CDL Exam Tomorrow!!

A little late on this but;

Good luck Turtle!

A little late on this but;

Good luck Turtle!

0

Actually you're not as late as you think, G.

It snowed a couple inches last night, so the pad was covered. They plowed and salted, so we're now in a holding pattern waiting for it to melt so we can do the skills test. I'm pretty sure they'll still do the road test today too, provided the roads get cleared.

The good news is I passed the pretrip test!! I only missed one point, forgetting to mention the lousy coolant reservior! I NEVER forget that part. My intentions we're to ace the test, but I'll settle for one miss. :)

Thanks for the well wishes folks. More to come...

Hey Turtle. I'm coming out to PRIME on 1/7/17. 22 hour bus ride :\ I really appreciate you posting recent ''what to expect'' diary of the PRIME training program. A lot of my questions and curiosities were answered about the actual in's and outs of PRIME ! I"m really happy to hear about the Christmas party ! I love good food ! Also getting some, hard to come by, details about trainer selection, and tests (wouldn't have expected pre trip to be that daunting )

Let me ask you something, Have you noticed a difference between company trainers vs owener-op trainers ? From reading the forums I'm getting the idea that an ''enthusiastic desire to teach personality'' you might just end up as free labor, and not get the recommended time practicing backing maneuvers, parallel park, pre trip etc.... (pre trip you can kinda do on your own, I think )

As Rainy said, you really gave to take control of your own training. That starts with the trainer interview. You interview the trainer also. I understand it's kinda luck of the draw with who you get, and yes sometimes you may just be free labor. That's why it's up to you to teach yourself, and if you feel your trainer isn't teaching you adequately, then contact Prime.

A female member from my class wasn't getting any backing practice, and her trainer wouldn't teach her pretrip because "his truck was a peterbuilt, and you'll be testing on a freightliner." That's bogus. She should've taught herself pretrip. They give you an idiot proof guide to follow. So no excuses.

Backing is different. You need practice, and if you aren't getting it you need to speak up. Well, the female student did speak up, and Prime routed them back and took her off his truck. She'll get the practice now.

Gotta go...

Great job Turtle,...99% is as good as 80%, you passed, that's all that counts! One down, two to go...

I only missed one point, forgetting to mention the lousy coolant reservior!

Don't sweat it. That Coolant Reservoir is overrated anyways!

Turtle, I have been following your diary with interest and know I'm rooting for you!

Congrats on passing the pretrip!

I've been looking really, really hard at prime and I've even talked to Rainy on the phone! She is a sweetheart, by the way!

I won't be out of school until the end of April, but I may very well be joining you guys not soooo far in the future!

Good luck with the rest of this! I know you'll do a great job and be out there driving in a heartbeat!

She doesn't know me well enough yet hahhahah

Penny is awesome. After talking with you both I know you can both do this!!!

I couldn't remember what a valve stem was called if my life depended on it while doing the pre-trip. I've only known what a VS was since I was about 5 years old. Every time I got to it my brain would freeze and my mind would go completely blank. I would actually be standing there thinking to myself "That little do-hickey thingy that you put air in the tires through". Thankfully I remembered test day because I'm pretty sure if I recited my quote above to the examiner he would have had to fail me on principle alone. LOL!

JJ

Sooooooo, we finally got to the backing skills test and I passed that too! Overconfidence got me here too though.

My trainer warned me that backing a split axle on an icy pad will change the turning characteristics a tad. I had no problems with the offset, parallel, or straightback. But when it came to the alley dock, I got ****y and tried to get it in without a pull up. I pushed a fraction too far, and when I was just about to pull up, he blew the whistle. Out of bounds-2 points!

Again, I expected to ace the skills, but a pass is a pass.

After waiting a few hours, they finally made the judgement that the roads were too icy for the road test. Bummed me out since I was all pumped up, but we get to go first in the morning. Can't wait.

Grats! Turtle got skills to kill! lol