Post flatbed load photos here V2.0

yikes !

 

I drove by maybe 20 minutes later and got a look at the back of the cab. Cabinet cab guard was destroyed, but still in place.

 

Seems every time a picture gets posted on here of structural steel beams going into the cab, the one thing they all have in common is they were strapped not chained...

 

As strict as some of those steel shippers are, you would think they would have some rules on securement that the driver must follow before leaving the facility.

Also, what’s up with so many flatbed drivers not having any chains? Seems to be a lot of them out there. We have a customer in the utility field that occasionally ships out material via some obscure third party logistics company, if it’s something that we can’t haul for whatever reason. They have had drivers show up to pick up loads of cable reels with no chains.

 

Chains and straps have the same WLL?
I see more steel haulers using chains, use less than they would if it was straps?
I use a combination usually, sometimes only straps. But LOTS of them. And lots of dunnage. The dunnage is your connection, and friction between the load and the deck. Ours are always divided several times by dunnage all the way up thru the stack so lots of belly's can be added. I think the belly's are the ones that will stop it from moving.
That, and checking your straps to make sure its tight, and stays tight.

 

I’m done working on my tan so I might do some real work next week. Perfect timing with all this talk about sliding steel, I’m supposed to do a couple loads of structural…
Back to my roots, for 33 years steel was mostly all I hauled. The first 20 I was at a fabricator that never really cared about chain marks on the material so we always chained. The other 13 years I was at a place that did alot of bridge iron and stuff with sophisticated coatings so I switched to straps.
Knock on wood, I’ve never had any serious incidents but pictures of others misfortunes always scare the crap out of me.
The guy I’ll be working for usually secures my loads for me…with chains…

 

You can get a straight set of beams like that a lot tighter with chains. I used to think you could get straps as tight, but you can’t. Chains & binders you can get those beams to dig into the hardwoods. Not to mention it’s faster. It probably really doesn’t matter much, you screw up bad enough there coming forward.

 

Before they came out with all the load securement requirements that used to be our rule of thumb. We’d go down the road with 3 chains on a load…we had a guy who hauled for us and he’d only use 2 (his chains were heavier)
I’d come out of Bethlehem with 4 chains on a 60’ load and never got a second look from DOT

 

3:4 loads that been on my trailer this week were shingles