Beginning CDL Training In Massachusetts

June 2016

After a long while of starting and restarting of The High Road Training Program I went and successfully obtained a 2 year DOT medical card from a chiropractor licensed to do DOT physicals. The exam wasn't that involved and it was cheap at $60. My insurance didn't cover DOT physicals and it was cheaper than the $150 and up other places were quoting. Happily bopped on over to the RMV to take the CDL learner's permit test and promptly failed their vision test. Regardless of what the vision box on the DOT card says the RMV will spot test you again. They do have an official waiver that can be signed by an optometrist which will get you out of the test.

It was a bit confusing as reading books had never been an issue and neither is seeing clearly straight to the horizon. Also no issues with colors or peripheral. A few weeks later the optometrist said it's an astigmatism and the mid-distance area has trouble coming to a focus. Issued a new pair of glasses that are a pain but have eliminated a lot of head and jaw aches. Who knew. Transferred job, CDL on hold.

June 01, 2017 - Morning

One year later. Started and finished a good part of High Road, again. It's a great program. Went to the RMV and passed General Knowledge, Air brakes and Combination (and the vision test). Couldn't take the tanker endorsement due to lack of money. My driver's license was expiring in less than 6 months and you can't hold a permit that extends past the license expiration date. So an extra $50 was spent there instead of the extra endorsement. In the long run having to pay another $30 test fee plus the tanker test fee doesn't really matter. Since Hazmat and Doubles/Triples can only be issued to an actual CDL holder another test will be necessary as it is.

In case it happens to someone else; The clerks at the registry had a tough time figuring out why the tests wouldn't activate properly and later on why the CDL permit wouldn't print. Both were due to the license expiration date issue. They did manage eventually.

June 01, 2017 - Afternoon

There really isn't too much information out there on basic Massachusetts trucking driving schools other than it being difficult to get licensed here because of the state troopers conducting the testing.

Without mentioning names I had e-mailed the closest place for more information but received no response. Not really a surprise as their website was out of date. Showed up anyway around 3:30PM and rang the (broken) bell at a standing room only counter. After several long minutes a clerk appeared from the back and asks if I have an appointment. I didn't, but explained I was just looking for Class A program or enrollment information. Clerk says that they only take appointments for an interview with the owner. After more long minutes another clerk for scheduling comes out but we can't decide on a day and time. I mention already having a permit and ask to leave my name and number for the owner to call me and they looked as if I just ran over their dog.

Never did receive a call.

June 02, 2017

The school that had actually come personally recommended to me is south of Boston. The location is much more time & distance from the house especially with traffic in that area which is annoying. They have a good website with an online form for information requests and had sent back an e-mail within a day with all the relevant info someone could ask for. It may or may not have been an automated response but it contained various upcoming dates and times for open house and classes so it was up-to-date. As a bonus they welcome walk-ins during business hours.

Showed up right behind another fellow interested in driving a Class B straight truck. The office is what you'd expect to see at a CDL school. Plenty of seating, water/magazines, job boards/recruitment posters. Assumably they've been around a while and the proximity to Boston and some major industrial parks for the area probably helps their cause. The two clerks were friendly and joking with us and spent quite a bit of time answering questions for Mr. Class B and even showed him new job postings they had open for Class B job placement.

Supposedly because of the job placement they send everyone for new medical cards and drug tests regardless if you have a valid card already. Was a little disappointed not to save some money there as mine is still good for 1 more year.

After the clerk had stuffed me full of jolly ranchers they mentioned that after the academic hours are over the hands-on schooling and testing is done at a site 20 miles closer to my house. I paid the initial enrollment fee and signed up.

