Unreasonable Request?

Hello all,

It has been a minute since I've contributed to thw message board but do read it from time to time still.

My new life as a trucker has taken away some of my frequent web surfing tendencies.

Anyhow, I got assigned a new driver manager about 3 weeks ago & just came home for hometime the 1st time since this has happened.

He sent me a list of hometime expectations which included me going back to my truck every day to start it. I am home for 4 days.

To me..I don't see the benefit & My plans when I'm at home aren't always conpatible with this & the closest place to park my truck is 11 miles away too.

I'm not getting paid for my personal gas or mileage for doing this & it can throw a wrench in what I may have planned while I am here as well.

I want some other opinions on this.. Is there an actual reason it should be started EVERY day when I am only here for 4? Will they notice if I don't? Am I wrong for thinking my hometime is my free time & shouldn't have to involve anything trucking related?

Thank you in advance.

Did they say why they want you to do that by chance?

I know in the winter if it's really cold a diesel engine can have some trouble starting, and if you have some sort of a short in the electrical system it can drain the batteries over a period of a few days. But honestly, no, I don't think that's a reasonable request. Not on your home time. I've done that sort of thing myself voluntarily just to ease my mind during a seriously cold stretch or something. But unless I had a very good reason for it there was no reason to do it.

Ask him why he wants you to do that. It sounds like he gave you a standard list of precautions that someone passed on to him at some point. I'm curious what his reasoning is.

And be careful not to get defensive or be confrontational about it, especially since you guys just began working together. You know how it is, it's a lot harder to get on someone's good side if you get off to a bad start. Right now you have no idea why he's saying that. It could be something the boss wants him to relay to all drivers. I really don't know. But be cool about it with him.

They just want to make sure that when you get back the truck wont have dead batteries. Find the battery switch and turn it to the 'Off' position and unplug everything inside the truck and you'll be alright.

As for his request, in my opinion I would ignore it. Your hometime is your hometime and I would never go back to the truck as he recommends. Its way unreasonable, but do make sure to turn off the batteries because then you'll be the one looking like the dummy.

Johnny, as a rookie you've not experienced some of the things that can really mess up your whole week, and cause a big mess in your driver manager's plans. One of those things is going back to your truck after four days of home time, having a critical load assigned to you, and then discovering your truck won't start because the batteries have run down. It can take hours to get the breakdown people to find someone to come get you started and then everything is thrown into chaos.

I guarantee you that this driver manager is trying to help you avoid this mishap, and that is a good thing. Many trucks have a battery disconnect switch that can be used to help avoid this problem.

If it's really an issue that is going to cause problems for you contact your driver manager, explain the logistics issue to him and communicate professionally with him. He will understand.

Anytime your off duty that long it really is a good idea to disconnect the batteries.

Personally I start my truck each day that I'm at home. If I don't the battery in my Zonar tablet (our version of the Qualcomm) dies and it takes forever to get it working properly after that.

Your driver manager sounds to me like he's looking out for you. Try to work with him understanding his concerns. That's how you get to be at the top of the food chain out here.

I've never had a truck with an "off" switch for the batteries, but that would have been nice!

I think the dead battery thing could very well be it. If you haven't had that truck shut off for a full 24 hours before then it would be a good idea to go back there after 24 hours or so and see how it acts when you go to fire it up. If it cranks right up, no issues, then you're probably good to go. If it seems a little weak then you might have an issue of some sort, maybe old batteries, maybe a small short, who knows?

If there's a battery disconnect, that would certainly be the thing to do.

Personally I start my truck each day that I'm at home. If I don't the battery in my Zonar tablet (our version of the Qualcomm) dies and it takes forever to get it working properly after that.

Oh you kids and these fancy electronic gizmos these days!

I never heard of Zonar.

Yeah, that tablet going dead is a great example of the unusual problems you can run into with the truck shut down for a while. These rigs are meant to run and run and run. They don't like being shut down for long.

The battery shut-off switch is usually found near the drivers side door, next to the area where the seat assembly is mounted to the floor. I use this switch to force a cold start reboot for the Qualcomm , Swift's version of The Zonar. Attach the suffix " The Magnificent" and Zonar sounds like the perfect name for a an "Old School" magician.

Here's a picture of a Freightliner battery switch, right inside the driver's door. Pete and KW switches are pretty much the same.

A truck should have no problem starting after 4 days if it has good batteries and not an excessive drain. Don't expect a fridge to run though I would unplug that. If it does have problems I would look at getting the truck to a shop to find out why. On that same note I had seen an o/o put a solar panel on his truck to keep his batteries charged while not running.

(None of the above applies in cold weather)

Attach the suffix " The Magnificent" and Zonar sounds like the perfect name for a an "Old School" magician.

Zonar The Magnificent.....that's an excellent magician's name! Black cape, sparkly stars on his pointy hat, long wand, 70's mustache.....