Nosing In. I Still Just Don't Get It!

After 9+ months It has yet to click what is so great about nosing in. I have heard the usual excuses.

"It is quieter without other trucks running around me". That is said by the guy whose truck is runnning ALL NIGHT LONG. Ladies and Gentleman, I think we found a genius.

"It is so if anybody hits me they hit my trailer". I understand fixing a trailer is cheaper than fixing a tractor. But having a big square box hanging out is a far bigger obstacle than something that is more narrow and more rounded. Either way if you are stuck waiting to get repaired, you are stuck waiting to get repaired. That and you expose your cargo to the chance of being jacked up.

Either way, it still doesn't make sense to me. Trying to get out the next morning is easily twice the effort of what it would of taken to back in, in the first place.

I forgot to add, the guy I usually hear that so my trailer gets hit not my tractor is usually a reefer driver. Umm, what happens when the side of your trailer gets torn open, oh yeah, your cargo gets ruined!!! Yet another person who really thought this one thru.

Jim Morrison said it best; "People are strange."

Look at it this way "Different folks different strokes".

I know plenty of good drivers who nose in when it's safe to do so, a lot of them are owner ops who don't own/lease their trailer. They do it for the reasons you mentioned. But I do agree 80% of the time it doesn't make any sense. But there are exceptions. If you can do it where you pretty much have a straight back and intend to leave the truck stop after most people have left it's usually okay.

However, another exception I see to this is when rookie drivers nose in because they don't want to or are not confident in their backing skills. A lot of the time they don't have the experience to know which spot to nose into and they end up creating more trouble for themselves later.

The reality is that if your truck gets bumped and your bumper is pulled off and your alignment is knocked out or worse, it costs a lot more money and the key word here is "downtime". I've seen trailers get backed into by yard dogs and the damage is usually cosmetic and wouldn't be considered something that puts you out of service. Try not to bother yourself too much with people who do this its more common than you would think. I mean this in the nicest way possible, this is not at all a roast. Sometimes its just hard to see both sides of things.

Everybody runs their truck differently, and at the end of the day as long as they're obeying the rules and delivering freight safely without damaging equipment it shouldn't matter.

Dan

If I ever meet up with you for a quick dinner I will surely nose-in park beside you just to troll you.

If I ever meet up with you for a quick dinner I will surely nose-in park beside you just to troll you.

If I'm carrying a tarped load and expect rain, I'll nose in to a spot if it allows a downhill slope to my trailer, thus eliminating the possibility of water flowing under my tarp overlap. That's pretty much the only time I'll do it.

I nosed in for awhile after I had my bumper ripped off and got stuck at home for over 2 weeks. Fear of that happening again made me really nervous.

Now the only time I nose it is at a couple of our yards where nosing in puts us facing away from the western sun and into shade! Much cooler in the truck that way.

I've been known on occasion to be lazy on my 30 and nose in, but only in wide open lots where there is plenty of room to back out.

If I ever meet up with you for a quick dinner I will surely nose-in park beside you just to troll you.

I'll nose in on the other side with a load of 65' steel beams lol.

I will use a pull thru no issue. I just think nosing in is more hassle come the morning than it is worth. I have only ever nose in parked twice. The first time was my first trip out after orientation. The other time I was doing circles around a Petro waiting for someone to leave. A spot came open which was 45 degree spot of to my front left facing towards me, either I grabbed it or lost it to someone else circling.

Never nosed in, never will; not even if it's a straight back out. To me, it's pure laziness. I don't attribute it to bad backing skills because I consider myself horrid at backing. I'll go out of my way to pull through into a spot, find a straight back spot, a spot that has at least a 1 space gap. As long as it's a legal spot.