June 26 - June 30. 2017

First 5 days of class with 8 other hopeful guys. Our instructor is an old hand with over 4 1/2 million miles. Packets and study books are handed out and filled out. Old Hand is surprised I have a permit already. We watch some dated, industry standard instructional movies and are issued many, increasingly lengthy general knowledge, air brakes, and combination paper tests that almost all of which was already covered in The High Road Training Program. My tests are finished in record time with all passing with usually only a couple wrong due to wording or trickery. It was noticable how in just a couple of days everyone else caught on to the test questions through memorization. Due to taking The High Road so many times and coupled with the paper tests in class I'm very much over the questions. It's good practice but it does get tiring. A silver lining is all the insight and experience our instructor is giving us while reviewing the questions. Old Hand has a good sense of humor and I'm grateful for all the stories and anecdotes about the industry and trucking lifestyle. You can tell he actually cares a great deal about sharing his experience to help us become truck drivers and not just CDL holders.

Noticably; The High Road Training Program has many questions in it that the were actually on the Registry tests that weren't covered at all by the school. That may actually be something to bring up with them later on.

We also had 2 recruiters come in and talk with us; Adam from TMC and another from a local construction company. If anyone from TMC is reading this your man Adam may be the best pitch man in the business. Take everything with a grain of salt of course - like it'd be nice if he replaced the words "more responsibility" with "more liability" - but he did make hauling flatbed loads for commission in a new Peterbilt tractor with your own name on it sound pretty good. On the flip side everyone I know who has done flatbed work hasn't liked it at all.

Lastly at the end of the week we all got to do a drop and hook. No one wanted to go first especially with the rest of us standing there staring at them but finally one kid took one for the team.

The backing up looked pretty rough and while no one was judgemental some of the guys recognized it to be because of the clutch work. I'm probably the only guy there who hasn't driven a standard so that scared the **** out of me. A few other guys went including one who had Coach and one who had large but non-CDL truck experience. They didn't have any issues. During break time I expressed my shifting concern to Old Hand who reassured me it was OK and it was actually better than having to break bad habits from someone who has driven stick in a passenger car or truck. Briefly wondered if that was a default response to put guys at ease but decided to take it at face-value. By dumb luck one of the other instructors had a private lesson and had to take the truck. That left us with an older automatic they used to road test with before it would give an automatic-only restriction on your license.

I jumped in and was immediately confused because there wasn't a shifter at all. Just vertical buttons on the dashboard to change gears. These buttons did not give any sort of confident click or anything when you pushed them so it was a little tricky. After pulling forward I couldn't seem to line up the outside edge of the tractor tire with the trailer in the mirrors - it looked fine but was too far outside - we all went under the trailer and talked about what could happen if you miss the slot for the kingpin. After getting back in to try again I realized I had been looking in the convex distance mirrors and looking in the actual side mirrors everything was so much more obvious. With the tractor frame slowly backing under the trailer and a slight "you're good" nod from another student it coupled up.

No one really had any issues with the landing gear, king pin/checking, or line hook-ups during their turn other than wear and tear on the glad hands making life difficult and rememebering to release tension on the kingpin so the next guy up could pull it.

July 3, 2017

Today's class was cargo securement and Hazmat oriented. We watched a mix of videos over the course of the day. The first cargo securement and Hazmat videos were newer with the Hazmat being a real glazed eye, memory overload. The final Hazmat video was obviously much older but was actually much easier to follow. Passed the tests with no issue. As usual prior High Road Training Program experience helped immensely. We're off tomorrow for the 4th. Looking forward to pre-trip and air brakes later in week.

We have conflicting information on whether or not getting the D/T & Hazmat endorsements are possible without an actual CDL. A couple of the other guys are going today to get their permits so we'll find out Wednesday.

Very interesting read! Seems like you are enjoying so far and seem to be doing well. I do agree that getting into the HazMat this early seems like a bunch of information overload. I am currently going back through the High Road Training Program to add the HazMat endorsement onto my CDL. Good luck and I am sure you will do just fine. Keep us updated as much as possible I really did enjoy reading this.

Thanks icecold24k! Will do. It's definitely been interesting so far. We were told that getting the Hazmat endorsement post-CDL is beneficial anyway because otherwise the State Troopers here would tack on a Hazmat stop during the road test. Around here we have a lot of ports and chem plants running Hazmat so it's definitely a must-have eventually.

