Friday, Feb 17, 2012, was a good day!

I passed the Michigan Commercial Driver's License practical test! Let me tell you about it. The test has three parts:

• The pre-trip inspection test 
• The basic vehicle control skills test
• The on-road driving test

Let me briefly explain each of them so you know what I did.

The pre-trip inspection (PTI) test. The applicant walks around the commercial motor vehicle and points to or touches each item on a lengthy list and explains to the examiner what is being checked. For example, the steering linkage, which on a truck is pretty complex, as you can imagine. I would point to it and say, "The steering linkage, steering shaft, pitman arm and castle nut and cotter pin, drag link, upper steering arm, lower steering arm, tie rod and steering arm are securely mounted with no cracked, bent, broken or missing pieces. There are no loose or worn joints or sockets, no loose or missing nuts, bolts or cotter pints." There are 17 pages in my manual that contain the items to check. The PTI took about 40 minutes for me to complete. Because all parts have to be repeated in case of failure like I had yesterday, I did better on today's inspection than yesterday's. In fact, I did not miss any; I was allowed to miss 29 items.

The basic vehicle control skills test. This test consists of four basic off-road (meaning not on a public roadway), the forward stop, straight-line backing, 90-degree alley dock (the task that kicked my butt for a couple of weeks), and a right turn (the reason I failed yesterday.

1. The forward stop requires driving into an "alley" (lines painted on the ground with cones at strategic places) and coming to a stop as close to, but not past, the end line, without looking out a side window or standing up to see the cone or line. It's harder than it looks, but I did not miss any points.
2. After that event, I leave the "alley" and position the truck for the straight-line backing. Then, on the examiners signal, I back the truck straight back through the alley until my bumper is clear of the other end. I did not have any problem with this one pretty much right away, so it was a 'gimme.' Not so the next event.
3. The dreaded 90-degree alley dock requires positioning the truck 90 degrees on the sight side to the alley. Then, at the examiners signal, I back into the alley, taking care not to hit any cones or touch any of the boundary lines and coming to a stop as close to the back line as possible. Keep in mind the back line is 60 feet away from the driver, so making that judgement is tough. And those cones and lines represent things like buildings, cars, and the alley dock itself into which a driver spends much of his or her time backing. This kicked my butt good for a long time. I was penalized four points yesterday and only one point today. Good show!
4. The right turn is the final event on the range and consists of making a right hand turn around a simulated corner with a curb, coming as close as possible to, but taking care not to touch, the cone on the corner. I killed the cone yesterday and did not come close today, so my total score was one point!

On-road driving test. After completing both of those parts, the examiner, applicant, and truck head out into the world for "real life" driving. Small city streets, Interstate highways, multilane road, school zones, busy and not-busy intersections area all included. There is no backing but there are lots or right and left turns, curves (some were pretty 'good' curves for a 60 foot commercial vehicle!), railroad crossings, urban and rural lane changes, and awareness of bridge, overpass, and regulatory traffic signs - the one he pick out for me was a "Bridge May Be Icy" sign somewhere in the middle. While following his directions, I was graded on speed and lane control (refer to 'good' curves comment above!), clutch usage, brake usage, proper gear selection (there are 10 forward speeds from which to choose), vehicle spacing, steering, my decision-making, and the one thing that cost me most points, traffic checks.

An applicant can miss 25 points on the on-road portion and still pass. I missed 10; the examiner said the average applicant will miss 15-18 and anything below 15 is "excellent." So having not done so well yesterday, I was pretty happy with the result. Even though my CDL does not show any grade, I came away from the test knowing I will probably not kill anyone (like I did that 5-year old standing on the 'curb' yesterday...) as I make the next step in this journey.

Next step for me is to go to work. I have picked a company called WEL Companies (http://www.welcompanies.com) based near Green Bay, Wisconsin, because they offer the best balance of equipment, range (how far do they really go?), pay, and whether I can take the truck home during my home time. Right now, my plan is to start their 3-day orientation on February 27, after which I will drive locally with one of their trainers for one week then go on-the-road, or OTR, for 4 weeks all over the country.

I am glad my initial training at West Michigan CDL is over. It was challenging, rewarding, very frustrating at times, and very intense at all times. I would not want to repeat it nor would I want not to have done it. And I think I am well-positioned for the next step on my path to become a professional truck driver.

There might not be many posts for the next week or so, dear reader, but please look forward to more as I move on to become a driver for the WEL Companies!

Thursday, 2/16/12

Bad news. I took my CDL test today and did not pass. I did well in the pretrip inspection; this takes about 30 minutes and is a thorough, front-to-back check of the tractor and trailer to make sure everything is safe for operation. Then I went to the range for Part 2 and did something I have not done since the first week I was a student here.

I crushed an orange boundary cone that was set up in a right turn maneuver on the range to simulate the curb trucks have to deal with when making right turns.

If a small child or handicapped person had been on that curb...well, the picture is not pretty and I deserved the failure.

Retest tomorrow!

Even on Super Bowl Sunday, I work

Today is Sunday, February 5, 2012, and it is Super Bowl Sunday, so you might think I would give myself a day off to relax and enjoy something. But no. I just returned from spending a couple of hours doing a pretrip inspection, or PTI, on the tractor and trailer in the West Michigan CDL parking lot because nobody is there, the weather is wonderful - 42 degrees and sunny - and the only deficiency I have found in training so far is the instructors did not do a step-by-step, item-by-item PTI early in the week. For those of us who didn't tear cars apart and rebuild them as teenagers, learning the difference between the air conditioning compressor and the air compressor and water pump is challenging, especially since the engine compartment of a commercial motor vehicle is packed with large, sturdy pieces of metal, hoses, and electrical wiring.

Fortunately, there is YouTube and there are examples from other CDL schools that point out each item, so I spent time doing that then validating the pieces on our own equipment.

I also have a take-home test to complete and must spend some time visualizing the shift pattern of this 10-speed transmission, especially downshifting and shifting from 7th to 5th, the turning gear. As I have written, this whole truck driving experience is very complex and I'm having a bit of difficulty managing the myriad tasks that come quickly to me when I am:

• Planning far enough ahead to make that turn up there, while
• Getting into the right lane to turn without hitting the curb and without leaving enough room for a 4-wheeler to squeeze to my right (which almost happened once, which is a VERY exciting experience, I can tell you) while
• Slowing down well ahead of the stop line, and
• Downshifting from 8th or 9th to 7th 
• So I can be in 5th gear before the turn.
• If the light stays green,
• I must be in 5th before the turn, so I can
• Make the right turn at a very slow speed, while
• Driving as far as I can into the left or on-coming traffic lane, so I can
• Complete the turn without hitting anything or running the rear tandems of the trailer over the curb.
• Oh. And I must remember to put the right blinker on and turn it off. A truck blinker is not automatic.

So, dear reader, the next time you make a right turn in your 4-wheeler, think about the myriad tasks you are completing without consciously thinking about any of them - you just do each of them to perfection and adjust to anything out of the ordinary, also without consciously thinking about it. If you can, try to remember what you were like when you were learning to drive and making right turns was not a natural, well-practived task. That is where I am in truck driving.

Then again, I have only been at it for one week and I have two more. I am pleased with my progress, dear reader, and thank YOU for reading and staying with me.