Class one training diary!

NEW AND WANNABE DRIVERS (INTERACTIVE)
21

AndyM:
Wayne…

This is how my instrustor told me how to do it for the first time… Dunno if it will help… but here goes…

Right, to Start with, FORGET the trailer is even there!!!.. you can parallel park, so just as you start to move backwards, get the Right Hand lock As soon as you can… look out the side window, or in the mirror, and get your back drive wheels about 2 ft from the yellow line…Once they are 2 ft away from the line then get your unit straight by getting the steering wheel back in the middle, again, as soon as you can, Now you should be running parallel with the yellow line on your right hand side… as soon as its straight, try and look out the passenger door window at the Herring Bone markings in the middle of the Reversing pitch… count back about 10-12ft, as you should be able to see the markings and numbers throught the window. Once you count back, 10-12ft, look out the drivers window, and start getting your drive wheels next to the line, this is bringing your unit drive wheels back out away from the line and your unit back in line with your trailer… NOW is the time you should think about you trailer.… as all this movement with the unit, will make the trailer go where you want it to… this happens without you having to think about it…

Once your rear wheels of the unit come away from the yelow line, you now look in your mirrors to get the trailer in view on both sides in the same amount… By this time you are Past the ‘B’ cone that is the cone in the middle!!

Now this is where you have to get the feel of backing up, with only very small movements of the steering wheel…once your unit and trailer are straight, and your front wheels are straight, put your hands in the ‘Quarter to three’ position on the steering wheel,… now you only move the wheel at **Most One Quarter of a turn.**Now, try to get a little more trailer visible in the right hand mirror, but remember, you can look out your window!!.. this will mean that you are guiding the trailer to the right hand side, and you should looking at your trailers wheels and seeing the line they are taking… if you need more turn, turn the steering wheel One quarter turn to the left. if you have got to much, then its one turn to the right…
Think of it like this …Going forward, you turn right, to go right, left to go left… well, your going the opposite direction now, so you do the oppsite, right to go left, left to go right… Make sense■■?.. :confused: :confused: :confused:

This is how I managed to do it, and after reading it back… I am having my doubts… but hey, hope it helps a little… :unamused: :unamused:

Keep ya chin up mate, I know exactly how your feeling… Been there, Done that.!! :unamused: :unamused:

All the best buddy… :wink: :wink: :wink: :wink:

Flippen eck!!!

I have drove artics for a while & I didnt realise it was that hard! :confused: :open_mouth: :open_mouth: :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:.

My Advise is this, Calm down take a deap breath, get you head out the window and slowly make your move, keep watching remember do it slow, then you can correct a wrong steer keep your head out the window, look at the drive wheels so you know where you are pushing,give a bit take a bit back, nice and slow and nice and calm.
take a shunt if you need to but if you do, take a good shunt and get yourself straight.

A friend had the idea that longer it took him to do the reverse shorter the road test would be specialy on a Saturday :wink: :open_mouth: :open_mouth: I am not sure if it is true or not but he passed because he TOOK HIS TIME REVERSING!!

You can do it …you dont need luck just calm nerves!

See you on the road in your new topliner soon :wink:

22

One other thing to consider is that after you pass on Saturday and start driving artics for a living you will never, ever encounter a reverse like the one on the test again. :wink: :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

23

As Neil says, the reverse maneuovre is out of date , the only time you may have to it is at South Mimms at 7.00 pm to nick a space before a foreigner gets in ! :laughing:

Seriously mate,it’s got better this week, and it WILL get better.

Good luck.

P.S.It’s nice of you to post your diary on here - this must give you some extra pressure that you don’t need.

Good luck and all the best mate.

