TDI Forsyth Georgia CDL Training Experience

Today was my first day at TDI's training facility in Forsyth GA.

Firstly, some background.

I had been RIF'ed from my prior job because NCR decided they would rather pay Serbians to do my job than Americans. From a purely fiscal point of view, I can't dispute that decision. That doesn't mean I'm not just a wee bit bitter about it, but I'm not saying anything beyond this on the matter.

After months of finding nothing worthwhile that I could reasonably commute to, I decided it was time for a career change. To a career that couldn't be shipped overseas. I originally intended to go to a CDL school based on a student loan, but discovered that this doesn't seem to be possible if you do not take the class as part of a technical college in a standard technical college setting. Someone else might figure out a way, but I couldn't. I didn't have the time to wait to take the class over the course of a entire semester.

The fact that I was released at no fault and had been looking for a job for a while with no luck and little income other than unemployment led me to being eligible for the Workplace Investment Act (WIA)

The process of working through the WIA program through the holiday season was slow, but it's a government program. I don't think that have high gears. It took nearly two months from beginning to end to do the testing, classes, counseling, and finally for me to get my voucher.

This morning, I arrived at 0630 for my 0700 class. There were six of us to begin with.

The first thing we did was fill in even more paperwork. The same types of paperwork I'd already filled out for the TDI recruiter, but not the same forms. If someone from TDI corporate sees this, I strongly suggest that TDI should create a single uniform document set for all office actions, recruiters should send the same thing to students that the office uses for records. I was not able to complete my paperwork, and I was one of the more prepared ones. Unified paperwork makes everyone's life FAR less painful.

The second thing we did was drive to get a DOT physical and drug screen. The instructor, Vic, was very clear that this drug screen was going to test very thoroughly. Not a typical drug test easy to fool by drinking lots of water and failing to smoke MJ for a couple weeks, and if they tested positive, it would be on their record forever. Period.

Two of the students apparently were not certain they would pass the test. Before noon on the first day, we were down to four students.

Then we started studying for the CDL. I have been very happy with Vic, our instructor. He clearly knows the business, and he's been teaching a while. He is careful to not disparage any company, but he has praised a few that he has personally worked for in the past. Zero complaints. It's good to learn from someone who knows what they are doing.

We had a Werner representative stop by and toss a pitch at us. Then two recent graduates that were working for May stopped by to say hi to Vic and we spoke with them.

After that conversation with the May drivers, who were taking tractors with empty trailers home with them, I realized that there was a new facet of driving a truck that I needed to consider. Where will I keep the truck when I'm at home. I cannot keep a tractor and trailer at home in my subdivision. Just Not Happening. Not even a bobcat. So I will be limited at first to companies with terminals in the Atlanta area, or who have some sort of secure arrangement for truck storage where I can drive my personal vehicle to and safely swap back and forth.

The Werner representative did mention earlier in the day that they had an Atlanta terminal...

So, my homework for today is to complete the office paperwork, take a sample test on the general knowledge section, and read sections 3, 5, and 6 of the GA CDL documents. Oh, and fill out four job applications. We were given about ten to choose from.

Typing up this post is taking away from my homework time. And then I have to sleep. I'm commuting about an hour each way. I could have gotten a hotel room, but I don't want to bunk up if I didn't have to. I'll have to be doing that soon enough with a training driver. They do have the option of paying $25 (per day) extra for a single hotel room, which I can't afford.

Day 1, signing out.

Day 2:

Lots of CDL test prepwork. Part of it was done on computers.

While most of the information was good, the questions were clearly homegrown, and I found two errors that were verified to be errors. Whoever wrote the computer questions was clearly not very good with English. Some of the questions were rather painful to parse, and not in a 'tricky question' way. That I could understand. Truck driving doesn't require a great deal of formal education, though it certainly requires some skills. TDI could really use someone with solid English to go through their testing documents and make them all make sense, English-wise. Nothing is really broken, but it's highly distracting. Maybe it's just me, since I am an amateur author.

Still, I learned a lot today. Tomorrow early morning, more review, then in the late morning DoT testing.

Day 3:

Took the DoT CDL tests, passed all three. I am now a CDL permit holder!

