Comments By Joe S. (a.k.a. The Blue Angel)

Old School,

I could have worded it differently when I said "when I set I loose money".

A more correct statement would be, When I set, it costs me money.

I get bored. When I had a DVD player, I would buy movie after movie to watch. On one 34 I did with my last company, I walked to a shopping center about a mile down the road. And I spent money.

15 dollars for a movie and about 12 dollars for dinner.

So it is much cheaper for me to keep rolling. In more ways than one.

As far as the income point. No matter is you work on recaps or do 34's every week. The income potential is the same.

Keep it safe out here. The life you save might be your own.

The Blue Angel.

Errol V. Glad it works for you and glad you feel safe with only 4 hours of sleep.

I know a lot of doctors and lawyers that would disagree with that point. But what ever works for you.

I have known many men that could work that schedule day after day after day of nights and be fine. Others, like myself, can't.

As far as the thick curtains in the sleeper cab. Your body clock doesn't care if it is a heavy curtain or a brick wall. If it doesn't want you to sleep you won't.

Keep it safe out here. The life you save might be your own.

The Blue Angel.

I have run into an issue just lately that I am following to see what course it takes.

In the past I have posted my "daily routine" and how I like to run. For those of you that have not read any of my posts and seen it, I will post it again here.

I don't mean to bore you, but I do this because it leads to the main point of this post.

I try to start out between 5-6 am. Hit the road no later than 7am. I run recaps so I try to run 8-9 hours a day on duty. Not always my drive time due to several reasons. Weather, traffic, construction, etc.

I hit my stopping point by 1800. No later than 1900 if I can help it. I hate hitting a truck stop late and fighting for a place to park. Or find out it is full and have to drive another 100 miles to the next truck stop.

I don't do restarts. When I set I loose money.

I try my best to run during the daytime. For several reason. Most are personal. Better light. Better visibility. And just because I like to run during the day better.

But the most important point. I try to run during the daytime because I don't sleep good during daylight hours. Never have been able to. Even when I was young and in the military. I usually worked evenings/nights in the military. The next day when I would get off work, I would sleep maybe 2-4 hours and I was up and going again.

On the weekends I would crash and sleep and sleep and sleep. But I was much younger then and my system could take it.

I am older now and maybe not much wiser, but I understand my limits. Yes, I can do a night run from time to time if I don't make a habit out of it.

As of late I have been talking to a few other drivers. Trying to find the ones that like running nights. I have found out, by a very large majority, most drivers don't like driving nights. Not like the old days when trucks were all you saw on at night on the roads.

However. Something else has come to my attention. I want to center around the three most recent drivers that I have found that like running nights.

All three do restarts. They drive 10-11 hours a day. Average 3000 miles a week. And when their hours are up they take a restart. And all three admitted that the sleep most of the time during their restart.

All three admitted to the same problem I have of sleeping during the daytime. One driver even admitted that if he got more than 2 hours sleep during the day, he was lucky.

They all said the same thing about why they run at night. Less traffic and less hassle putting up with the idiots out here on the road.

Well, who is the idiot? The person that drives during the daytime because he/she admits to their limits on running nights. Or the guy/girl that denies they have an issue driving an 80,000 missile down the road with only 2 or 3 hours sleep?

We have enough people causing us problems out here on the road. We need to stop making problems of our own.

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own.

The Blue Angel.

OK, my head was about to explode trying to read this and figure out the point you were trying to make.

All in all, it makes no difference in the miles per week, per day, per month, etc, etc, if you run on recaps or do 34 hour resets.

You can get in just as many miles either way. It all depends on you. If you want to run 7 days a week. Or you like "2" days off every week.

There are many differences in how many miles 2 different drivers will get each and every week. Terrain. Traffic. Road construction. Weather. How long each one has to set at a shipper or receiver. How many drop and hooks compared to live loads. ETC.

But on paper, it doesn't matter which you choose. Running on recaps of doing 34's. Miles add up the same with both.

As far as running when you want. That can be done. Up to a point.

What I am about to say, some old timers will say that I am not a true deep down trucker. Well that may be so. But I run safe. I don't push an envelope like some truckers do. I run electronic logs, which tickles me pink. The paper logs, yeah you could in theory make lots more money. But if you had a less than "legal" dispatcher or company you were working for, you ran till you were about to drop.

I usually start my day between 4 to 6am. I run all day long. Bathroom stops and maybe a lunch stop. Around 5pm I am looking for my nights stay.

Every trucker will tell you. Make sure you plan out your trips. Make sure you have your stops planned out. Well, I do that to an extent. But they aren't set in stone. I make a target location on where I WANT to stop for the night. But I also keep in mind how many T/S or R/A are close by. Just in case I don't have a good day or I have a great day.

I don't do nights unless it is totally, absolutely, down and out a have to case. I don't sleep good during the day time. Never have been able too. Even years ago when I was much younger and in the military. If I worked nights, I was lucky to sleep maybe 4 hours a day.

I might not be the smartest guy in the bunch. But I know when and when not to push myself. And doing too many nights is pushing me out of my "comfort zone." So, I stay away from nights as much as possible.

Working your HOS is something that takes practice and it has to be done everyday, every week and every load you handle. So you can make it come out in your favor.

I run recaps. I run 7 days a week. I try to run 8 1/2 to 9 hours a day. Some days I have to run maybe 10 hours. The next day or within a couple of days, I will run a 7 hour day. When it rolls around again, I push a couple of hours off the 10 over to the 7 hour day.

No matter which one you choose. You can't get a perfect 8.75 hour day. And you can't get a perfect 11 hour day. So you have average and work it out to work best for you.

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own. The Blue Angel.

