Maverick .... from a wife's perspective

Latest update.

Redcoat made his way to Waverly, OH, without incident and got in line at the consignee to be offloaded the next morning. He was 4th in line and in the morning it worked out because they take groups of 4 trucks at a time. He got his lumber tarp folded without too much trouble and hoisted it up onto the trailer bed. Bad idea. He almost busted a nut doing it so he knows better next time.

His next dispatch was to bounce to Aurora, IN to pick up a load headed to Darlington, SC, and this trip shall be known as "The Tire Trip."

Made it to the shipper in good time and got loaded. While he was maneuvering the truck in the yard, someone noticed that one of his inside tires on the trailer was flat. That meant he had to call breakdown to come out and see about the tire. Turns out there was something wrong with the valve stem and after replacing it, they aired up the tire and Redcoat was good to go. Unfortunately, he lost 4 hours of driving time messing around with the tire and didn't get back on the road until 1500.

He made it to a Pilot on I-40 in Tennessee and spent the night then got up early to see if he could make it to the consignee by noon. If he can't make the noon deadline, he has to wait until the next day to deliver.

When he started up the truck and pulled out, he got a warning light that one of his drive tires was low so he made the circle to get to the place to air up the tire. Once he was on the road, he kept an eye on it. He knew he had 111 psi in the tire when he left and normally the psi goes up in all the tires as they heat up but this one was staying right at 111. There is a slow leak somewhere. So now he is at a T/A on I-40 in North Carolina waiting for them to have a look at the tire to see if they can find where he's losing air.

So much for trying to make it to the consignee today. <sigh>

He is still waiting for his first complete dispatch without any drama but I say, "What's the fun in that?" Just kidding. Gotta have a sense of humor to survive.

 

Ah, good to know. RC probably already knew that but I didn't.

As it turned out, RC was delayed another 4 hours. This time it was a nail in the thickest part of the tread. RC was of the opinion that the tire could be fixed with a plug but the T/A mechanic said it needed a new tire. So now RC is hauling a tire around with him until he can get to a yard to drop it off.

Anyway, he made it to Darlington last night and checked in with the consignee. They told him where to go to spend the night and he had a devil of a time getting turned around. He saw a truck coming down a road and thought maybe if he went that way he could get turned around but ended up in a car parking lot instead (or as RC would say, a "carpark"). He couldn't see where the truck had come from so that was a mystery. Fortunately the parking lot was empty and he managed to get headed back the other way to the truck parking area. It was a roomy lot and he's supposed to monitor his CB at 0600 for the call to come in and unload.

He told me that while he was in orientation he was told that when backing up the trailer the front wheels were supposed to come up off the ground to make turning the trailer easier but so far he hasn't seen it happen yet. He had a look under the trailer and didn't see anything that would make it work. Can any of you shed some light on this subject for me? I'm probably not describing it right but I'm figuring y'all will know what I'm trying to say.