July 5, 2017

It was super tough to get back into the routine today after the mid-week holiday. Barely slept and was up at 0530 per usual to shower and get to school earlier than 8AM. Leaving early is necessary as the first 25 miles of Route 24 is only 2 lanes before opening up to 3 and with all the traffic heading into the Boston area in the morning it doesn't take much to slow it down and back it up solid for miles. There's a Walmart to kill time at near the school and they've had some great Manager's Specials at open. Scored a ridiculous 9 lbs of turkey pastrami for $4.30!!!! and $7 "hot and ready" chicken, wedges, rice meals for $2.19!

Three other guys have their permit now which leaves 4 to go, with another completing air brakes but getting tripped up on general and combo. Permits are "due" tomorrow but we'll see what happens. Also, one guy did do doubles / triples but it won't be active until after he is a CDL holder.

In class we got hit with quite a few subjects and movies;

Air brakes & Pre-trip / intra-trip / post-trip Hours of Service Regulations, driver's record of duty status / paper logs / electronic logs Bridge law, weigh stations, axle weights, proper sliding of tandems & fifth wheel Cat Scales procedures; standard, split, doubles

The day flew by because it was all super interesting. For every subject Old Hand had stories and examples from his years out on the road from common mistakes and tips, dealing with the DOT , shippers, receivers, other drivers, violations, and the comedic drama of people improperly weighing their vehicles or sliding their tandems.

Everyone did mock paper logs from a day of written times and activities which is harder than it looks and it took me 3 sheets to get right. Was definitely relieved when the hours added up correctly. One small mistake just ruins your entire Christmas which is frustrating but kind of funny at the same time. Seems like properly completing it going about the day will be easier? It's almost a little disappointing that the electronic logging device law is almost in full effect because the paper logs are kind of cool and weirdly satisfying.

Tomorrow we're outside with a substitute instructor and it's finally time for practical air brakes and pre-trip. The pre-trip here in Massachusetts is absolutely crazy. It's necessary to do the entire truck and I understand why but is still a lot of pressure.

July 6th, 2017

Today we had a substitute instructor with 2.5 million miles under his belt. He was a car hauler so I'll go with PPL short for Portable Parking Lot. PPL is more laid back and had a completely different view than Old Hand on career choice as he strongly disliked going over the road. In the last couple of days both instructors have given us a lot of background on their own career choices and their reasoning and pro's and cons, while also giving examples of other people they know who went one way or the other or ended up switching and why. It was nice to get that bit of career contrast.

So we spent time outside going through pre-trip. Our pre-trip study sheets are about half a dozen pages front and back, so it was good to finally go through it on the vehicle and be able to start committing locations to memory. I've rolled around in my driveway plenty of times pulling engines and replacing parts so most items were recognizable but seeing things makes all the difference.

Something PPL showed us that was extremely helpful was how to take advantage of equipment that physically flows from one item to another E.g. Radiator and two-stage reservoir to radiator hose to water pump/belt. Or steering shaft to steering gear box to pitman arm, drag link upper/lower control arm, knuckle, tie rod, etc. It really knocks off a huge chunk of what needs to be touched on. Remembering the isolated equipment and of course properly describing what I'm inspecting for is the tricky part.

We also had a recruiter from Werner come in. It was an actual presentation with video and he showed us some of the regional employment they have around this area. The available work didn't seem too bad but the 401k seemed pretty lacking in comparison to the other companies so far.

July 7 / July 10, 2017

Last 2 days in the classroom for kinetic energy, perception hazards / hazard testing, aggressive driving and a big section on turning and some videos required by law! Average classroom days with not too much to report.

Recruiter from Schneider came in and got right into the details with us. Health benefits are pretty much the same everywhere so far. 401k trumped Werners. The pitch seemed to be the opposite of the standard recruiting BS every recruiter for anywhere seems to do. Instead of 20 reasons why you should come work for us it really was more like "Hi folks. We have our s*** together. This is what we do and how we do it. If you want to come work for us this is what you can expect and if you think you can handle that and are interested - we'll give you a shot." Well not exactly - but it was clear he was honest and wasn't there to waste time. I filled the information card out and will look into them more later on.

We're out in the field starting tomorrow.