24

it doesnt actually add pressure writing on here niall, it’s a bit embarrasing telling you lot what a numpty i am being. the real pressure is being able to pass it so i don’t let my friends and family down, especially my wife who has put up with me for the last four months being unemployed with very little money coming in, and supported me 100% with this change of career. then there is my mother in law who has lent me 2k so i could get through this and the real pressure is lettin them down if i don’t pass and obviously i am gonna feel gutted to my boots casue i really feel that lorry driving is my true vocation!! and i really really want it :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

p.s you will all have to suffer another one if i dont pass saturday :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

25

If you really wan’t it , at the end of the day you’ll get it.

Don’t worry for one minute about letting people down - if you think that you will be disappointed and so will the others.

Show all the relatives the Truck Net posts, and let them make their own minds up.

If it’s any consolation mate, I didn’t pass my car test 1st time,and I didn’t pass my class 1 test the 1st time.

If it’s your true vocation , you will get there.

Good luck mate !

26

once you pass mate youll look back at these posts and laugh. i had big trouble with nerves on my test, i passed and ive enjoyed most of the job ever since. remember- if you make a mistake they wont chop your head off! every one on this board (with the exception of a few with grandfather rights) has had to pass a test. if we can do it you can. chin up, deep breaths, dont panic or rush.

27

nice one niall, we’ll see mate…as they say tommorrow is another day lol new beginning an all that. end of the day can only do my best i suppose :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: it is just an amazing feeling when i read all these posts and messages of support which is why i love this place so much cause ur all diamond people!!! :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

28

thanks johnboy, will bear that in mind tommorow mate :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

29

I read your other thread first, hence the reply but this thread has bought back so many memories. When I did my training my nerves were completly out of control and a good friend found me sobbing in the rain, looking at the reversing pad so he took me to a motorway bridge at Corley Bank and he said
“Look at the trucks, there’s hundreds of them and they are not all being driven by rocket scientists, it can’t be that difficult now can it?”
Then he went and sat in the car and left me to get my head together and I will never be able to thank him enough I realised that I was stopping myself from learning because I was convinced that I just would never be able to do it, what I needed to do was know that I am not stupid and I needed to watch where I was going wrong and learn from it. A truck is a machine and it only does what you tell it to do so I needed grasp the right instructions.
So you are by far a long way from being the first person to be crippled with nerves I’m sure your just feeling the pressure unlike myself who was proving to be completly inept but I got there in the end and I have faith in you. If by any chance saturday is not your day then there will be another and Trucknet will be behind you all the way. :wink:

30

Margate…
Everyone has already given you better advice than I ever could… :open_mouth:
I know it is easy to say, but trust me, all of a sudden the reverse technique will come, as Lady trucker says . some of us drivers are not rocket scientists but we passed, Try not too stress about the reverse and follow the good advice given and and suddenly it all becomes clear how to get the trailer where you want it to go.

I would wish you good luck, but I dont believe you need it, you have the ability to do this , and you will!!!

31

blimey lady, i was starting to fill up with that message :frowning: :frowning: thanks very much not just to lady but all of you, all you guys and girls with all your support are one of the reasons i have not just jacked it in and have persevered with it :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: i know i keep saying it but i really can’t thank you all enough!!! if had the money i would throw you all a massive party!! but i ain’t so i can’t :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

32

Hey , good luck with it Wayne. I learned with Learn HGV, and I took my test at Hersden, so your story is like a little flashback of my own life 16 years ago…

Dont worry if you become nervous as the test nears, its the same for everybody. In my experience, this disappears completely as the test actually starts. At this point, you will be running on adrenalin.

I did my test over the Margate route and as I came under the railway bridge just up from the Victoria lights, I had to make such an emergency stop (to avoid a Ford Capri that was being chased by the police) that my examiner, Mr Mummery flew forward and cracked his head on the windscreen. I asked him three times if he wanted me to take him to Margate hospital to get looked at.

I think it was his confusion and concussion that led to him passing me!

Let me know when you pass, I will ask around for a job for you. My own employer would take on a new driver if he was enthusiastic enough, and sensible with it. You won`t find much in "Fannit* though, I work in Sittingbourne and if you are prepared to travel this kind of distance then you should find a job.