The four applications I provided to the school the other day were sent to the four companies this morning. Before the end of the day, I had a response from Werner, and will be attending their orientation on 11 Jan (school ends on 08 Jan.)

That's not to say I won't be looking at other opportunities, but from what I've seen of Werner, they are pretty high up on the list of companies a new driver would want to spend their first year with.

It was a good day.

Day 4:

Maps and regulations today. One of my classmates decided halfway through the map test that they didn't want to drive trucks. Apparently maps scared her. Started at six students in my class, now down to three. There was a student from a prior class present making up a day he missed, but that's going to be the last time he shares class time with us, I think.

I already knew that the last number of an Interstate being odd/even indicating N/S or E/W routes. I was not aware that there was a meaning for the first digit being odd or even for three-digit interstate numbers. Even is a loop, odd is a spur. Good info.

Regulations classes were good info too. Learning how to do my logs gave me a much better idea about the limits of what I'll be able to do as a driver, and the rules other drivers should be abiding by. I have to say that I like pretty much everything I learned except one thing. The 34 hour turnaround requiring inclusion of two 1AM-5AM time stretches is pretty amazingly stupid. That means that a 34 hour turnaround might end up being a 48 hour turnaround, or even as much as a 52 hour turnaround if you end your day right at 0100 and are forced into 34 hour turnaround.

This will tend to force drivers that prefer to drive at night when there is less traffic to start their day far later than they would prefer after a 34 hour turnaround.

1) Messing with people's sleep schedules seems like a BAD idea. 2) Forcing drivers who prefer to drive at night when the roads are less crowded to drive in the day time isn't quite as bad, but it's just adding to congestion issues.

In any case, all the book learning is done. I've got my permit, and have passed the academic portion of the program.

Oh, and I got a second prehire. Stevens Transport. Their reefer carrier business looks very good. An average haul distance of 1500-1600 miles is exactly the sort of hauling work I was hoping to get. The pay per mile is a bit less, but with the average haul distance being so long, I think I'll be spending more time driving miles and less time idling in traffic or waiting for loads.

Still, Werner and Stevens Transport both seem like solid companies. Today, I discovered that Covenant has a firm requirement that all their new drivers must be part of a team for at least several months - after being teamed with a trainer for a fairly typical training time. If I don't already have a team driver in mind, they will choose one for me. If I'd known that beforehand, I would have never applied to them. I have less than zero interest in team driving.

TMC, another company that I like the looks of, also replied and threw me a curveball. I advised all the companies in my applications that I have an no-fault accident where I was hit from behind while I was at a full stop. TMC is the only company that wants a copy of the accident report, the rest seem to be happy with my MVR not indicating any at fault accidents. The police department records department where I need to get the report from is 80 miles from the school, and they don't offer electronic reports. I can either pick it up in person, or have it processed by snail-mail. I should have gotten a copy of the report long ago, but I was trying to save money, and it was not an at-fault accident. That's what I get for assuming. I almost certainly will not have the opportunity to go pick up the document in person, because I will be spending every weekday in class. I am going to check their webpage now to see if, perhaps, they have Saturday or Sunday hours, but the business card I got from the officer with the report number on it seemed to indicate M-F hours.

I also wish that it were a requirement that law enforcement should be required to allow all involved parties free access to at least one paper copy of any accident they are involved in. The fact that I'm having to drive across town and then pay money to get proof that I was hit from behind and wasn't at fault for an accident is a bit annoying. It's not a long drive, and it's not a lot of money. But it is still annoying.

However, the day was still a good one. I'm going to stop complaining about painful things and just be happy with the progress I've made.

Day 4 supplement:

I just discovered that the police department that I needed to get my accident report from has recently started allowing a private company to sell the reports online.

This has me conflicted. I'm very happy that I was able to rapidly acquire my accident report for TMC. At the same time, I'm highly annoyed that the government is selling law enforcement records to private companies. I just paid $11 for a copy of a report. It would have cost me $5 in person. That's a $6 markup that the police department could have used to help fund their own operations. Failing that, the GA State government could have initiated the same program. The Georgia DMV already has a lot of data online. I would have FAR rather seen the DMV provide the data for sale than the reports go through a private company.

When government has a perfectly valid and understandable way to generate an income stream that would prevent them from needing as much tax money, they should NOT sell it to private companies.

