Today's topic is Don't Follow Trucks.
There are many reasons why you shouldn't follow trucks.
They are bigger than you.
They have to fit inside a lane that was made for cars. They might have 2 feet to spare if you add up the space on either side.
You cant see in front of us - so when we inch over into the other lane to avoid that chunk of tire in the road it might end up causing you some problems if you end up hitting it. (if your following real close and dont notice) Or if we inch over because there is a guy is changing his tire on the side of the road, you might not notice and that too might cause some problems if you hit him. There is also the occasional deer carcass, the christmas tree, a boat, insulation, baggage that fell off someone's car, plastic in many forms, a bicycle, mystery bag with something in it, large rocks, and the suicide rabbits that love that joke that goes.. Why did the rabbit cross the road... Rabbits and deer have no concept of speed v.s. size v.s. distance.
Rocks.
Any rock that hits your windshield that is bigger than you fingernail, we probably did that. Trucks ALWAYS have rocks on them. We have rocks on the D.O.T bumper, see picture to left (they were there when i picked up the trailer) yes, i cleaned them off. We have rocks on the
landing gear, in our heads. You know the two legs we lower when we are dropping the trailer. There are big square feet on the the bottom. Look next time you pass a truck. There are probably rocks sitting on them. And the rocks you have in your tire tread. EVERY tire has rocks in the tread. Trucks can have thumb size rocks in the tread. Some day somewhere, all rocks will be free!
Some trucks, that's all they do is haul rocks. They look like this. STAY AWAY from these! This one is carrying sand. Follow a rock hauler - fresh from the rock pit, and it can rain stones on ye.
A lot of city's/towns haul their trash to another town or state. It either goes onto a train or a truck hauls it away. All of Seattle's trash goes to Oregon. I saw a little car trailing one of these trucks and liquid muck was coming out the back creating a fine mist of rotten milk, cabbage juice, whatever junior left in his diaper... You get the idea. Whatever got crushed and was liquid enough to find its way to the back of the trailer ends up on the road or your car between here and there.
Tires.
If you have ever seen or herd a truck blow a tire it is louder than a shotgun and the dust and smoke and debris that gets throw off will make monkeys fly out of your butt. If it is a front tire, the truck goes right or left and it becomes a tug of war to keep the truck from violently turning . I think thats what happened in that picture to the left. So don't get run over and DONT FOLLOW TRUCKS!
| Location: Medford, Oregon |
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5 comments:
You're not kidding about the loudness of a truck blowing a tire! I had a dumptruck blow one in front of me while cutting across Atlanta. Not only did my car get smacked with a fairly large piece of tread that had been blown sky-high, the dust cloud that errupted from the flailing beast completely removed all visibility from the road. If you were behind this guy, you were driving blind for a dangerous distance. It was an impressive experience.
Can a truck continue driving with a blown tire for a large distance? I once saw a truck screaming down I-4 with a treadless tired (there were only walls left, nothing else) and the driver didn't seem to notice or care.
If I'm light or empty and there's no debris coming from the tire, I might drive to the next town on a flat.
And you forgot - never, never follow a livestock trailer! For the same liquid muck reason you don't follow a trash trailer.
I was riding my motorcycle once, down the highway, and A truck had a blowout right next to me. It was 3 lanes over, but I almost go tup and jumped off it frightened me so bad.
Vince, i bet that guy didnt know.
That happened to me once. It didnt explode and i didnt notice it till the light of a car behind me caught my eye in the rear view, then i saw the sparks.
Whats worse than that, i had a bearing freeze and didnt know becasue of the mist from the rain.
There were falmes when i stopped.
bearings? beerings?
berings..
no time for splelk check
A while back I read about an old timer who was towing a jeep from one of those huge bus conversion RVs. The jeep blew a tire, and he didn't notice for hours... and so the wheel went down to metal, and sparks everywhere. They figured he started about 5 difference forest fires....
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