mrginge:
I have only had my class 1 a few months but i was a shunter for nearly 2yrs before. I find its all about practice, when you go into motorway services during the day instead of parking in the easiest place you can find try a blind side into a space with an empty spot next to it for error. Sometimes i screw it up trying something elaborate and no doubt other drivers in their cabs are thinking “Why didn’t he just stick it in that easy spot?” but it is nice when outside a customers premises and you get it in the right spot first time.
Well intentioned mr but most times the parking areas are busy and if you are going to mess about for sometime then you will incur great wrath. Drivers are on limited breaks and they do not want to be held up by a “learner”.
Much better is to practise on roads/depots where you will not be hampering anybody.
That way the “learner” is relaxed and less pressurised and (I hope) learn more.
I can only say how I used to do. There’s prob much better advice on here. I didn’t have electric mirrors on my old Scania. I did actually use the wide angle. I’d get out and scope out the area. Particularly the side you can’t see on the drivers side of the trailer and also the area the unit will swing into when straightening up.
You sort of have to imagine it as it looks from above in your mind’s eye as you do it. Like playing piano in the dark! I used to reverse slightly differently blind side compared to nearside. I’d pick an angle of attack that would allow me to keep the trailer in view within the wide angle as long as possible before tightening up and losing the view. I’d try and make sure that when I was at the point where I needed to tuck the unit it more and tighten up the trailer was away from obstacles as you’ll loss the vision at the point. In a nutshell, try and limit the time spent going backwards where the angle is such you can’t see jack in any of the kerbside mirrors.
mrginge:
I have only had my class 1 a few months but i was a shunter for nearly 2yrs before. I find its all about practice, when you go into motorway services during the day instead of parking in the easiest place you can find try a blind side into a space with an empty spot next to it for error. Sometimes i screw it up trying something elaborate and no doubt other drivers in their cabs are thinking “Why didn’t he just stick it in that easy spot?” but it is nice when outside a customers premises and you get it in the right spot first time.
Well intentioned mr but most times the parking areas are busy and if you are going to mess about for sometime then you will incur great wrath. Drivers are on limited breaks and they do not want to be held up by a “learner”.
Much better is to practise on roads/depots where you will not be hampering anybody.
That way the “learner” is relaxed and less pressurised and (I hope) learn more.
Fair enough i generally just do it for the crack but i suppose lucky for me i learned how to go backwards long before getting the licence so i have never had that horrible feeling 99% of new drivers get in the services. I still have my moments, i think when you get more experience you realise sooner doing a reverse manover that it needs correcting so to anyone watching they just assume your a trucking hero.
mrginge:
I have only had my class 1 a few months but i was a shunter for nearly 2yrs before. I find its all about practice, when you go into motorway services during the day instead of parking in the easiest place you can find try a blind side into a space with an empty spot next to it for error. Sometimes i screw it up trying something elaborate and no doubt other drivers in their cabs are thinking “Why didn’t he just stick it in that easy spot?” but it is nice when outside a customers premises and you get it in the right spot first time.
Well intentioned mr but most times the parking areas are busy and if you are going to mess about for sometime then you will incur great wrath. Drivers are on limited breaks and they do not want to be held up by a “learner”.
Much better is to practise on roads/depots where you will not be hampering anybody.
That way the “learner” is relaxed and less pressurised and (I hope) learn more.
Held up by a learner■■? Hope you kept your “I can do everything perfectly same day I passed my test” certificate.
Im sure most experienced drivers watching a guy just passed trying to park thought " I remember struggling first times out " and maybe get out and help I would if it looked like they were struggling.
Very right, I can remember well those first few weeks and watching the experienced guys at the docks swing into the lanes with perfection, I watched them like a hawk and aspired to try and be as smooth, like everything if you don’t practice you wont get better eh .
Held up by a learner■■? Hope you kept your “I can do everything perfectly same day I passed my test” certificate.