In any case, I will not provide a live link to the site, but anyone interested should be able to easily figure it out: www (dot) buycrash (dot) com

Day 5:

Very late. Short update.

Got into a truck on the yard, and also on the road today!

I managed to avoid hitting even one cone today on the range, in about 20 straight line backs, I needed to stop and pull forward two or three times to avoid cones. I've got some experience pulling MUCH smaller trailers, and a lot of that helped me for straight line backing. More difficult backing maneuvers might prove troublesome. We shall see.

When we went on the road, I discovered that the fact that I've been driving a synchronized manual transmission for nearly 20 years is going to cause me at least some problems in the short run.

Double clutching while accelerating isn't terrible. Clutch-in, shift-out, clutch-out, clutch-in, shift-in, isn't hard to do as long as I do it quickly. That's not to say I didn't fudge it up a couple times, but by the end of my time in the seat on the road, I was progressing up in gears fine. My biggest issue was remembering to change from low range to high range. (10-speed, 5 Low, 5 high)

Downshifting will be more of a challenge. Clutch-in, shift-out, clutch-out, accelerate motor, clutch-in, shift-in seems like it's only a little bit more difficult to deal with, with only one extra step, but using the accelerator when in the process of shifting gears is completely outside my experience.

I'll learn it, but I'll have to watch myself. Driving home in my personal vehicle felt VERY weird today for the first few minutes.

Day 6:

(A day late)

More backing in the yards. Visible side offset. More time on the road, either on the shoulder, going from 3rd to 6th, and then slowing to a stop and doing it again, or on long straightaways and going from 6th to 10th, up and down the gears.

Nothing terribly exciting, but I am making fewer mistakes, and less gear grinding, though I STILL have issues with downshifting by double-clutch. It's so incredibly weird to touch the gas when I'm shifting gears. For 18 years I've used a clutch and never touched the gas when clutching, other than to start. And on the school trucks, you don't use the gas to accelerate from a start.

TMC accepted the final paperwork bits and I now have a pre-hire from them as well. Now all I have to do is get that CDL and I have my choice of three solid companies to go work for.

I really need to begin studying the pre-trip checklists. Passing the backing tests will probably be easy. Probably. I'm getting more control of the trucks every day, and I've never been scared of backing up in any vehicle.

Day 7:

More touch-up paperwork with TMC. One of the forms apparently went through the fax and lost it's signature. Handled.

Did more offset backing for the first half of the day. I was a little thrown for a loop at first. I was in a different truck, but it was the same size truck. It was behaving differently. One of my fellow students a week ahead of me pointed out why that was. The driver's side front tire was slightly flat. Now I know why the truck was drifting in a direct back. Now I also know to look for flat/soft tires. Especially on the steering wheels.

When we went out on the road today, I was almost satisfied with my upshifting. I only missed a couple gears. Downshifting is getting better. I remembered to use the accelerator to rev the engine every time I needed to downshift, but I struggled with it a couple times when I forgot to take my foot off the clutch.

When we were nearly done with the road run for the day, our instructor got a phone call. Our truck was needed at the DOT. Apparently TDI student drivers have the option of requesting the actual road training truck to test in if they have failed one road test. The road training truck is a bigger vehicle, but we don't go out on the road at all with the yard trucks. The policy makes some sense, I suppose.

I was the last to drive that day, so I got tapped to drive from our typical early-driver straight roads, across county to the DOT testing facility.

We managed to arrive alive :)

Not only that, but I didn't run anyone off the road, was not responsible for any downed street signs, and the biggest mistake I made was not braking fast enough for the instructors tastes in a couple places. AKA I was not braking far enough in advance, and I need to work on that. Another problem was that I was not stopping far enough away from cross-walks and other white lines. In GA, the tested driver needs to stop far enough back that the DOT road test administrator can see road between the front of the truck and the vehicle or white stop line.

I am doing a good job of tracking my mirrors, and keeping my hands on the wheel except when shifting, and shifting quickly when needed.

Fortunately, off-tracking when driving forward is really simple (IMHO,) though I can easily imagine scenarios I would definitely not want to try to navigate through, front or back.

On the return trip to the shop, I was picked to drive again. This time, about twenty miles on I-75 South, exiting the highway on exit 185. Nobody in the truck screamed. Not even once. I managed to accelerate and merge without any problems.