I was thinking about some of the neat conversation about the companies and types of runs a driver gets when pulling for Concerts, Plays and other traveling stage events and it got me to thinking about other interesting industries and types of work that's out there off the beaten path.

Do any of you guys and gals know what carriers NASA likes to use for moving equipment and supplies around? Considering NASA is a very large and diverse organization with locations all over the country, I presume they have loads that would fall under all avenues of the different trucking specialties out there.... Dry Van, Reefer, Tanker, Flat Bed ... and of course there are perhaps many loads that could be high value and involve national security.

Have any of y'all done any pickups or deliveries at say Kennedy Space Center in Florida or the Johnson Space Center in Houston?

I think it would be a pretty cool conversation to be able to say you pulled a load that is now part of the International Space Station in orbit. That's a load that is quite literally "out of this world". lol :)

I

I don't know who or what he hauls. But a guy that lives a few miles from me hauls government loads. Most times he has no idea what he is hauling.

Doesn't know where the pickup is or where the drop is until the moment he sets in the seat. And there are times he has a "guide" along that just tells him which turns to take.

And, the real kicker. He is not allowed to talk to anyone about where he has been. Or if he knows what he has hauled, he can't talk about it.

But the pay. As an old saying goes. "Over the moon". He works on average about 6 months a years. He makes enough in that time to support his family for the whole year.

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own. The Blue Angel.

There is not a city, of any size, in the US that is not terrible during rush hour. NYC, Washington, D.C., Los Angles, Atlanta, etc. How about during off hours. That is where you learn what cities are bad to drive thru.

I have driven thru NYC, Washington, DFW, Atlanta, and many others during rush hour many many times. But without a doubt, in my opinion, the worst city any time, rush hour or not, is Chicago. There is almost no time of day it isn't rush hour there.

I have been thru there at 6am. 2pm. 2am. And have never found a time that it wasn't busy. With other cities there is almost always a time when the traffic is not "rush hour" and it is pretty easy to go thru.

Washington, DC. If you hit it before 6 or 7am, you usually don't have a problem. Same way with NYC area. Maybe a little earlier. But there are times you will be on easy street going thru.

I noticed Boston was mentioned. The serious thing to me about Boston is like Chicago. 53 foot boxes have no business inside the city limits at all.

At least in Manhattan they have banned anything over 40 feet (without a special permit and escorts). Now if the other boroughs would follow suit.

I was in a suburb of Boston the other day in my truck. The first time I was in that specific area in a truck. I was on pins and needles that whole time. And yes, I had an accident. Not my fault, but it still happened. I won't get into the details here, that is not the topic here. But suffice to say. 53 foot trailers don't belong in these cities.

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own. The Blue Angel.

I have seen that tablet advertised. It looks really good. The price is way out of my range at this point.

However (here is the "BUT" that people always look for).

With a GPS, that is all it does. GPS mapping. With a tablet, it is like a minicomputer. There are many things you can do with it. And many ways you can get distracted by it. Like texting on a cell phone.

It would all depend on who you got inspected by. What kind of mood they were in. ETC.

My very first level 1 DOT inspection happened last year in Canada. Since it was my first I asked tons of questions. I want to be as legal as possible. That money comes out of my pocket.

At that time the "Trucker's Tablet" was something new. But I did ask the DOT agent about it. Flat out, in no mixed information I was told they were illegal in Canada. If found in a truck, they would be removed and the driver would be fined.

As was told to me by this agent (which I knew ahead of time), the tablet is not a simple GPS. If hooked to the internet it becomes a fully operational computer. Which is illegal to have in the cab of a truck.

Now, it saying that, I will repeat what I said above.

I would all depend on who you get inspected by. What kind of mood they were in. If the last trucker they inspected really got them going. ETC.

It is like any other issue. For example. Using a bluetooth that covers both ears or having ear buds in both ears at the same time is suppose to be illegal. But I see drivers get by with them all the time.

I was behind a car hauler at a weigh station the other day that was empty. It was a day cab so I could see inside his cab. I could tell he had both buds in. And his head was just rocking back and forth to what he was listening too. I was sure they would pull him around back. I mean it was as plain as the nose on your face, he was not fully concentrating on his driving. He was jamming down on his tunes.

Nope. Went right on thru the weigh station. I was totally surprised.

Just my two cents.

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own. Joe S (The Blue Angel)

I drove truck several years ago and I also spent several years driving a tour bus all over the place.

And when I got back into trucking, I had to go the whole way. Not just a refresher course.

I questioned it a few times till one day one of my instructor said, "Just because a driver has been driving for years, doesn't mean he has been doing it right".

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own. Joe S (The Blue Angel)

Yeah they push and push to make sure you arrive in their time frame. Then all of the sudden you get a message. I can use playback on mine to hear it, but if it is a load assignment.

Now I have 30 minutes to answer. I pull over and start working on it. Some loads take a little while to work on. And now they are asking you what you are stopped for and what is taking so long.

There has to be a better system.

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own. Joe S (The Blue Angel).

I learned this from a driver from Canada. When it's really cold and raining/freezing rain leave your sun visors down when you have your defroster on. It helps trap the warm air and keep it close to the windshield keeping it warmer so stuff doesn't freeze.

Now that is brilliant. I will try that...

The only problem with my ProStar is ice building up on the wipers, making the sweeps clear inconsistently. I think that is called driving in winter conditions, however.. lol

I wonder if the passenger side defroster vent is blocked a bit.... ?

The ice building up on the wipers. I have that issue also.

I went out and bought a good set of actual winter blades. My company won't supply them. It doesn't cure the problem, but it helps a bunch.

Keep it safe out here, the life you save might be your own. Joe S (The Blue Angel)