If you pass, I`ll let you buy me a beer :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

Vince

33

well day 4 has now finished.

after only having three hours sleep the night before lesson four, i am knackered and no i was not on the beer either :laughing: :laughing: just could not sleep with all the pressure i have heaped on myself.

anyways, lesson four starts and we go straight to the reversing pad yippee :frowning: :frowning: :frowning: :frowning: :frowning: all those negative thoughts start coming back from yesterday. the instructor (dave, what a diamond he is!!) tells me he will reverse the lorry back into the start box and then i do the rest. so while i think i will call him diamond dave from now on :laughing: :laughing: gets the lorry at the start position, i look around and try to get a mental picture of what i am going to do and (i know this is gonna sound mad) but i say to myself that i can do it and i am the guvnor not the lorry!!

so diamond dave has the lorry in position, i jump in and get it up to the first cones and put parking brake on, then take a couple of seconds to compose myself and say that saying to myself again. i then get it over to the box but when i get to the box i have not got it straight and get into some difficulty. then diamond dave comes up to the cab and says why don’t you think about taking a shunt forward you can have two on your test. now why didnt i think about that :bulb: :bulb: i’ll tell you why cause i was so pleased i got that far without gettin in a knot and my male pride or ego kicked in cause i wanted it to go in, in one go!!! what a plonker :blush: :blush: :blush:

so i shunt it forward and get it in the box, i do this again four or so more times and have to shunt it everytime :blush: :blush: :blush: but the male pride and ego aint gonna get in my way again, i have two shunts on my test so if i need them i am gonna take them!! and not be :blush: :blush: :blush: by it.

so my confidence is starting to climb again. so we now head over towards margate to do some tight cornering. i come up to the traffic lights on margate seafront, i have to go literally nearly all the way over to get it round and not hit the lights :blush: :blush: :blush: . i get as far over as i think i need to and start to turn but see in wide angled mirror that i am going to take lights out so adjust accordingly and miss lights by tightest of margins :blush: :blush: but i am round.

we then carry on through over to westbrook to do some more tight turns and i gotta say i am not brilliant but i was just about doing them ok. the lesson ends and my confidence isn’t sky high but it is alot higher than yesterday. so i am feeling a bit better about things now, just gotta see how things go tommorow when we hit the pad again, and head over to herne bay for the wonderful tight roundabout over there :sunglasses: :sunglasses: :sunglasses: .

anyways i will let you all know tommorow how it goes, and hopefully my confidence will grow a bit more and hopefully be sorted for test on saturday morning. i have to say this i used to be an ignorant ******* when it come to lorries and learner drivers when i was just a car driver would always hate being stuck behind a lorry or a learner and make dman stupid comments like " can’t you go any faster than that" or to a learner car driver " you could a bus through there ", but the last four weeks doing the class two and now the one has opened up these bloody ignorant and arrogant eyes to what it is like being a proffesional driver and appreciate what it is like to be a learner again and appreciate exactly what a lorry driver has to deal with everyday!! :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: . i do honestly believe, and even my wife has said it to me i am a better car driver now. so to all you lorry drivers i would like to apologise now for the stupid comments i used to make about you driving to slow or taking up to much of the road :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile: because i am doing the same thing myself now :blush: :blush: :blush: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :wink: :wink: :wink:

34

margatemafia:
i do honestly believe, and even my wife has said it to me i am a better car driver now. so to all you lorry drivers i would like to apologise now for the stupid comments i used to make about you driving to slow or taking up to much of the road because i am doing the same thing myself now

Another convert to the right way of thinking. :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

Just imagine if evry driver had to spend a couple of hours in a large vehicle after they pass their car test, the roads would surely be a safer, less angry place. :slight_smile: :sunglasses:

Sounds like a lot of things fell into place today so it seems you are nicely on schedule for Saturday. as you say you are allowed two shunts on your test so don’t forget to take them if you need to.

