Houston Community College CDL School

Also, I'm not sure if I should have done this, but Friday I applied for my TWIC. It is now ready for pickup, and it's only TUESDAY.

The government is so efficient!

To a certain extent, it’s good that you’re struggling now. While it’s tough & challenging now, on test day, you won’t be caught off guard if something goes wrong. You’ve not only practiced the maneuvers but you’ve practiced the corrections should you need to use that knowledge on test day. Until test day, I made little to no mistakes on the pad. But my stress levels weren’t as high as when that dude with a red shirt & his clip board were standing there watching my every move. I hadn’t been tested in over 30 years.

So enjoy the pain & suffering now cause on test day you’ll be better prepared than most. Don’t overthink it. Take your time. Take baby steps as you maneuver that trailer into position. And this is huge, stop completely between reference points when backing. You’ll do great regardless of those butterflies in your stomach.

Well I'm on lunch and did parallel blindside all day. It's so easy! First two times and the last two I did it perfectly.

The only problem is when we come out of the parking space to set it up,but I'm figuring that out and taking my time. I know I won't have to do all that for the test, but I make damn sure my set up is correct and I get it in there just fine.

I feel much better about the test now. I still need to practice offset, and I'm not sure how I'll do on the driving. I want to street drive at least one more time.

So the rest of the day was a bit different. I did about two more backings for parallel blindside. On my last one, I had my tractor and trailer inside of the box. I did not hit any cones. I was only a little bit crooked when I pulled up. Personally, I think that's fine.

The rest of my day was helping someone from one of the night classes learn to downshift. He had failed his PTI as part of his test because at the end of the test, he forgot to do the tug test. The examiner asked if he was done, and he said yes - forgetting to do the tug test after the air brakes. The night classes are apparently run really crappily. They weren't ever told they could start in third gear. Outside driving, which they've only done once, they were all starting in intersections from 1. And after that, no one told them how to downshift.

After a little bit of instruction, I got him to downshift just fine, and I was practicing just fine on it too when we switched. Tomorrow, I think I'm going to be practicing pre-trip with him if he comes tomorrow. And then I should also practice my offset backing.

I feel a lot better about everything right now.

So today I did some offset backing, a full pre-trip, and I went driving outside.

With offset backing, I think I did really well. I even had one situation where the other student messed up and parked it inbetween the two lanes, so I had to go fix it and put it in one of the other lanes which was all improvised, but I was able to do that and then set myself up to offset again. With pre-trip I did mostly all right, but I need to practice some more tomorrow on Friday. Who knows what will happen tomorrow because there's different classes.

And when I went driving outside, well, the instructor said I did very well. I messed up my shifting a lot more than I thought I should have, but I recovered. He said I made the turns well and, unlike other instructors, he tells us to watch the tandems to decide when to make our turn. I was having to drive an actual 53 footer, so it was a bit different.

unlike other instructors, he tells us to watch the tandems to decide when to make our turn.

Turning onto a side street ofr at an intersection?

Are you sure that's what he meant? Watching the tandems as you progress through a right or left hand turn is understandable and advisable but not for setting up in preparation to start the turn.

On your pretrip, memorize the speeches! The lights & air brake ones specifically. Also the coupling segment also. I don’t know if it’s the same in Texas but in Missouri, those three are mandatory. There’s a one hour video on the pretrip in YouTube. It’s posted by acme driving school. https://youtu.be/EfW615ZnELE

unlike other instructors, he tells us to watch the tandems to decide when to make our turn.

Turning onto a side street ofr at an intersection?

Are you sure that's what he meant? Watching the tandems as you progress through a right or left hand turn is understandable and advisable but not for setting up in preparation to start the turn.

It was for when you decide to turn and as you are turning I think.

It was for when you decide to turn and as you are turning I think.

I am 100% certain his instruction only applies to watching the tandems as you are going through a turn.

Not as a reference point when deciding to start your turn. The truck is moving in a straight line up to that very instant, when you decide to cut the wheel left or right. Where the tandems are is not a factor.

Checking the mirrors however is absolutely something you should do throughout the entire turn. Maybe that's what he meant.

Not suggesting to ignore what he said, just ask for some clarification.

That can't be right because every instructor has us watch the end of the trailer and those wheels when we make our turn, and his instruction was clearly meant to be different.