How Truck Drivers use math

Anthony Aragon

10/10/08

Algebra1 5th period

Truck driving

• There is lots of math used when truck driving. you use basic math skills(additon, subtraction, multiplication, and division) when truck driving. You have to write in log books, you have to know how many miles you have to go, how much money you are going to make and spend, How much the load weighs, how much of a product you have, how many stops you have to make, and how long it will take you to get to your destination.

Miles

• To see how many miles you will travel from a shipper to a receiver, you will use addition. To figure out how many miles you have left on during a trip you will use subtraction.

Example

• 40 miles in Arkansas• 196 miles in Oklahoma• 564 miles in Texas• 40+196+564=800miles • You travel through Arkansas• You drive 98miles through Oklahoma• 40+98=138miles driven• 800-138=662 miles left to drive

Make and Spend

• To figure out how much money you will make off of a load you will us addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

Example

• $1500.00 gross pay• 800 Miles• 5 Miles per gallon• $2.889 per gallon• 5/800=160 gallons• 2.889*160=$462.24• 1500-462.24=$1037.76• $1037.76 would be the total revenue after fuel

Log Book

• Filling out your log book tracks how long you’ve been driving which requires Addition as well as subtraction along with division when figuring how many hours you will need to log to complete a trip.

Example

• 11 hours is the maximum driving time• 10 hours sleep after 11 hours driving• 1 hour break after 5.5 hours of driving • 50 miles per hour• 800 miles to be driven• 800/50=16 hours• 16-11=5 hours• 11+1+10+5=27 hours total for the trip

Number of stops

• You also need to know how many stops to deliver. The number of cases at each stop can vary and you will need to subtract the number of cases at each stop to know how much product you have left in your trailer.

• The number of stops can also add time to a trip which would add to the number of hours a trip would take to complete.

Load

• You need to know how much the load weighs because depending on the weight of a load, a heavy load would need to be loaded differently than a lighter load to comply with state and federal laws.

• 80,000 pounds is the maximum gross weight• 12000 pounds is the max on steer axle• 34000 pounds is the max on drive tandems• 34000 pounds is the max on trailer tandems

Miles Per Gallon

• You also use math when calculating how many miles per gallon you are getting on a trip.

Example

• 800 miles

• 160 gallons

• 800/160=5 miles per gallon