Accepted My First Job

Ahhh the coils...I"d rather nail chicken feet to the trailer and head for Tyson... There are 2 names for coil loads...Shotgun, and Suicide...and those names ain't no joke. Coils are tough to get tight, and I ALWAYS added an extra chain front and back...CYA..

Yeah they have preached to secure more then legal. It doesn't sound fun but the challange does.

Well orientation is now done. We got our log books and spent the day outside in 20 degree weather getting a preview of strapping a coil and also metal sheets. It was very informative and gave me an idea of what this is gonna be like. Right now I have mixed feelings just because I had no feeling in my feet or hands lol. Anyway all the formalities are now done and its time to head on the road. They gave me the name of my trainer and his phone number. Didnt wanna bother him today but tomorrow Ill be giving him a call to see what I need to bring and how its all going to go down Monday morning. Im excited and horribly nervous as well. Thanks to all of you for the advice and help though this. Ill definitely be keeping you updated on how its all going.

TroyD

Troy....just relax....you will find that flatbedders aren't very excitable...It may be because of all those shotgun and suicide coils . So your trainer and you will probably get along fine..And your JOB is to learn learn learn...while you are with him.WATCH what and how he does it, ASK questions when you have them,SPEAK up if you don't understand, and PRACTICE every chance you can get.

BTW....thats WASP....Watch...Ask...Speakup...Practice. The very best way to learn all you can possibly learn while you have the chance..

Good Luck !!! and enjoy your adventure !!!

Troy....just relax....you will find that flatbedders aren't very excitable...It may be because of all those shotgun and suicide coils . So your trainer and you will probably get along fine..And your JOB is to learn learn learn...while you are with him.WATCH what and how he does it, ASK questions when you have them,SPEAK up if you don't understand, and PRACTICE every chance you can get.

BTW....thats WASP....Watch...Ask...Speakup...Practice. The very best way to learn all you can possibly learn while you have the chance..

Good Luck !!! and enjoy your adventure !!!

Thanks. I wrote that down and will be bringing that with me.

Right now I have mixed feelings just because I had no feeling in my feet or hands lol.

Good one! I'm from outside Buffalo, NY so I can appreciate that!

Congrats on getting through it! Yeah, hopefully your trainer will be easy to get along with. And everyone is super nervous at this stage. You'll be just fine. Trucking involves a lot of pressure so it's imperative to practice remaining calm and clearing your mind in stressful situations. And over the next few months you'll get lots of practice!

But just learn all you can, take your time, double and triple check everything, and do your best to enjoy it all as you go.

Welp meet my trainer at the terminal at 730 am tomorrow morning. Im excited to get out there but very nervous just because well its my first time out but the weather is also horrible right now. I really hope he lets me just sit and observe tomorrow to get a feel for how it works.

Went to the store today and bought some bread and PB & J, a few soups and some chips to snack on. Also grabbed a few of the great Ramen Noodles. $375 a week for training I have to go cheap a little bit lol. Good part is when Im with the trainer they put us in a hotel every night. So hopefully its one that has a decent breakfast.

Anyway wish me luck. Gonna be crazy in this weather but Im ready to go.

Hey...I'm a junk food junky !!! I like top ramen !! and if it has carbs, I'm a happy camper !!! I know,...I know...its not healthy...but I"m one of those fortunate people who have really low good AND bad cholesterol, and my bp is in check...And I figure that if I can get critically ill at a truck stop from eating off the buffet...junk food won't be what kills me....

Well today was the end of day 2 with my trainer. Let me first say I lucked out and got an awesome trainer. A little back info. We don't run as a team. We stay at a hotel everynight. Anyway.

Day 1 I meet him at the terminal and its starting to snow. We have to pick up 55, 000 lbs of Ibeams and take them all the way to northern Michigan in Onaway. About 30 min from the Mackinac bridge. The weather was horrible so needless to say I didn't drive at all on day 1 which was completely fine with me. I wanted to sit and just watch and ask questions which is exactly what I did lol. We made it to Gaylord MI and shut down for the day at about 4 pm. We couldn't deliver after 3 pm so no need to rush. We got the hotel and went to Burger King to grab a bite to eat then went back to the hotel. He showed me how to fill out my log book by showing me his and explaining it. After that we crashed because the weather was horrible and they were expecting and got about 6 inches of snow. It was also very bitter cold.

Day 2 It was 3 degrees with a wind chill of -14 when we got up at 5 am. Went out to warm the truck up and it didn't want to but slowly turned over and fired up. We head out after our pretrip and he is driving because the roads are all snow covered. We make it to Onaway in about an hour and we had another driver from Modular there to get unloaded as well. They get us both unloaded and now Modular wants us to switch trailers with each other. We had a 45' one and he had a 48'. Now with that all done we find out we are heading to Clair Mi to pick up a 9500 lb load of very small pipes. We not but 4' long. We get that strapped and tarped and off we go to Lansing Mi to pick up an oversized load. Its one freakin plate that hangs over each side of the deck by like 4-5" lol my trainer couldn't believe it was only 1. It weighed about 2400lbs. So now we got that loaded and strapped and tarped, now we have to put all the oversize warnings on the truck so he showes me how to hang the banners, pop the middle light out of the trailer to hook up the warning lights. We get all that set up with the nice orange flags and we are ready to rock. We have 2 loads on the truck so the first one which is the pipes we picked up in Clair Mi are going to Ft Wayne IN. The oversize load goes to Harrison OH. We are now done for the night in Angola IN.

The weather go a lot better while in Lansing so I was getting more eager to drive. We were at where 69 and 94 meet and we stopped at the TA truck stop on 94 to fuel up and so he could pull money off the comdata card to pay for the hotel for the rest of the week. We fuel up and he shows me how to do that and we go inside and I fill up my 64 oz mug with some good ole Mt Dew. He then says to me "you ready to drive?" I'm like hell yea lets do this. He got a kick outta that so here we go the nerves are really ramped up. My first drive is with an oversize load although it wasn't that much of an oversize. I only had about 40 min of driving to do because I guess with oversize you cant drive in the dark. So here we are now in Angola and I'm ready to get back behind that wheel tomorrow. It makes a world of difference having a great trainer.

I will keep you all updated. Oh and Tarping sucks lol but I can get use to it. Also if there are any typos I'm sorry , I'm on my phone.

TroyD

Glad to hear you got a great trainer! I don't know where all these great trainers were when it was my turn. Oh well, I did get some good stories to tell out of it though.

Well first week is down and wow is all I can say. Here I was thinking all along that I was gonna be more worried about the securing of loads and such and to me that has been fairly easy so far. Its the driving that is driving me insane. Im so nervous and Ill admit scared when im driving. I was in Chicago for the first time and I dont even remember breathing. My trainer was like dude relax while he was laughing because my knuckles were white. He says I driver great but man Im a nervous wreck behind the wheel. I thought the driving was gonna be the part I would be fine with. On Friday I drove from Chicago to the Port of Indiana to pick up some sheets and then drove that back to Grand Rapids and I started feeling more comfortable. It also didnt help that the weather sometimes was not the greatest. So far so good though. Looking forward to heading back out again tomorrow.

TroyD