Ruth Delacroix ยท
Federal Appendix G lists what must be inspected. It does not tell you the order to do it in, which is why inspections take longer than they need to.
We reorganised the requirement into a walk order: brakes and air first while the system is cold, then steering and suspension, then lighting, then coupling and frame, then wheels and tyres, then the cab interior.
Two items account for the majority of the failures we see: brake adjustment beyond the readjustment limit, and lighting or reflector defects. Both are cheap to fix and expensive to fail on.
Whatever order you use, photograph every defect at the moment you find it. A defect with a timestamped photo is a record. A defect on a clipboard is an argument waiting to happen.