New truck... but what truck?

That's what I thought. I unfortunately don't think old trucks are the way to go. My accountant does the books for a bunch of owner operators and tells me the guys who lease, have lower payments, better write offs, cycle their trucks thru every 3-4 yrs make out much better than the guys who hang onto trucks. ( defensive shields up ) UNLESS, you have a shop and want to do all of the wrenching big and small, because labor is very expensive. A set of injectors, or a turbo is actually affordable, iit's the labor and towing on the bill that will kill ya. From what I can see, in the 4 th year in the 700,000 km range there seems to be a ramp up of major expenses, then it seems to drop off , so buy an old truck, payment free, for penny's, and spend the payment on repairs, maintenance etc, or do the new one. I like new stuff. Example is the international I mentioned above. Even tho it has been maintained as well as it could have been. And all records are there, I bet you could still spend 5-10k on it in the first few months making it what you want it to be. I would rather order a new one and have exactly what I want every 3 1/2 yrs and (hopefully) not have the headaches. My first chuck at this was a bad experiment, I think I got a real bad example, of an unproven design, and I do see that all the manufacturers seem to be getting a handle on the newest trucks, and believe me, I asked lots of questions, to lots of drivers on the road before taking the plunge this time. And I like new stuff.

 

First off, hauling what you are, I hope they are paying you a minimum of 2.25/mile + about 60 cpm FSC. I would never buy a new truck just for the warranty, I would never buy a new truck period. I have 4 trucks and the newest one is an '05 and its one of the more stupider thigns I have done. Everything else I have is '02 n down. If you look around alot you can find some good deals on trucks around 10 years old for under $15K. The first truck I bought was a '98 FLD120 w/ condo shack, 3406E 550HP 1850 TQ and 900,000 orig. km for $10,000. And that was 5 years ago! Warranty is a pretty good mask on a new truck, as you are covered for all the sensors and emission problems that they are plagued with, but who's gonna pay your downtime and truck payment when you are in the shop getting your "warranty job" done? You will! There are times where it can take 2 weeks to get in because of so much backlog. IMO you should very seriously reconsider what you are wanting to do at this point. I am looking into a deal right now that is tridem deck loads of pipe one way from Edmonton to Estevan and empty back, strait pin to pin and it pays over $2.70 a mile on all miles... BTW, my '98 FLD with 1.7M km on it averaged 8.13 US MPG pulling a van with average payload of 34000 lbs over the last 3 months...

 

I bought a 2002 Freightliner FLD 500hp with about 650,000 miles About 5 years ago... I kinda got screwed on the back end.... New fuel pump, new ecm, new air drier, new alternator and new engine heads

 

Buy new ISX power, GET THE EXTENDED WARRANTY!!!! Make sure on a cummins it's the tear 1 with after treatment. Blow a turbo, you will need an entire new exhaust system. DPF, SCR and sensors $9500.00 including turbo. W900L all the way, drive in the sweet spot and shift like a real driver not a cowboy and you will see that aerodynamics is not all that effective as you might think, it has a lot more to do with the engine and tranny combo, and driver skill. Running in 1:1 (direct drive def. has is benefits.

 

Driver skill definately has alot to do with it. Dirtboy, did you buy a new ISX as what you are describing here? I doubt it and so why are you trying to tell someone who is either gonna make a descent living or go bankrupt how to run their business? I wouldnt be telling anyone what to buy, I only like to make suggestions based upon alot of experience. 3 years is not alot of experience in a truck, unless you have been driving the same truck since day 1.

 

In my opinion Onedayaway, what you might want to consider is something around the 500-550 HP range, definately an 18 spd tranny, and if you are in the hills alot then a good gear ratio would be a 3.70 or 3.55 on LP22.5 rubber with low rolling resistance. An Aero style truck WILL definately make a difference, its been proven time and time again. I had a large car to show everyone I had a small dick once, but thats not the way to fly. If you are here to make money rather then trying to look cool, then a T800 or something of the like will do you pretty good. I sold my big W9 hood n replaced it with a T600. Much happier with what I am saving in fuel now...

 

If an older truck needs repairs, once those have been done you won't need to worry about it for some time. You can also go to any shop you wish to have those repairs done. A new truck that breaks will still have big payments. In order to prevent your warranty from being voided, you will probably need to go to an authorized dealer. You can easily pay double the labor rate for the same work that could be done at an independent shop if it was an older truck that didn't have a warranty. Dealers rarely get in a hurry to get trucks in and out. You could even need to get a motel room waiting on the dealer. If the truck needs to be towed, that is not usually included in the warranty. Even if you needed to have an inframe you could recover those costs with only a few months of new truck payments. Payments on that new truck go on for a number of years. Repairs are very short lived. No payments to be concerned about.

 

Of course, if California is not in your plans, getting a Pete 389 or Western Star glider and building it up with a good, powerful engine and drive train combination is a lot better than dealing with the emissions stuff. And you would have those warranties that you are concerned about. A factory remanned engine has a base warranty like a new engine and can be extended. Same for the tranny. And you could put new rears in and get the full new warranty on that. The chassis/body would have the same warranty as a new production truck.

And the truck would be cheaper than a new production one, and there is no federal excise tax. At least until the tax code changes.

 

He's from Canada, so FET doesn't apply.... Just saying lol

But if it MUST be a newer truck, I would go with a glider all the way !!!