35

Hi Vince,

which company is it you work for mate?, cause i phoned a company up in sittingbourne already and they were called mainstream. just wondered if it was the same company mate :slight_smile:

36

Ive sent you a pm mate. Ill do what I can to try to get you a start when (not if) you pass.

Vince

37

Great Margatemafia, today sounded much better and I will explain my intence post on saturday just keep your head and carry on thinking the way you have today don’t forget the truck only goes where you tell it have a good lesson tomorrow, it will set you up for your test. your going to be great! :laughing:

38

Margaret, I’m waiting with baited breath mate. I’ve just had a problem with my internet connections so sorry I’ve missed half your diary :unamused: . It sounds like it’s all comming togeather for you :wink: .

39

thanks bigone, every bit of support is appreciated mate. LOVE the suit by the way :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: my wife has one just like it :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

40

well boys and girls :laughing: :laughing:

day five has finished :frowning: the last lesson before D-Day :frowning: . day started off back at the reverse pad. attempted two reverse manouvres one went well and the other well if it had been test i would of failed, because i was concentrating on my right mirror too much and wheels on left hand side on trailor went over the line! :cry: :cry: :cry: but diamond dave said just take a shunt and get it in box. to which i duly obliged. We then uncoupled and re-coupled the trailor and went through the show me tell me questions.

still really nervous on reversing but a little more confident about it now as i completely understand the how the trailor is going to work being pushed backwards, just putting it into practice is the hard part now :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:. went for a drive over to canterbury but turned off at sturry to go to herne bay as the examiners have been taking people up that route the last couple of weeks. Had a drive round herne bay and anyone who knows herne bay will know the two roundabouts that are nightmares in the town. managed to negotiate these ok, will take photos of them and put them up on here for you all to have a look at. one is not so bad but the other one is like a snake on snakes and ladders :laughing: :laughing: and it is only a mini roundabout but the island in the middle is raised so you dont get the luxury of going over any hatched markings.

anyways enough of that, came back through herne bay in the opposite direction and negotiated them bloody roundabouts from other way :laughing: :laughing: got through ok again, coming down herne bay high street cars all parked up on side of road n parking bays and people double parked etc. manage that ok then we head for flyover on thanet way, now this only means one thing we going down the chislet road back towards sturry. now those that have read my diary will know that i love the chislet road :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: but i actually didnt find it that bad today. i could of picked up my speed a bit more in places but it was ok. we then head back to yard to finish my lesson and get a debreif for tommorrow morning and diamond dave tries in vein to boost my confidence for tommorrow :cry: :cry: :cry: bless him he has more faith than i do.

i personally feel at the moment that i could of done with an extra lesson, as i wasted driving time being stuck up at the pad reversing for two of them. but hey its all booked up now so we can only wait and see, diamond dave says i have ability so maybe i should have a bit more faith in myself, but it is one the biggest things i am ever gonna do in my life so with it being so important i am finding it hard to have faith in myself :cry: :cry: :cry: .

well i can say this, pass or fail tommorrow i will probably cry like a baby. for passing it will be weeks of stress and worry and happiness just bursting out, or obviously bitter dissapointment at failing :cry: :cry: :cry: . but whatever happens people i will be gettin drunk :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: . I just want to say a big THANKYOU TO YOU ALL again :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: for all the words of advice and all the words of encouragement and support i have had from everyone this week, it really has been touching at times to hear words of comfort from people i have never met before when i have been at lowest point this week, you all really did help to pick me up and i thankyou again :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

well people time to go and be moody till tommorow morning :cry: :cry: :cry: when the rollercoaster ride carries on again at 8.45am lets see wether i get de-railed or make it bak to the station in one piece :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: will post up here tommorow and let ya all know how i do pass or fail :laughing: :laughing:

thanks again people and big respect to ya all :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: