Auto trans in Dump truck

90% of ALL Class 7 and 8 HD Trucks are Auto or Semi Auto trans now.  Few to any being constructed Old School as decreasing few can drive them.

I rode the school bus until the 1974-1975 school year. Most were no air conditioning, and five speed transmission w/two speed rear axle. 350 V8, or 366 V8 Chevrolet engines. Diesels, and automatic transmissions came along after I was out of school.

We have a Japanese mini truck we use at the farm and it's a 5 speed. I made my girls learn how to drive it and now they love it. It's funny to see new people come around and see them sitting in the truck and they say "wow they're driving at that young?" Then when they take off they get a funny look on their face and say "does that thing have a clutch?" You better believe Ole Daddy rares back and says "yes, yes it does".

I remember our bus driver Mr Simms changing gears with the floor shifter. Can't remember what I had for breakfast though. Oh well

All of the semis that come to the farm are Volvo's and they all have automatics. There's one Mack that they bring the forklifts on and it's still manual but that's all

All of the MDOT Plow trucks are Allison Automatics. They hold up well. And they are a pleasure to drive when clearing intersections!

We got an Chevy 8500 with a Cat an AUTO,,, its pretty sweet ! Just mash the GO Pedal- and shes gone !

Driving semi’s with ‘auto-shifts’ suck. They down shift when you don’t want them too, they up shift when you don’t want them too. Slow as turtles from a stop. No warning then BAM, not shifting and your dead in the water. And worst of all, they have increased the ‘driver pool’ thus suppressing wages.

Drove a Ford tandem dump with old Allison 5 speed with a 2 speed rear , CAT V8 , for 3 years mostly city driving so seldom used low range . 
  Thing is the dang truck weighed in at 23,000 empty and boss never wanted over 11 ton in box . He then bought another Ford tandem with Cummins and 5 speed Allison and it weighed about the same but had a foot longer box - so ended up putting another axle under it as city said had to be tri axle or more as they didn't want tandem any more on jobs .
 Both my other sons Quint's were also Allison Auto but with electronic push button shifting , as old Fords were a manual selector and governor shift , new trucks were all electronic modules  .   The old Auto transmissions are now hard to find anyone who can set or adjust them to shift right , new ones are all computer controlled . 

Its sad. It seems that few people want to develop skills so equipment becomes more complicated and harder to maintain. I know im old school but I dont want a damn computer to decide for me if the engine will start or when to shift gears. Or on new cars and such if the window will roll down

All the hours I spent going through Chicago, Detroit and the other big cities during rush hr inching forward 10 feet and stopping I think an auto would have felt good on the clutch leg. Wait to long and another car would squeak in so ya had to stay close to the car ahead of ya. Your right about there is a lot of people think they got it mastered and there goes clutch and throw out bearings. But I do like the ole 18 and 13's when ya start pulling the mountains.

My cousin's fleet got transitioned to automatics. Said got tired of replacing clutches as today's drivers don't have the skill. Also why you flags on trailer wheels. A coworker years ago when we hauled grain dumped the clutch on the cabover and twisted off the driveshaft

I alternate daily between automatic and manual. Clutch is only used to start, stop and unload driveline for downshift.

Allison still makes Autos, still see them in the Medium duty to Lower end Class Seven trucks. Eaton/Used to Be Fuller, has a Next Generation called AMTs.