Fun Just A Few Things I Noticed When Driving In The Truck

High Plains Drifter

The Drifter
VIP
I am so tired of everyone going off about a**hole truck drivers. The pickup I drive is a full size, extended cab, with a full box. The truck is a overall length of 22 ft. It's pretty intimidating at first when you start driving it, but after awhile the truck feels like a S-10. The truck is also fun in the winter. Nothing's more fun then to get the truck sideways like drifting style, and bring it back in a straight line.


Here's a few things I learned, and just a few helpful tricks.

Not everyone in a pickup is a a**hole. Most of us will try not to ride peoples bumpers. Mainly this is due to stopping force, and it takes a few seconds to stop.

We are not trying to blind you with our lights. Trucks setup a little high, so the lights will hit your mirror. I always try not to run the fog lights or brights when getting near others.

Parking spots are not all truck friendly. Ever notice how trucks take up 2 spaces at times. It's mainly cause most spots are 18 to 20 feet long. This also goes for width at times, stores are trying to save space, so they make these tiny, little, parking spaces now.

Ever notice how trucks park all in one area together. It's mainly were trying to make it easy to pull in and leave. Plus, most of us park away from the busy area's, uphill away from carts, or even use cart corrals as walls.

Truck doors do have a nice swing to them. Take this into account if you park next to a truck, We sit up a little higher, and can do some damage. Try not to wedge yourself next to us.

Remember, trucks are long so we have to swing out more, when parking or leaving. Plus this also goes for backing out. We can not see off the box so we have to back out blindly. Most times we are told were a**es, with a horn and a flick off.

Other truck drivers are just as much of a a** just like anyone else. They will cut in front of other trucks, don't use their mirrors, ride on your bumpers, drive with brights, and foolishly try to race you off the light.

In the winter for some weird reason people think it's cool to convoy/draft off the back end of a truck. I know you think your going to be safe following behind me. Remember IF I'm sliding and spinning so are you, back off my tail gate.

One pet peeve I have, and I notice this a bit. People in cars tailgating on the back ends trucks. One thing most don't pay attention on this on If there is alot of stuff in the back it's really hard to see out the box. I mean I use all 3 of my mirrors. There are times I can can only see the sides of the car. Police are bad for this tactic of tailgating bouncing side to side. Plus, do you really thinking pushing a truck is going to make them move faster?

If you see truck beat to sh*t stay away from them. It could be a work truck or a jackass that has no respect for their vehicle. I have come close so many times to being side swiped by these asses. Dumba** in the photo came close to sideswiping me. Turned into left lane and keep on coming.
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Anyone else have fun tales of driving a pick-up truck?
 

Janine The Barefoot

Wacky Norwegian Woman
First, thanks for the post HPD! I wanted to respond last night but it deserves more time than I was able to give it and so I decided to wait.

My husband and I owned a company that had a box-truck just like you described, along with a flat-bed of the same size to haul our equipment on. We installed artificial sports fields all over the western half of the US and to do it we also had 2 four-man, full sized bed, Dodge Rams one of which was a 6 on the floor (I called it "Blue", the one I drove the most and loved the most dearly). We had the pick-ups in addition to the box truck and the flat bed. We lost all of them when the business collapsed but I remember the driving very well... very well indeed.

It's a damn hard, exhausting job that generally just seems to piss-off the driving public no matter how important the contents of those trucks may be to them or how hard it is to do the bloody job. To say that most are rude and clueless is rather an understatement and I have a very clear memory of taking "my" blue truck to the local grocery store the day before Thanksgiving because some of our guys were working in our state, couldn't get back home. I wanted to have them over to our place rather than leave them in the hotel on their own. As you can imagine, a full-sized truck (it was actually an extended bed too, come to think of it) in a market parking lot on the day before Thanksgiving was a full-blown nightmare. It wasn't because I had 6 gears to contend with, it was the amount of idiocy from the people in those bloody little Honda 2 and 4 doors that made it so impossible. I could get the truck anywhere but it's against the law to flatten the car of an actual yutz who picks that day in particular as the only one on which they sally forth from their tiny little garages!

