| Author | Message | ||
| john (192.9.25.11) Rating: N/A |
"Oh yeah, one more little thing... I don't know how to drive a bus!" As I get closer to buying my bus, this thought has started to nag me. Am getting an automatic, and planning to "book study" the finer points of air brakes, and get a primer on the bus systems by the seller. Will I be able to herd an MC 9 down the road by myself without causing an international incident? My first real test will be getting it over to the local bus mechanic to get it inspected before signing the check. Have checked out driving schools (expensive! lengthy! not local!) and school bus driver training (once a year, and you gotta apply for a job). Do ya think I can handle this, or should I pony up the time and money for real training? Thanks, John | ||
| Jim Ashworth (Jimnh) (172.173.83.195)
Rating: N/A |
John- From this day forth, do not turn around to look back in anything you drive. Use the mirrors every time. No cheating ever! Even if you have to get out and look. Then, remember where the driver of the bus is, right on the front bumper. Look at where the front bumper is on your vehicle when you make turns and think of yourself sitting on it. You will have to use the mirrors when you turn the bus to make sure you clear the curbing or lamppost at the corner. Put a little stick-on spot mirror on your current vehicle's mirror and use it to keep an eye on the side of the vehicle as you turn. As to running straight down the road, put yourself where the left tires should be. You are a lot wider than a car and need to be more to the left of the center of your lane. Again, use the mirrors to see if the lines are spaced equally on each side of the vehicle. Stopping a vehicle this big takes a looooonnnnngggg distance. Ideally, you would allow 5 seconds following distance (1 second for every 10' of length and 1 more for being over 40' in length). Never, ever follow too closely. You will always be at fault for rear-ending the car in front! It is not difficult to drive a bus and once comfortable at doing it, you will be more relaxed after a long day than driving either a car or plastic motorhome. Jim | ||
| Nick Russell (152.163.204.58)
Rating: N/A |
John, We had been fulltiming in a 36 foot gas powered motorhome for 2 1/2 years when we got our 40 foot MCI 8. "No big difference," I told myself. "What's an extra four feet?" At the first right turn I cut it too sharp and dropped the rear wheels in a ditch. Forgot that in the bus I sit further forward than in the RV. But after killing a curb or two (or three) I finally think I have the hang of it. Like Jim said, give yourself lots of stopping room, learn to use your mirrors, and if you can find a big old empty parking lot, get some plastic cones, or even cardboard boxes, and go practice. | ||
| Henry, eh (24.79.130.10)
Rating: N/A |
The idea of your driving position being in front of all your wheels, including the steering, is difficult for some to get used to. It creates a situation of "overhang" where your front bumper travels in a different arc than the tires. You can hit lots of stuff without ever contacting the tires. Also, the long wheelbase creates "offtracking" where the rear wheels travel a dramatically different path than the front. Go slow, understand how all 4 corners travel down the road, especially during turns, and take that course. All professional drivers have to take training to handle the big rigs. Just because you don't HAVE to take the same training, doesn't mean you shouldn't. The laws of physics don't change even if the driver does. When you get caught in ice-covered mountain roads, won't it be nice to say to your better half "We're OK, I can handle this because of that training." (actually the nice thing about training, is it helps you see when you are over your head rather than trying to fake your way through) Don't let all this stop you from driving over to your mechanic, just take it slow! Henry, eh | ||
| Nick Russell (152.163.201.69)
Rating: N/A |
The RV Driving School (www.rvschool.com)has a great program, and compared to the cost of a bus or RV, the course is very affordable. To me $350-$400 or so is a worthy investment in my safety and that of others on the highway. They have classes in several states. | ||
| john (192.9.25.11) Rating: N/A |
I have to say, this board is incredibly responsive and helpful! I really appreciate the suggestions, and will definitely print them out, read them over a bunch of times, and also check out the rvschool.com site. Also - big news (for me, anyway) - I drove a bus for the first time today! Took one of the buses I'm looking at for a 15 minute jaunt around a big empty parking lot. Enough time to let me feel a) Yes, this is VERY different from my car b) No, I wouldn't want to be driving in this lot with actual CARS in it! Yet! c) With practice (and, ideally some instruction) I can definitely learn how to do this All in all, a big step toward feeling like I can do this. I can't wait to get my bus, get some orange cones, and spend a few days driving around a parking lot learning these techniques! Thanks again -- you guys provide great support! Looking forward to being able to give BACK some wisdom one of these years! John | ||