Then the instructor started asking me to tell him what the signs we had just passed said... Whoops. Bridge icing warnings, and lane restrictions for vehicles with six or more tires. I had been fixated on my mirrors and the road in front of me, trying to maintain the Smith Method of driving, but I had NOT been paying attention to every single sign, only the ones for exits, speed limits, etc. That's going to have to change.

I did voluntarily shift from the right to the middle lane in order to avoid a passenger truck that thought it was a good idea to match our speed and drive next to us when their on-ramp was going to end in a quarter mile or so. No passenger vehicles were harmed in the process of moving out of dummy's way, or getting back into the right lane after dummy got out of our way. I even remembered to check my blind spots, and I was glad that the trainer explained that the flat side mirrors should barely be able to see the sides of the trailer. Having the trailer being visible only if I leaned forward a bit would be good too. That gives me a better field of view into potential blind areas. It was definitely appreciated on the highway lane changes.

I decided to make the trailer barely visible - ONLY because I want to know if my mirrors shift. If I can't see my trailer unless I lean forward, then it's possible that the mirrors might shift while driving, and I might not catch it happening.

All-in-all, a very good day.

Day 8:

We were going to go on part of the DOT test route, but there were several back-to-back accidents on I-75. So that didn't happen. We went on some alternate routes that were more complex. I was not entirely happy with my shifting, but I'm almost able to upshift without even thinking about it.

Still having issues with remembering to stop early enough to allow the DOT tester to see the road between the white line (or car in front) and the hood of the truck.

Still occasionally having issues with downshifting and forgetting to come off the clutch when I take the motor up to 1400 for the downshift.

Forgot twice and changed gears while I was crossing an intersection from a stop. Low gears in a truck are so slow! I can't stand trudging across an intersection in one gear. However I need to learn to stop doing it, or it could fail me on the driving test.

The trainer caught me on two signs as well, one was a town limit sign, the other was a strange off-color lime-green sign with a bicycle on it which indicates a bicycle route. I do not think that is a valid Georgia street sign, but I should have still noted it.

When we got back to the school, we resumed offset parking. I'm still having issues nailing either offset without pull-ups. I need to spend some time on the long yellow line tomorrow seeing what it is that I'm doing wrong when I'm backing and making adjustments while trying to back straight. Some of it is the soft tire (still not fixed) but it's happening on other trucks too. I've learned something that's caused me problems with my straight backing.

However, I did find out that I have zero problems with driver side parallel parking. In my first four tries, I nailed it all four times. No hit cones, no get outs, and no extra pull forwards. In one case I barely managed it, but the other three cases were spot on. This makes me irritated even more that I've started having issues with straight line backing and offsets.

Another good day. I've been advised by my instructors that if I don't fudge up a backing maneuver or the pre-trip inspection , I could probably pass the CDL exam now if the test administrator was in a good mood, and I still have around a week before I'm eligible to take my first test.

I really need to figure out what's changed with how I'm backing though. That's really driving me nuts.

Day 9:

There were only four people in the school today that could drive on the road, and two driving instructors, so plenty of road time today. At lunch we came back, went through some practice pre-trip inspections, and then hit the yard for more backing exercises. I've figured out what I'm doing with backing. Two things, mainly. First I realized today that truck mirrors can be adjusted in and out as well as being rotated. This means that even if the angle of the mirror is the same, the sight picture is different. Also, the soft tire as mentioned in an earlier post. And then there is the fact that the parking lot is a little more sloped in the upper sections where more complex backing maneuvers are performed. Finally, I was occasionally screwing up my straight backing because I was getting two saying confused.

"Turn left when the trailer goes left."

AND

"Turn left when you want the trailer to go right."

They both mean the same thing, and are both correct, but today I caught myself thinking "Turn left because I want the trailer to turn left." Duh! I know, I have always known, that this is incorrect, but sometimes I was still getting it confused.

Alley backing is pretty easy if set up right.

I am having a hard time with blind side parallel parking, but I think I know what I'm doing wrong, and should be able to straighten it out tomorrow.

Yup, tomorrow. Six day week this week because we did not attend school on Xmas day, and have to make up the time.