Comments By Matt H.

I am curious about dash cams. In this age when technology makes it so affordable to protect your butt, I don't see why someone wouldn't want one rolling in their truck.

Are there any companies that run dash cams in all their rigs by default? Are there any companies that don't but have it an optional install that you can request? Are there any companies that reimburse you fully or partially for a dash cam you pick up? Has anyone picked up their own dash cam and had any issues getting the company mechanic to install it? Does anyone have any good reason I am overlooking that they choose specifically not to use a dash cam?

The electricity from lightning strikes flows through the path of least resistance and tends to move along the outside of a vehicle. In a vehicle that has a considerable amount of metal, the electricity will move along the body/frame, and sometimes moving through internal electronics like a radio.

The electricity itself is not a danger to you as a driver/passenger. It is mostly the risk of a fire starting from the extreme temperatures the electricity can generate as it runs through your vehicle that you should be aware of. If your vehicle is struck by lightning, make sure you check for signs of fire starting.

If lightning is getting a bit crazy around you, just pull over and sit tight. Pulling over is important because of the risk of fire, the chance you get caught off guard and jerk the wheel, and because lightning can kill your engine and cause damage to other parts. As long as you are pulled over, have a fire extinguisher ready, and are staying inside a closed truck, you should be fine sitting through a lightning storm.

Rules & Regulations, Driving Safely, and Transporting Cargo Safely are all part of General Knowledge. I saw questions on my written test that had information from all three of those sections.

If you are going for a CDL A, you need Combination Vehicles and should also study and test for Air Brakes since so many vehicles use them now. I was glad I had because the General Knowledge test had some questions that came from material in the Combination Vehicles and Air Brakes sections.

It sounds like you already got an updated DOT medical card. If you haven't though, go talk to whatever company you are interested first before getting it. They may have a deal with a local medical examiner to get a discount and may extend that to you since you are looking to go to work for them.

Looking at it theoretically, it comes down to how far you are driving. If you are running coast to coast, OTR will beat regional. If you are OTR but constantly making only 500-750 mile hauls as you hop around the country, you could probably match that with a Regional.

I have seen quite a few OTR drivers talk about Rookie Loads, where apparently a FM or DM gives a newer driver loads that are shorter distances frequently and saves the longer distance loads for experienced drivers (not an industry rule, just saw mentions of it happening to some people). If you are getting the lower mileage loads as OTR, you are probably no better off on mileage than a Regional would be.

Overall distance matters because loading time represents a smaller part of your average work time. Clever scheduling can help if you can keep yourself moving more hours in a day, hitting your 11 driving before running out of 14 on duty. You should also look at loading times themselves. A drop and hook Regional could do better miles than an OTR if the loading times for the OTR were high enough to negate their longer distance between loading. You could also have a Regional who is running terminals vs an OTR that is stuck starting and ending in big cities at prime traffic times. Home time scheduling for each type can also affect which comes out on top in mileage.

There isn't a clear cut answer without knowing the specifics of how you would be running Regional vs OTR at Schneider. You should really get as much info as you can directly from Schneider about the specific options available to you so you can compare with details.

Quick Google search shows a lot of schools in the Denver area. Here is info from the first one I checked.

Open enrollment enables our students to make their own training schedules. Our Pay-as-you-Go policy allows students to pay off their balance while they train. Open 7 days. 7:00 am - 5:00 pm. Classes start every day. Come down and check us out anytime, no need to call.

I won't recommend any specific school because I don't know any of them first hand. I just wanted to see if there was some lack of schools in the Denver area that was causing you to have trouble finding a school. Quick Google search popped up quite a few schools, so use Google to find them and then start checking out their websites and calling them up to get info.

Just started reading your diary here. Congratulations on getting started in school!

As a fellow big man who is working on getting in better shape, the medical was a big chunk of my anxiety. Getting that out of the way has me sleeping like a baby (for now). I am still waiting on confirmation of my start date for school, so I have to live vicariously through your posts at the moment.

Backing from video games will translate. Every once in a while you see some of the experienced drivers on this forum actually suggest practicing your backing with a toy truck. Seeing the way a trailer reacts when the front moves one way or another gets you past a big mental hurdle. We don't naturally want to think that turning left causes a trailer to go the opposite direction, especially when seeing it through a mirror. If you have already gotten your brain used to how the steering wheel movements can affect the trailer, you are a big step ahead of someone coming in with nothing as a reference. Just remember to take it calm, think it through without rushing, and to step out frequently in the beginning to walk around and see where you are at as you are backing.

Keep up the positive attitude and, when looking at something like shifting, remember that all it takes is time and repetition. Your brain just needs more input (doing it) and time to wire itself so that you eventually do it without having to think about it. Hope you get an awesome trainer and keep updating this as you keep moving towards a full CDL and being out of training.

I passed my medical today and went to the SOS right after to do my written. Studying using this website helped a lot and I passed each of the three tests the first try, General Knowledge, Combination Vehicle, and Air Brakes. I will test endorsements when I go back to get my full CDL after school.

With my medical, I was extra pleased to see that my life changes were working. I previously was Stage 1 Hypertension and it was causing me a lot of anxiety. I ended up 128 over 78 for my BP today, which immediately had me doing mental somersaults.

With the CLP testing, I had to reread questions and take quick mental breaks quite a few times because of the noise. Having the testing machines with not even as much as a divider between them and the main lobby/waiting area seemed really stupid, but I just took it a little slower to work through the noise and distractions to get the test completed. What I learned from this site definitely made a difference. There were very few direct matches in questions/answers between the written tests and the practice/review questions here, but this site gave me the overall knowledge I needed to think through those questions.

