Tips from the more experienced please

Pathetic as I’m sure this will sound, can you offer any advice when it comes to places like this? It looks to have more space than the second place I ever took an artic but not much. I just couldn’t get the trailer to move about much because I couldn’t move far back and forth much and (seeing as I’m going to this place three days next week) I’m a bit concerned :blush:

google.com/maps?f=q&source=s … 64,2,4.27

Hi. I presume the worry is getting onto a bay. If that’s the case you want to drive straight forward from the gate. About a truck length from the far fence, steer left so that the unit is at about 45 degrees towards the top left corner. Go as far forward as you can. Get your left on which will send the trailer towards the bays. Don’t oversteer and you should be fine.

I’m making the assumption that the yard is reasonably clear and that you may have a choice of bays. If that’s not the case, the principle is still the same but you will have to work with what you’ve got. Whatever you do, you must start off all the way up to the far fence. If you don’t do that, you’re stuffed before you start.

As always, take your time, don’t oversteer, get out and check if you need to.

Good luck, Pete :laughing: :laughing:

Sorry, that was supposed to be a picture from streetview. Basicly though, there’s about an artic and a half between the bay and the fence- boy did I struggle with similar space the other day! No matter what I did, I just couldn’t get the thing to move across a bit without overcooking it or having no effect at all or even making matters worse! Lol.

The guy who tipped it said they’d had worse, if you weren’t right first time you were stuffed and did I know I’d very nearly ripped the mudguard off (it was nearly as I’d found it so no mention of it…)

hi,
as above but it also can be about speed of turn of the unit.
think of your test when you first set up trailer for the reverse turn, you went from one wheel lock to the other to bend the outfit in a short distance.
get the back end roughly pointing at the bay and then turn your attention to the headboard.
whip the unit around and almost push the front of the trailer straight.
then straighten up to see where you are.
the trick here is to do a lot in the shortest distance.
remember the trailers pivot point (middle wheel on a tri axle)
so go to the furthest corner to gain distance and as you do so do two things.
1 drive along the edge of the bays and then turn towards the far corner. this should leave your back end of trailer point roughly at bay markings.
2 make a note of an imaginary pivot point. I use the yellow paint line that indicates the bays and add a couple of meters.
3 reverse slowly correcting all the time until the trailers pivot point hits your imaginary one
4 force the headboard straight toward the bay and the unit straight fast as you can still going slow
5 have a look and then shunt into place

the amount of turn is the skill and can’t be learned by reading and I still have much to learn.
older drives call this the swan neck

if you look on the overhead Satellite view and zoom in there are two entrances and the loading area at the back looks nice and big so you might be lucky and reverse there :smiley: on the other hand from the satellite view the other area that you have shown looks not wide enough to swing a cat around when you see the artic parked there :open_mouth:

It definitely looks quite tight, the only advice I can offer is as the others have said…try and get the trailer pointing in the right (ish) direction and have the right break on the unit as you stop ready to reverse (if that makes sense). You never know, it may be empty when you arrive, if not and you are unsure, speak to one of the other drivers on the bays, explain you are new and ask their advice. I am sure they will help and watch you back etc.

ZigZag:
if you look on the overhead Satellite view and zoom in there are two entrances and the loading area at the back looks nice and big so you might be lucky and reverse there :smiley: on the other hand from the satellite view the other area that you have shown looks not wide enough to swing a cat around when you see the artic parked there :open_mouth:

Didn’t look at that! looks great except the sign on the gate that says “no entry before 7AM” :frowning: I’ll be there about 3AM :cry:
At least there’s not likely to be many people about to ridicule me :laughing:

darkseeker:
“no entry before 7AM”

Oooppps :smiley:

:open_mouth: well, I was in a rigid last night and it sounds like I will be tonight too - thank god! It’s the big yard, trouble is it’s full of rigids and 7.5tonners at night, to the point where it’s probably more awkward than the one I was worried about :confused: especially getting in and out of it.

Had a scania 26tonner which was good, until I went to see goods in and took the key out - the bloody thing wouldn’t go back in the ignition! Just the right amount of brute force sorted it though :unamused:

I did it! And it was A LOT easier than it looked. The depot itself doesn’t seem to have any artics but one of the guys in the yard explained how it’s usually done which helped a lot even though it was very much the same as my own plan. No photo’s or diary this time as it wasn’t all that interesting but my reversing was three times as good last night as it was on my first run.

cheesey:
hi,
get the back end roughly pointing at the bay and then turn your attention to the headboard.
whip the unit around and almost push the front of the trailer straight.

remember the trailers pivot point (middle wheel on a tri axle)

Annoyingly, I knew most of that but wasn’t applying it for some reason :blush: Works much better when you do it that way though. Thankyou very much!