Trying to find out about Oilfield trucking!

Discussion in 'Trucking Jobs' started by bennythejew, Feb 22, 2007.

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  1. slodsm

    slodsm Light Load Member

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    Jan 19, 2008
    Tyler TX
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    Scratch what I said about Basic lol. Seems the economy is even getting them now and they are the second largest oilfield services company in the US, Grey Wolf is the only one bigger.

    The started laying people off last month but it started as just the bums who weren't worth much to begin with.

    Then they canned my one of my bosses and demoted the other one.

    Then they "combined two yards" to make things more "efficient". That turned out to be a joke.

    Then as of today, they went through and fired every single office person that originated in my yard, then went to the disposal wells and fired every well hand we had that originated in my yard. They called it "laying you off due to slow times" but that's BS. The slow times are self inflicted because the new regional manager killed all of our major contracts because he said we could profit more running the trucks for hourly well work vice contract work.

    I am sure that would be true had he CHECKED TO SEE THE AVAILABILITY OF HOURLY WORK IN OUR AREA!!!! There is none. So therefore we now have almost no water and even less hourly work so they are starting on drivers next.

    I run my ##### off for these people. The weekly average for my yard is 20 loads. In my first 3 days this week I pulled 20 loads, usually I cover 28-32 loads a week and I don't speed or cheat, I just hustle hard because I don't want to drive a truck all my life, I want to move up lol.

    Unfortunately, I am 6th from the bottom of the totem pole in my yard so I will be one of the first to go if they start cutting drivers next. This is kind of depressing for me because I don't want to be labeled as a job hopper. I have only had 4 jobs in the last 12 years, the problem is, three of them are in the last year because I can't work for free and Conway and Melton both thought I should. This job I love but it's teetering on the edge of going away.


    CRAP!!!!!
     
    Drive-a-Mack Thanks this.
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  3. Coonass

    Coonass "Freshy Fresh"

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    If you dont mind my asking but how did Conway and Melton expect you to work for free? By how I mean what were you having to do?
     
  4. slodsm

    slodsm Light Load Member

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    Tyler TX
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    I was only running 1000-1500 miles a week, sometimes less. I was a professional big rig baby sitter for both of them.

    When I ran team for conway it was great, plenty of miles and plenty of money but I like solo and there were just no miles. For melton I normally only got two loads a week and they would be short ones, the rest of the time I spent sitting a flying J surfing the web and begging for loads over Qcomm and cell phone.

    Both companies had me earning just enough money to shower and eat. Here on the other hand there is (was) plenty of work, plenty of OT, and never a dull moment but this new management had just ground it all to a halt over the past 2 months. The hours and cash are still there but we are watching co workers one by one get picked off and told to seek employment elsewhere.

    It's slightly depressing wondering if you're next.
     
  5. Drive-a-Mack

    Drive-a-Mack Light Load Member

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    Aug 13, 2007
    Eugene, OR via Lincoln, NE
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    ..i can see where this is going now that oil is under $50 a barrel, there's just no profit in operating those oil rigs at that price; they'll just shut most of 'em down & wait it out until the price goes up again.. sorry to hear u might be losing a job u like soon but don't give up until u hear the word, this happened to me too but it was a year later after they started downsizing & i was 1 of the last to go..
     
  6. Baack

    Baack Road Train Member

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    Another poster stated an interesting detail
    He said you cant just shut them down or they go bad
    So looks like all that windfall profits will be needed to keep them open
     
  7. slodsm

    slodsm Light Load Member

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    Jan 19, 2008
    Tyler TX
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    We mostly deal with natural gas here now, the oil has all been sucked out of the ground so they moved on hahaha.

    Well, even more have been canned and it's looking scary at the moment.

    On a side note, seems like it might be ok after all. I got a call from a Master Sergeant (retired) that I worked with for years while I was in the Corps. He has a new contract with Uncle Sam doing some rewrites on tech pubs, tracked me down, and told me if I was interested in the job, he would pay 70k a year for my experience doing a translation from engineering speak to plain english that mechanics can understand lol.

    And a week ago I got a call from General Dynamics about a machinist opening here in Tx. I told them I had no experience with the fabrication of aviation components, only installation/removal and troubleshooting and they said it wasn't an issue, they would train me.


    Now THAT being said, I swore I would never work in aviation again when I left the military because of the amount of stress. Not pressure, plain old fashioned stress because if you screw up, people die. It's not like a car you can pull over, it falls out of the sky. I lost my best friend due to innatentiveness (not his or mine) and it is just one of those chapters in life I thought I had closed although I am exceptionally good at it (not bragging, I was just born with a wrench in my hand and a desire to understand EVERYTHING mechanical).

    I want to drive a truck, I enjoy driving a truck, but I spent 12 years learning everything there is to know about flight and now it's all going to waste. I have been away from it for a year and can already tell things are starting to slip away and be replaced with trucking info so I am kinda lost on what to do.

    If I wait much longer, I will no longer be a desirable hire for an aviation company but if I leave trucking, the same can be said about that.

    What the hell do I do now? lol
     
    Baack Thanks this.
  8. Drive-a-Mack

    Drive-a-Mack Light Load Member

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    Aug 13, 2007
    Eugene, OR via Lincoln, NE
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    ..well if you dont love what ya do it really doesnt really matter how much you make, you get up hating to go to work, that happened to me & even now that I am unemployed I would hate going back to that line of work again.. unless I am starving of course! :biggrin_25510: ..and if you do like what you do, you can put up with everything else & be happy about it even tho you're not making as much money, you just might wish you could.. :biggrin_25525:
     
  9. Waterloo

    Waterloo Medium Load Member

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    Nov 16, 2008
    Grass Lake, MI
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    I thought about going back to the patch, but after a little research... They are staking out rigs rigs left and right from what I am seeing and hearing. Not good. Even the wind guys are on hold as the prices of commodities are sinking like a rock. I know this, because I almost dropped $150,000.00 on a blade trailer a few months ago. #### glad I didn't! And still looking at all routes of revenue.

    Mike
     
  10. Grumpy1

    Grumpy1 Light Load Member

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    Dec 19, 2008
    Carthage, TX
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    Slodsm... who are you working for. You might have posted it and I just over looked it. I worked in a gas plant here in Carthage for the last 16 years, 18 years total with the company. When I started out it was Union Pacific Resources, then Duke Energy Field Services and now they are called Dcp Midstream. It was a really good place to work when they were Union Pacific but after Duke bought us out it all went down hill. I was offered a job by Marlin Midstream but just don't care to go back in the oilfield unless it is the last resort.

    For the original poster.... There are a few companies around here that are still hiring drivers straight out of school. CJ, Cudd and Weatherford are a few. Everyone except me who was in our class is going to work for either Cudd or CJ. You will put in a lot of hours but you will bring home some pretty good checks. You might be out on a job for 16 hrs straight and only actually work 6hrs. It's a lot of hurry up and then stand around waiting. Check with your local frac companies or workover companies.
     
  11. EasyMoney

    EasyMoney Bobtail Member

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    May 8, 2008
    northeast MS
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    Back in the early 80s when the oilfield was booming in MS, my uncle made a killing! He would stay out 3 or 4 days, and never be more than 50 to 80 miles from home. I did it for about 6 months during the winter and swore it would be a last resort for me to go back. When I did it, the boom was over. We could get good hours somedays, but then the next day you would get sent home if it was slow. That would eliminate all the overtime from the day before. I actually enjoyed the work itself, just didnt care for the supervisor and his policies. So I moved on.
     
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