| George Bate (210.50.77.141)
Rating: N/A |
John, as Nick Russell has said, I too think that it is a worthwhile investment and also a necessary. You are taught not only how to drive the vehicle, but inspect it too and learn a bit about how it operates too. Without such instruction you'd be cleaning up curbs, signs, buildings and all sorts of things. A few good things to remember are: If in doubt, don't! Always give yourself more room than you think is needed to conduct movements, until you have mastered how much room you to complete them and then more room in situations your not used to. Best wishes | ||
| Tom Caffrey (Pvcces) (12.146.32.12)
Rating: N/A |
John, One other thing that I haven't seen mentioned in the posts. Part of learning to handle a big rig is learning to manage energy. If you did all right in your math classes, you should be able to put a tip to use that you probably didn't pay much attention to when driving a car. The energy in a moving body relative to its surroundings is proportional to the square of its speed. This means that when you are doing 60 mph, your coach will have stored up four times the energy that is stored at 30 mph. If you do almost all your stopping from 30 mph, you probably will think that the brakes have no trouble stopping your coach, if they are in normal working order. However, if you make even one hard stop from 60 mph, it will take more pressure on the pedal to stop than it did before, because the lining and the drum coefficient of friction will be reduced. If you make a second hard stop from 60 mph within a few minutes of the first, you will likely begin wondering if the brakes will get you stopped in time. That's partly because a considerable amount of heat will be stored in the brakes, even before you begin your stop, and that will mean that everything will be that much hotter when you finally get stopped. Since your coach will likely weigh ten times what your car does, you will have to throw away, in the form of heat, ten times as much energy on any given stop. This is one of the places your fuel mileage will go when in mountains or in traffic, whenever you need more braking than you will get from engine compression. When you step on the throttle to make your bus go, it will cost you the fuel needed to get up to speed. When you step on the brakes, you will pay in brake wear to get rid of the stored energy, and then pay in fuel to get it back up to speed. The better you get at predicting how to avoid the use of brakes, the less you have to spend on energy to drive it. The same ideas tell you what is likely to happen if you go down a long grade and wind up having to ride your brakes. By the same token, consider what happens with motion across the lanes. Busses almost never cross lanes as fast as cars do, so there is not much energy required to get the job done. You will notice it the most when you need to make a hard right turn, if you try to keep your speed up at all. When the drive axle on the bus is nearest the curb, you will notice that the driver's position speeds up quite a bit as it swings across the lanes. Brakes are adjusted frquently on heavy rigs. The local tour company adjusts theirs every 500 miles or takes the coach out of service. The last little bit on a brake adjustment really makes a difference. When it is done by a practiced person, brake adjustments are easy and worthwhile. We plan on trying to get service done most fuelings, including brake adjustments, 1000-1500 miles. I hope this helps. Tom Caffrey PD4106-2576 | ||
| john (209.239.203.11) Rating: N/A |
Tom - great advice (great sounding, I mean -- can't vouch from experience obviously) but it sure makes sense. Thanks, John | ||
| maybedream@aol.com (64.12.105.168) Rating: N/A |
Just Remember.. Your bigger then they are  They'll move...(most of the time!) | ||
| John Ogle, Jr. (64.12.107.46)
Rating: N/A |
How to drive??? I found the North Carolina Driver License Handbook to be surprisingly GREAT for a government publication. It was even INTERESTING from the technical viewpoint and had a lot of info about the engineering and physics involved in CDL vehicles. Just remember to start slowly and work up to speed. It's easier to stop and back up if you haven't gone too fast and hit something! Good luck. | ||
| Steve Fessenden (63.27.88.35) Rating: N/A |
Reminds me of the story a WWII pilot told me. After training in small planes he was assigned to fly a really large transport and told his instructor, "I can't fly anything that big." "just fly the front", the instructor said, "and the rest will follow along behind." The information in CDL books on long straight trucks is same as for buses. Look at one in a bookstore or buy one. The recomendation on right turns is to stay within your lane on the road you are leaving and wait until traffic allows you to turn into the oncoming lane in the road you are entering. Then pull back over into your lane, when you are clear of the corner. That way no one pulls up on your right to make the same turn. Don't begin a tight turn until the bus is halfway past the turning point. Steve Fessenden |