Day 2:
Started off much better than day 1. i now have the feel of how much extra room i need to take on the road to not go up the kerbs. We missed out the airfield today and concentrated on town driving, hill starts and awkward junctions.
Day 3:
Starting to feel a lot more relaxed and comfortable with the extra 30ft behind us. kerbs are now a thing of the past. Instructor did a secret ‘test’ that i didnt know he was doing. we went around one of the test routes, and it was only when we stopped for a cuppa, that he told me that on the last 45 - 50 mins driving, if i had been on test i would have passed. so that gets me on a bit of a high hearing that. off to the airfield now to practice there. Couple / Uncouple 2 or 3 times. reverse 5 or 6 times . 1 emergency stop. then off back to the yard.
Day 4:
Best day so far. Instructor says he feels im ready for my test, not really much more that can be done now, just keep practicing until test day and fingers crossed ill be class 1 driver tuesday afternoon. more reversing and trailer uncouple / coupling. more awkward junctions etc.
some pics of the coupling equipment on the W+D
Pin Indicator, This shows when the pin has dropped and is engaged. If you havnt coupled quite right the indicator will be angled slightly higher than shown on the pic above. above shows the properly engaged position. Also shown are the ‘Jaws’ on the truck and the Eye of the Drawbar. as you can see there isnt much room for error at all. you have to reverse the unit dead straight onto the eye.
Shown here is the Pin release controls. The handle is in the locked position as shown in the picture (handle pointing down) to release the pin you have to pull up the plunger ontop of the control box and turn the handle to the up position. The setup we are using is an automatic system. Before coupling up you put the lever back in the down position, and as the eye engages into the jaws, there is a pressure plate that automatically drops the pin down and locks it in place, sometimes its often better to wind the trailer up 2 turns on the legs to make sure the pin drops when you back onto it.
Picture showing the susies we use, note they are different from standard susies, these are continental ones, much easier imo. as a side note the connections on the trailer are still standard susies so students can get experience with both types
pic of the setup ive been driving 