JJ's Place

I suppose that I can Be cosidered a BED BUGGER but I haul elec, trade show stuff and Medical Equ, Mostly between the Bay and LA, That being said I just did three trips to Palm Desert today w containers and Next week have to do a 51 by 14.8 by 15 high load, so what am I classified as, besides a rookie?

 

We are all rookies man. One day we may be more, but that will be when we stop driving and learning.
It depends on your religious beliefs where we are when that happens.

 

right now i am either 15 or 18 depending on when i haul. and no they are not hiring. just a small two truck operation.

 

Understand that's a nice gig if you like the trade show circuit. Are you doing mostly crates. Ran into couple that do the specialty shows and drive for beacon. He was really into it, but he had a specialty niche with the big boys, Apple, Nike and the Pharmaceutical/Medical equipment arena.

 

Speaking of being rookies....today I broke my own rule and had to work out of it. Always, always always get out and check the height of the trailer vs. 5th wheel when hooking up before backing up totally. (unless you dropped the trailer to be loaded and then might be good too). Sure enough what sounded like good contact was the pin sliding across the pad and landing right in front. Well, you just tilt the plate forward and jam something (mallet or chock work) under it to back out. Just make sure you don't damage the reefer housing by ramming...now you know where that damage occurs. Well this one ended well, but was a lot more work than usual.

That leads to second observation. This trailer was obviously dropped by one of you scurvious 0/0 L/O or just a real lazy company driver ( I suspect the former). Why?
Supposed to be 4 Load locks, they left only one. Reefer fuel 3/8 tank and finally the excessive overall height due to larger tires...not company standard. Am I right?

 

Plus when I was at Central all company trucks and I thought all or most lease trucks had an Air dump for the drives.
If you have it you crank down till you just make contact. Then dump when you drop.
This way the next truck has no issues.
My last company everyone dropped trailers with legs 1/2 an inch off the ground and then dumped.
When we hooked we would dump, get under it some and then air up. So the landing gear was off the ground.
Never had an issue at that company, and the landing gear was always in great shape.
Oh wait.... this is JJs thread. Are you a central driver lol.
Anyway. Air dump is a great thing to have.

 

All the trucks I have driven, three to be exact, had an air dump. Very useful tool if you ask me.

KH

 

Ye but its just a short hood so that doesnt really count

 

Why not? Only real differance is the hood length and the wheelbase.

 

The trade show stuff is mostly crates and fiber cases on wheels, the med equ are cancer treatment radiation machines weighing in at about 32 to 34 k depending in configuration, also get to deliver a lot of digital movie projectors to the theaters. Would like to see a road other than I5 and 152/101 tho, coming up Sept 1 will be starting on my second year of driving after being off for 26 years, boy who knew!