out of the Army in 2 weeks and wants to get in to trucking. He will be moving to Tulsa, OK. What is the best path for getting your CDL, training, and assuring you get a job? He spoke with Swift about the company sponsored training but has also talked with a recruiter at Roadmasters here in Tulsa. Not sure which is best?

As a vet myself i would say have him go to a private school he can use his GI bill to pay for the school and they will also pay him a prorated amount of BAH while he is in school so he can still get some cash flow while he is training. He can email me at pv2garver@gmail.com or can get ahold of me on here if he has any questions and I'll help him with any info I can and from one vet to another tell him I said thank you for his service.

Let me chime in here as well I've known several O/O's and have a neighbor who owns his own company with 10 trucks it's a crude and rude business to get into first thing they have told me is you need a safety fall back fund of about 10 grand before you buy a truck just to cover your ass second thing the expenses are very high fuel alone is going to cost you an arm and leg so you want to think about that then there is tires and such then you have to factor in your unexpected ones like a transmission failure or major break downs that you then have to be towed to get fixed so you now have shop fees towing fees and parts. That's just the beginning then you get into the fact that the truck you're going to lease has been driven by God knows who and beat the **** out of so you now have that to worry about as well plus you are brand new to this industry and WILL make mistakes. Now factor in if one of those mistakes causes a something to break you now have to pay out of pocket to fix it and it won't be cheap. All this added on to you still trying to learn how to drive and control your truck is the makings for a disaster. I hate to come off as harsh here but it would be foolish to jump straight into buying a truck with no experience in this industry and no financial backing to boot. Take your time and learn how be a truck driver before you go buying a truck.

You people in the know correct me if I'm wrong, but IIRC I think most no-idle states have exemptions to the law if the temperature is beyond a certain range either way (extreme cold or heat). So if its crazy cold I think you can still idle in most places.

You're absolutely correct if it's cold enough to gel up fuel then you will be ok to idle.

Better dodge those coops and avoid time stamps and make sure you have plenty of energy drinks and stuff. You'll have to run outlaw logs the whole way so you can't afford any time stamps there and to the guy talking about the governed down trucks not all of us are have our balls clipped my truck has 560 horse and can move right along down the road at the same speed as cars.