This leaves me ready for school to start. This coming Monday would be ideal because it is sooner, but the school is still a person or two short on their minimum to start a class. If it doesn't happen, I would be delayed a week and end up starting the 25th.

I am going into the school Friday to pay tuition and to turn in some applications for pre-hires. When I visited the school earlier, I was very pleased with the setup they have and how they seem to run things. They had new students on day 1 in the trucks doing maneuvers and day 2, when I was there, they were already heading out to drive on the road. They don't waste time getting students into the trucks and that was a big selling point to me. I can study on my own just fine from a manual so the less time they spend on something I can do myself, the better in my opinion.

Right now I am looking forward to the start, which hopefully will be the 18th instead of the 25th. But regardless of the start date, whether it is sooner or later, I will finally wake up one day and be able to say "I am going to drive a truck today!"

Thanks to everyone on this site who has shared wisdom, either in direct reply to one of my posts, or replying to a post by someone else. And a big thanks to Brett and the other folks involved in making this site happen. I can say with 100% certainty that I would not be ready to start school yet without this site.

I am not 100% sure what you first question was asking as the wording seemed odd to me, but my best guess is you are asking why you are driving all the miles while you trainer doesn't drive any? For the first few days at least, it is very common for trainers to only observe and teach. You need the experience behind the wheel. Typically after the trainer feels you are pretty solid at keeping it between the lines, you will switch to a team setup, with both of you putting in 11 a day driving.

Your limit on driving, as you should well know, is 11 hours before a reset. If you are complaining about having to drive that 11 hours, then you might want to pick up some applications for non-trucking jobs and get a jump on your next new career. As long as you are driving legal hours, that is what you future will be. If you want to do a nice leisurely 6 hour trip each day, you won't find it in trucking. You need to work long hours for less pay than you deserve for the hours you put in, because that is the reality of the job. This isn't a paid vacation and you don't survive on half days. Once you get experience after a year or two, you might have some local jobs open up to you that are more of a 5 days per week, 8-10 hours per day setup, but those are very hard to get starting out.

As for being told to keep driving when you were tired, you need to report that she ordered you to drive even though you felt you were too tired to safely drive and had informed her of it. She is just your trainer and does not have the right to force you to be unsafe. You are the one responsible if you get into an accident and kill someone because you drove when you were too tired to be safe. Report it because she needs to be corrected immediately by someone above her and her company may need to evaluate whether or not she should be training at all. If she goes unchecked, she could end up with a trainee who kills someone because she forgot that safety is top of the list.

It should be very much expected that a new trainee will not only have normal fatigue, but also the added fatigue from being in a new and stressful situation. This can be even worse if your normal sleep schedule is not in line with what you have to do now. You can require more sleep than normal the first few days and anxiety and stress can make the situation worse by making good sleep harder to come by.

Make sure you are being honest about when you are actually tired, and not letting yourself use that as a way get out of having to drive because you don't feel like it. If you are honestly tired to the point that it makes you a danger behind the wheel, inform your trainer and refuse to drive until you have had some sleep and can resume safe driving. Your life, and the lives of everyone around you, is not worth it to get a load somewhere a few hours earlier.

You may need a strong attitude readjustment. That is not saying that your trainer isn't doing something wrong, and she may be a very bad trainer overall. Some things you mention are very similar to other experienced I have read about where the trainer wasn't in it to share experience in wisdom, they were in it to try and dig themselves out of hole with the potential bonus from taking on a trainee.

Remember who you are, what you are here to do, and what you should be getting out of this. This is your chance to get used to your career. Driving 11 a day is your life now. Stops should be fast right now. Don't mess around or drag you feet. Try to line them up with other events as much as possible. Push yourself past your comfort zone and get your mind where it needs to be, used to your new lifestyle. Get as much as you can get out of the experience regardless of who your trainer is. As long as you are being safe, get that 11 hours of experience in every day. If you consistently cannot drive 11 hours safely, then evaluate why and, if you cannot adjust to get your 11 daily, consider what your next career will be.

If you have a job lined up already, talk to the employer about it to see if they can get you a truck for your test.

Look at who you are testing with. Most places that do testing will provide the vehicle you need for whatever test you are doing, for an added fee. If the place you had been looking at getting tested doesn't, start searching for one that does. Don't just stop after finding one that offers a truck test equipment rental. Keep shopping and make sure you find one that has a reasonable rate. Some will charge a premium for the equipment rental and you get no added benefit. Just double check that they have the type of truck you need and make sure to ask about transmission. You need to test on a manual in order to be able to drive a manual once you have your license. You can drive an automatic regardless of what you test on. If you want to have the option to drive manual transmission trucks in the future, make sure they have a manual for you to test on.

If you are out of work, out of money, cannot raise a few hundred extra in two weeks for an equipment rental, and find providing financially for your children more important in the short term than being there with them, you might want to get going on filling out applications with the major carriers. Many companies pre-hire and will provide schooling, testing, and training, sometimes paying you a small salary during that time before you fully go to work for them.

Going with a big carrier who provides your schooling and testing likely means ending up in a contract with them for at least a year and doing OTR. You might be home only a few days per month for that first year, but it can be a way to financially provide in the short term. A couple years from now you could be looking good with a regional or local job where you get paid well and are home frequently, and would have been financially providing while you got to that point where you had the experience to get that job with better home time. You have to decide if you are willing to sacrifice something extra now to get the future you want later.