When Halvor turned the trucks down to 65 I saw very little if any improvement in MPG when driving the C13. Maybe on the flats a little bit of improvement but if i saw any mountains east or west my fuel mileage was the same as in 2006 when they were set at 68 MPH. I think the reason they went to 65 was to comply with Ontario's speed limiter law, but I believed they used the high fuel prices at the time to cover for it. Just my opinion.

Later last Summer I hopped into a Cascadia with a 60 series Detroit. The Cascadia was actually a little worse on fuel mileage, but it is a bigger motor and slightly more powerful. One good thing about it was it wasn't subject to that ridiculous Caterpillar program that lowered your top speed if you idled a lot. I could idle that truck forever and it wouldn't slow down. When it was comfortable enough to shut the truck off I would, but I didn't feel I needed to be penalized just to sleep comfortably. One of the big reason i left this outfit, I knew eventually I would end up back in a KW.

As far as Halvor picking up much of Monson's freight, I think that will be negligable. They will probably be able to pick up much of the slack for Monson's freight out of Sappi (Cloquet) and NuPage (Duluth), but they will be fighting with the other carriers up there for it. Also Bowater shut down, and Halvor hauled some stuff for them too. I'm not sure what the other Canadian mill was that closed. If it was Abitibi in Ft Frances and Thunder Bay, Halvor could really be hurting too. They hauled quite a bit of freight for Abitibi.

Also USG, one of Halvor's big customers, was deathly slow when I quit. This spring they were down to half the normal level of drop trailers that used to be up there. I hope for their sake that the housing and building construction market picks up soon.

As far as backhauls to Duluth/Superior, monson didn't have many big dedicated accounts. Their bread and butter was was paper out of Bowater (thunder bay), and Scrap paper back up there (from IL, MN, WI, SD, ND) That is all gone now, and a lot of scrap paper is going overseas to places like china from what I've heard.

I think it took Halvor two tries to figure out that Super singles aren't worth the hassle, on trucks or trailers. They are useless in the snow, and harder to keep the allignment in check. Plus far too expensive. If your gross weight for two different loads is 75,000 versus 78,000 you won't see much of a difference in fuel economy. A few hundred or even a thousand pounds using super singles is just a fart in the wind for fuel mileage. The only advantage would be the ability to haul a little more gross weight. Let's hope they don't try to see if the "third times a charm".

d_weasel;
The 30 new Pete's they are going to be putting into service all have super singles. Also, they are just now recieving 30 new T660's, again. all of which are SS, and what appears to be about a 60" mid roof sleeper.
Still no idea on power or trans.

The last batch of KW's they bought had duals, I figured they were finally done playing that game.

So they are cutting back on sleeper space now too? Are they trying to make all their drivers want to quit?

I saw 4 of their new 660's with the flat tops today. They must be in a hurry to get them on the road.

Thats quick but local KW dealer turns'em out quick. The Petes are a diff. story. My understanding is they came in all F'd up. Real messy deal.

I keep seeing ads for halvor in my area looking for drivers, I have yet to put a app in. Everytime I call they say there not hiring or there trucks are full. I wonder whats up with that?

Halvor has ran some pre-cast concrete to utah for us beore, always early, nice, well spoken drivers with great lookin rides. Sad to read Halvor isn't a top notch company

They only care about their money and the only way you will get taken care of there is if you live close to Superior, WI and bend over for them.

I stand by every comment I made before about this crumbling, sorry excuse for a company, with some more editions.

Hometime? Unless you are on your dispatchers "good buddy" list, they seem to think you have to go home with a load hanging over your head. This is even more the case if you don't live near the terminal. I used to live right near the I-94 corridor in Black RIver Falls, WI. The only loads they ever wanted to give me to take home would barely give me 34 hours off, and they alaways, ALWAYS went to NJ, NY or some undesireable hellhole that west coast crybabies were too good for. This was true even after I had been on the road over three weeks.

I started getting smart and simply eating the gas and bought a 2nd car to drive up there, just so I could give them the finger when they lied about not having any freight.

What especially got on my nerves is my dispatcher would tell me right to my face that i could have 3 or 4 days off (after working my ### of for 3 weeks, laying over twice, getting screwed out of my layover pay, etc). And wouldn't you know it, not even a day at home, and someone who is not even my driver manager ends up calling me on the phone telling me about all these hot east coast loads that need to get there yesterday. But oh, the west coast crybabies can take all the time off they want. They're the Vinje family's special adopted children, after all.

Fuel and Routing? This is the only outfit I've ever heard of trying to run drivers out of route, not paying them the extra miles, just to get their hands on cheap fuel. They use the same idiotic fuel program that all the big companies use. For example, I took a load one time from Pueblo, CO to Joliet, IL. My first authorized fuel stop was on the far north side of Denver, a total of about 40 or more miles out of paid route. Their genious "fuel and routing" cronie couldn't understand why I demanded a new fuel stop. I simply explained that if he wanted me to fuel there he would have to get dispatch to pay me the extra miles. And this guy used to drive for them?!? For those of you who work for Swift, Werner, or other similar dirtbag outfits, you will notice that usually 80% of your fuel stops are crime infested ratholes with barely enough room to park a pickup truck. I finally got sick of their garbage and expained that their penny pinching is not worth my misery. My fuel stop compliance dropped to near 0% my last few months working there.

New trucks? Coffins! I'm seeing a lot of new flat top KW's going down the road. Who would seriously want to do long haul in a company truck like this? The Aerocabs they've had for years are bad enough. Same gutless, detuned C13 Cat with too high of an axle ratio to climb hills. Worthless 10 speed. At least give your drivers some room to breathe when they get stranded for days at a time with no load. Now that Monson and Timberline are gone, 80% of the competition is eliminated. They seem to think this gives them the right to treat drivers even more like dirt.

Don't just walk from these guys, RUN!!!