Comments By Charlie Mac

When you say "Central" if you're referring to "Central Refridgerated", that's Swift. They bought those guys a few years ago. I hauled Central trailers all through my Swift mentorship.

The trailers still say "Central Refridgerated". I've seen 2 or 3 (older) trucks that do too.

Oh oh, me me! Err...I mean I would like to help out of possible. 😀

around 2-5am or so is when I was the most tired. Once the sun began coming up it was good though.

I agree 100%. I was running reefer during training & did tons of night driving. There's something about 4am driving that my biological clock didn't like. I found myself pulling over and walking around very frequently.

Once the sun came up, I was golden. (see what I did there?) 😁

I upgraded in Rochelle, IL but my truck is in Manteno, right outside of Kankakee.

As Errol noted, the test is fairly straightforward. 57 questions... you can miss up to 12 and still pass. Just pay attention to your Macros & you'll do fine.

(specifically the "directions to shipper") as the rest are listed on the test, but you'll have to recall that one from memory.

Blue Hotel Is working hard on a post:

Hopefully nobody beat me to this, I've been working on this post for 40 minutes or so.

When I do a long post like yours, when I'm done, I "select all", copy, then reload the page to see if anything new is there.

Then add a reply box, paste my stuff back in, make any changes then post it!

I know: all that work and after you Post, find another person has answered already!

Genius! I knew you were a mod for merit (aside from being an awesome Swiftie...of course). Hope I run into you some day in Memphis. 👍

Well, its been an eventful month. Buffalo to Sacramento & everywhere in between. Rockies, Alleghenies, Smokie's & Donner's Pass. Blowouts, shipper delays, 230am parking & countless truck stop showers later... here I am. I passed my written upgrade & road test.

I'm now a full fledged Rookie solo driver! The terminal I upgraded at is (litetally) in the middle of no where, but they are the nicest folks!

Well, I don't mean to drone on. Just wanted to share my success with the group who has been such an integral part or my success!

Thank you everyone who has played a role in my journey and gave me invaluable advice & encouragement in my darkest hours....from the bottom of my heart.

Stay safe.

Just walked to the office to see what the hold up is...they've been reworking that truck in the 1st dock this whole time thinking it was me! I don't know wether to laugh or cry. 😶

Show up to shipper, check-in, got the trailer #, can't find it anywhere in the yard. Go back to office, trailer number is confirmed. Go back out to yard. Finally find the trailer...except it's not my companies trailer. They loaded it into the wrong box. No biggie. Go back to office, they say they'll switch it right away.

Go grab some food & come back. Trailer's switched (sweet!). It's loaded to the gills (and a railroad trailer...those suckers are heavier) so I just know I'm gonna have to move the tandems...they won't budge. Buttons depressed, pins released but these things just REFUSE to slide. I hope for the best & head to the scale anyway...(20 miles away).

Get to scale, hit the button, "1st wiegh" blah blah. Just about to go in when a passer-by says "hey man...one of your wheels isn't on the scale". Crap. Fix it, re-wiegh & go in for the ticket. Load is 100lbs over GVWR. 80,100lbs! Tandems won't fix that 😝

Drive 20 miles back to shipper (it's dark now & raining cats & dogs... so can't use the Jake brake (with the heaviest load by far I've had to date), guy appologizes & tells me "put it in dock 137, we'll get right on it". Go out to the yard...find dock 137. There's a truck docked in it! Go back to office, get another appology. Get a new dock. Finagle it into this tiny little hole with yard jockeys flying all around me at kami-kaze speeds & sit.

That was 2 hours ago & the dock light is STILL green! Whenever they decide to finally rework the load I still have to go back to the scales & figure out what to do about these frozen tandems. Will this day ever end? Gah...

Thanks G-Town! I'm in my later half of training & am more comfortable discussing my concerns than I was when I first got on the truck.

I'm rolling with my Swift trainer right now. He's had me bust multiple U-turns...although he's a L/O so no cams.

I've been in situations where it's just necessary to do so...like in the middle of backwoods upstate NY and the QC signal completely dropped. Luckily he has a Rand MCNally unit too (with much better reception).

My first order of business when I upgrade...getting another GPS device with my fuel points. I've lost QC signal on at least 3 deliveries this far.