In any case, I personally have always tried to respect the truckers I share the roads with. I stay at least far enough behind them that I can see their faces in their side mirrors and when I have to get into their lanes, I get at least 2-3 car lengths ahead of them accelerating while I do it and signaling the whole time; so they know I'm coming and won't have to break! Wherever and whenever possible, I leave them to the lane they are in and regard it as "theirs". When I see one trying to make a turn on a side street (because I know exactly the dimensions of the vehicle I'm in) I stop and stay as far out of their way as is necessary and then give them a "thumbs up" when they make a perfect turn... I have a really good idea of the degree of knowledge it takes to do that and a perfect, tight turn in a large truck can be a real work of art to behold as I see it.

You've taken on a job that most don't understand and will never appreciate and others who just get pissed off at because "it's taking up their road". Idiots! Idiots all of them! So here's a "thank you" from a woman who has driven 10' box trucks, loved my 6 speed 4-door crew cab, extended bed Ram and has been married to a man for almost 25 years who taught me how to really use my mirrors and who has clocked hours beyond counting behind the wheel of trucks of all shapes and sizes only to get out, unload and then install the contents.

You guys are the last of the real Pony Express.... You get things to people who need them, in dangerous conditions that no one else wants to take on... only now there are no wide open spaces left and the people you're doing it for, rather than being grateful, like as not want to shoot you just for being there. So I'm sorry Drifter. I apologize on behalf of most of the clueless public who, instead of being grateful and considerate, are rude, stupid and make your job even more difficult on top of it all.

And crap! You don't even drive one of the big rigs do you Drifter? Here I am, saluting the virtues of the drivers of the "big rig" and you're in a truck the size of my Blue! Maybe even a little shorter from end to end :emoji_yum: Ahhh well, that's OK. They deserved the salute anyway and everything else I said was just as true now as it was when I said it.... But man, you make me miss my truck!

So although I get the whole headlights thing (I've driven trucks and am not stupid :emoji_no_good: :emoji_wink:) and I watch all the cars on the road looking for idiots, not just the guys in banged up trucks, I will confess that I appreciate the advice, the apology and the observations because I know they are aimed at all those folks behind the wheel who often just don't think about what's going on around them. So good for you for the update and the inclusion of some common sense that seems to often get lost along the way. And yeah, I get the problems with parking lots up close and personal as I think I've already proven. I will say that getting in and out of that parking lot is to this day one of my proudest driving moments! People can be difficult and trying to be polite while you're trying to get a parking space in a huge freakin truck on the day before Thanksgiving when the lot is packed like sardines is something worth being proud of!

But thanks for the apology about the headlights especially HPD. There's been many a time when I've flipped my mirror to "brights" (because I was being followed too closely by a truck who didn't care) and had to move my side mirrors all the way down to the ground because they pick up the refection when the rear-view is on the "brights" option thereby making me totally blind because some guy in a truck thought it was OK to drive right up on my rear bumper when there was no one else on the road. It really is nice for me to know that there's an actual truck driver out there who thinks about the cars riding beneath their eye level.... because my husband isn't one of those guys and would never listen to me about it..... he just told me it was his right to drive a truck and mine to get used to it. I really don't try to ask for too much.... just that other people respect the fact that there are other cars on the road too and that maybe, just maybe they would appreciate some consideration. You know, the kind you give!

:emoji_kiss::emoji_dancer:
 

chainsaw_metal1

Member: Rank 8
I spent a year working for a company here in Iowa that runs those industrial hog farms (evil bastards, but I had a newborn, and needed money, so yeah, life sucks), and my crew shared two work vehicles. One was a Chevy Blazer, a fun little SUV with 4 wheel drive, and a Chevy Silverado single cab. Since a lot of our travels took us to sites on dirt roads, we used to beat the hell out of those trucks. The only better way to go gravel jamming is when you've got a small beater car, like in high school with my buddy's old AMC Champ, or my old Chevette.
 

High Plains Drifter

The Drifter
VIP
@Janine The Barefoot Never drove a rig. This truck looks close to what I drive just don't have the longer box. :(

@chainsaw_metal1 We use to take my buddy's dodge neon, and later he got a saturn out mudding. Those are some nice little cars, and if they can take the abuse my buddy put on them then they are good cars. They were fun driving them in some nice puddles in the road. We don't have hog farms in this area just normal farms soybean, sugar beets, corn, some dairy farms. There might be some hog farms many miles away but not in this area. I believe those places smell worst then the dairy farms.
 
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chainsaw_metal1

Member: Rank 8
I believe those places smell worst then the dairy farms.
You should try working at one of those farms. Not just the terrible smell (which never washes off), but the things you see. I saw things I had only seen in horror movies. There was a reason we would crack open our first beer around 8:30 am.
 
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