Vehicle & Equipment · Driver Training VideoTrailer Swaps & Interchange

Here is the rule behind the rule. Before you drive, you have to be satisfied that the trailer's brakes, lights, reflectors, tires, wheels and coupling devices are in good working order. That duty does not transfer with the trailer.

So walk it before you back under. Start with the paperwork: the annual inspection decal or report on the trailer, the plate, and the last driver vehicle inspection report if one is available.

Then the walk around, same as your own equipment. Tires: two thirty-seconds of tread minimum on a trailer tire, no cuts down to the cord, and put a hand or a hammer on the inside duals, because a flat inner dual looks fine and burns the outer one off.

Now document it

Photograph every scrape, hole and bald tire before you hook, and get the damage onto the interchange receipt or the app while you are still standing in that yard. Damage you did not write down will likely be blamed on you. Do exactly the same when you drop it.

If it is loaded and sealed, check the seal number against your bill of lading before you leave. Number does not match, or the seal is broken, you stop and you call. You do not cut a seal to satisfy your own curiosity, and you do not take a load on a seal nobody can vouch for.

Your company standard: no trailer leaves a yard until you have walked it, and the pictures are taken before the hook, not after the claim. Defects get written up on a DVIR, not passed to the next driver. If a trailer is not roadworthy, it does not get pulled.