Not illegal mate. In my new job I pull only Dutch trailers, they are all palm couplings
Palms are still standard in France too.
We had a few tankers with high up ‘C’ connectors. As they were pointing downwards we could get under them and push up, that was OK. But if they are high up and come out horizontally then that would be very awkward for anyone IMHO.
Passing a class 1 assessment straight off is a fairly unlikely scenario, but it depends if the company is looking for the finished product or potential in the candidate IMHO.
Inviting effectively a new class 1 pass with some class 2 experience to interview was probably done with a good idea of the outcome. I mean, the home address was probably known, no? However, for the candidate invited, even although there was little chance of landing the job, it is good experience, so I wouldn’t knock the company for it.
When it comes to connecting the air lines, I think knack can come into it. Brute strength can sometimes cover up a multitude of sins in terms of technique. All I would say is try to make sure the pressure is square on and not at an angle, and it may be surprising how easy it goes on.
Thanks to @maoster and @franglais, that would explain why I never had a problem coupling, but does not explain why so many of my mates did, and as a result did what I consider to be risky things.
But some of the answers to some of the threads here have really opened my eyes to what I have been missing the last 21 years. And I am so glad I have. You are still on ‘work’ in a 15 minute taxi drive to a hotel, but have finished ‘work’ before your one hour drive back home from base? 
Thank goodness nobody bothered about such things when hitching home on a ‘dodgy’ for 2 or 3 hours. 
And nearly all lorries are now automatic? Admittedly I did have a 2 pedal Beaver a century ago ( '70s?) but other than that have never had anything but a manual box in a wagon.
The new format has really opened my mind, I have read all sorts of stuff that I wouldn’t have gone anywhere near in the ‘old’ days towards the end of last year. I even found myself in a thread from 2007 where someone was having a real go at me for some reason. I don’t remember a bit of it and can only assume that it was when I was a mod and stuff like that rolled off my back almost unnoticed. 
We had an odd two pedal Atki Borderer with a 180 Gardner and small pneumatic gear change near the steering wheel. Worked OK but heavy on fuel.
Most modern autos are really manual boxes with a mechanical clutch, but all clutch control and gear changes is done by a computor. Two pedal operation.
IMHO fine a lot of the time but they do have limits.
They will cook the clutch the same as a bad driver will on some manoeuvers. “Fried Ferodo” is a distinctive aroma! You even get an orange light to tell it is getting hot.
If you book off, and decide to hitch home rather than sleep in your bunk? That is your free choice. No one can make you sleep.
I wasn’t talking about leaving a bunk to go home, I was talking about back in the day before bunks were even invented, before the first Swedes arrived for instance. I was referring to a post in another thread, I think, that said the taxi or bus ride to a hotel for the night must be done within your official working hours. That is what surprised me, In my logic, once you leave the cab you are on your own time and where you choose to go is no-one else’s business, that’s all.
What are you up to now maoster? IIRR you got made redundant at the end of last year?
Agreed. Who knows what the real reason was, because IMHO I do have potential! It was a zero hours contract, adhoc work, so it may have been that I didn’t fit the profile as I would have continued with my agency work. Maybe they wanted someone who doesn’t have any other work commitments, who will just do the odd day here and there and be able to do it because they are free. Milk is planned the day before, so I would get a call at about 2pm for the next day. It is likely I would already be booked by the agency in that scenario, but I didn’t know that until the interview.
Hi driverless, yes i did indeed receive my redundancy on 31st December. I took January off and then made a phone call. I got a call back the next day, apparently the gaffer knows one of my old bosses (who obviously doesn’t know me very well at all ) asking me to take my cards, passport, bank details etc and the job was mine. No CV, no assessment drive, no interview.
I’m actually really enjoying it as it’s hugely varied day to day ferry trailer work.
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@maoster what do you think of the daf compared to what you used to drive
Some good points and some bad points as to be expected I suppose. The DAF is without doubt one of the most comfortable lorries I’ve ever driven. The bed is nothing short of superb. I love the adaptive cruise and luckily have not encountered any problems with it braking for bridge shadows etc.
The big minus over the MAN is that despite them being a mixture of 480’s and 500’s they are completely gutless and have a weird habit on cruise of knocking the power off when climbing hills, presumably an eco thing because intervention with the loud pedal accelerates it back up to the speed I’ve set the cruise to.
glad your liking it. I find it a lot easier to get comfortable in a daf than any other truck i have driven always wondered if it was that particular truck or dafs in general as others have disagreed with me.
not trying to teach you to ■■■■ eggs as your far more experienced than me and i am sure you have thought of this. I had a similar thing on a merc would suddenly cut the power or even worse go into idle half way up a slope turned out that as you said it was a fuel saving gimmick but you could adjust how much it allowed you to slow down by.
I found daf’s to be extremely uncomfortable, had a horribly curved back rest with no head rest adjustment forcing a curved seating position.
Did the candidate ask to dump the air? She does not sound that savvy
Besides, anyone can tell of a reason why the assessor would not allow releasing pressure? I can envision a scenario where the assessor is testing the candidate’s confidence in their actions.
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Nice one, glad it all panned out well.
that is a retarded approach to attempt success in the next examination or assessment, one-handed acrobatics are for seasoned drivers and shunters with fingers like dicks.
–For clarity’s sake: as for “retarded” is meant “unwise”, as per “fingers like dicks” strong hands with remarkable dexterity
sorry meant to post this earlier i dunno where i got the idea it was fridge work sorry. In this case split coupling wouldn’t help you. I have the same issue with mavis rails that just slide side to side i am too much of a short arse to reach properly and if they are parallel to the ground it is just pure arm strength which i am lacking at shoulder height. I think it is unfair to count that against you. Out of interest did you ask the assessor if that was a contributing factor and if so what you could of done different.
No I didn’t. I passed the assessment as afterwards he sent me to the office for the interview part and he said to tell the interviewer it’s a yes. (I’d performed and driven to company standards) He also said he would recommend a bit of training with coupling as it was only the second time I’d done it since my test and naturally I took ages 
so I don’t think he did count it against me, it was just me thinking of things that could have contributed.