Im sure most experienced drivers watching a guy just passed trying to park thought " I remember struggling first times out " and maybe get out and help I would if it looked like they were struggling.
Hi day trunker
I wish I could do everyting perfectly but alas I am as rubbish now as I was long ago.
If you read my text I was saying that I thought it better for the “learner” (which I was once and stilll am) to practice in situations that do not cause conflict or pressure and be better for the “learner”.
Say for example. Say that you are on 4 hours 25 minutes and to pull up behind 4 wagons waiting to tip or whatever. All waiting behind a “learner” trying to park blindside or not. Would you not be concerned about your own hours, I would be about mine.
Of course people need to learn and get experience but there is a time and place.
Ps on the day I passed my test I was a learner and I still am.
You just need to do a printout and a manual entry, problem sorted…I understand your point, but it isn’t like you come across this every time your on 4hr 25m and need to park
If you do a lot of blind side ask the boss for a classic Pete you can sit in the drivers seat reach across and touch the passenger door blind side not so hard then lol.
I just take my time don’t really care how often I gotta shunt and use the electric mirrors
You answered the question yourself. 6 blindsiders in 6 years. Im no fluent expert, but every chance I get, I have a go, I dont always do a good one, sometimes I make a right ■■■■ of it, bit I usually take most presented opportunities
Every truck driver should be forced to do at least 3 months shunting. Perhaps then we wouldn’t see the monumentally horrific examples of reversing that you see absolutely everywhere even in an Asda RDC where despite several football pitches of room in front of you and big white lines to guide you some people seem to need 20 shunts to hit a loading bay.
It amazes me seeing a shunter reversing in either way, no messing zooms in and that’s it! Quicker than I can find reverse!
Anyway, not done much apart from bay 1 at Alfreton Coop?? Anyone done that■■? Took me ages but got it in without hitting anything and actually lined up good for the bay!
With the truck on the bay the unit is pointing at sky a wall in front of you with what looks like steps filled in with concrete.
118steve:
It amazes me seeing a shunter reversing in either way, no messing zooms in and that’s it! Quicker than I can find reverse!
Anyway, not done much apart from bay 1 at Alfreton Coop?? Anyone done that■■? Took me ages but got it in without hitting anything and actually lined up good for the bay!
With the truck on the bay the unit is pointing at sky a wall in front of you with what looks like steps filled in with concrete.
Our night shunters can ‘Chuck’ trailers into gaps, in the dark, really quickly too !
We just end up trying to get all the damaged fixed in the morning, before we can leave the yard. Lol.
(It would be Funny, if it wasn’t Laughable)
Dipper_Dave:
I did one once so good that I was expecting a round of applause from all the other drivers. But the buggers all pretended they werent watchin.
lol, that is so typical
I always felt like that when I used to go into Daniels in Leeds, pretty tight, dark, an all or nothing reverse most of the time and with no audience
taffytrucker:
If you do a lot of blind side ask the boss for a classic Pete you can sit in the drivers seat reach across and touch the passenger door blind side not so hard then lol.
I just take my time don’t really care how often I gotta shunt and use the electric mirrors
My T600 has an awfully narrow cab too but the best thing about the old shed is the great big side window in the sleeper. Just pop the cover off, crane your neck back and for a good amount of angle you’ve got an excellent view down the blind side. Failing that, as you say, lean across the cab a bit and look out of the passenger window!! However all that said, I’ll always back in on my good side if at all possible.
Conor:
Every truck driver should be forced to do at least 3 months shunting. Perhaps then we wouldn’t see the monumentally horrific examples of reversing that you see absolutely everywhere even in an Asda RDC where despite several football pitches of room in front of you and big white lines to guide you some people seem to need 20 shunts to hit a loading bay.
I can hit a loading bay with no shunts, in fact I can hit anything with no shunts. But seriously, we only had one 6" x 4" flat mirror on each side when I first started and I don’t remember being worried about blind side reversing. Not just me, but nobody seemed to bother about it. Mind you, no internet then.
