CDL in hand... Now What ? Decision time, that's what...

As of now and beginning with Tuesday I already have 1329 miles, which is an average of 443 miles per day. If this keeps up for a full 7 days I will have over 3000 miles.

I really like my fleet manager - he is helpful and nice to work with. I am grateful that I had a chance to meet him face-to-face. I think that helps the relationship.

Today I started off in Warren, MI (near Detroit) then went to Saukville, WI (near Milwaukee), now I am in Wrightstown, WI (near Green Bay).

At some point traffic got stopped due to a grass fire along the side of the highway. It didn't take too long to get moving again, but the fire was spread out along perhaps 1/2 mile. Hope they got it under control before any serious damage.



Dropped off the load of dunnage at the steel place in Saukville. There must have been 15 flatbeds there, including a handful from Roehl, in various stages of loading, securement, or waiting in line.

And sure enough one of the Roehl trucks was my recent OTR trainer !! It was great to see him. We had a few minutes to get caught up while we were waiting our turn - him and his student to be loaded with "slinky's," me to get my dunnage unloaded.

Now one might think that I would have gotten a load of slinky's to take somewhere, but no - I went MT for about 90 miles to drop and hook to a different trailer preloaded with 42,000 pounds of custom welded steel I-beams. I had to do the securement, which took some time as this is the first load I have had like this. The load is going to our Appleton terminal, about 30 miles away, to then be relayed by another driver to Alabama. I am out of hours so I will take it to the terminal tomorrow morning. Tonight I am spending the night at the shipper's facility. It is nice and quiet here

 

Dropped off the load of steel at the Appleton, WI terminal and later met the guy who was taking that load to Alabama. He has been flatbedding with the company for 11 years and told me the securement was done correctly so I was happy about that. He lives in Alabama so he was going home after delivering that load. Makes sense now

Took an empty flatbed to the now oft-visited (for me anyways) sports floor factory in Amasa, MI. Third time for me there in as many weeks. The security guard recognized me and we chatted for a while. Picked up a pre-loaded trailer with sports flooring destined for 2 locations in North Carolina. As soon as I looked at the paperwork I thought there might be a problem. Total weight over 49,000 pounds. I am a little over 30,000 empty so was concerned about being legal. I contacted fleet management right away who said to scale it at the nearest scale on my route. I told them I suspected it would be heavy on my drive axles by the way it looked on the trailer. I looked up the nearest scale in both the truck stop guide and on the GPS and both agreed the closest was over 3 hours away down near Green Bay. I again informed fleet management of this and they said to go there. All of this is documented through the QualComm messaging system by the way...

I was running out of hours and could only make it as far as the Iron Mountain terminal, which has a scale come to find out. But apparently it's not functional... too bad.

So this morning around 10:00 I made it to the scale and sure enough: 82,200 pounds. 80k is the max so yes we are over. And guess where? On the drive axles.

So another call to fleet management (my FM was working today which was nice). I suggested since I was already getting close to our company facilities maybe we could find a forklift to take a little off. "Well we'll have to let the planning dept make that decision." OK I'm just being the new guy trying to come up with solutions.... So after an hour wait the answer was to take it the Oak Creek drop lot (where I was headed with it anyway) and turn the load over to the guy supposed to take it to NC. So I met this guy and this is his first load for the company. He took it in stride and prepared himself to take the load all the way back to the shipper.

Meanwhile I picked up an empty step deck and brought it to the Gary, IN terminal. I was then assigned a relay load going to Kentucky. After fueling I drove around the lot looking for the trailer number. Made 2 passes before I found it - a curtain side! And a really old rusty one at that. Opened it up and... Nothing inside! Called FM and they said 'hmmmm.' Yup that's what I said. So then "try this trailer." OK. So the other trailer is a flatbed with steel preloaded and tarped. OK now we are in business.

So as I'm taking the load over to the scale at the terminal, who should I see? The guy that was supposed to take the sports floor back to the shipper in northern Michigan. Yup they told him to bring the load to Gary so they could USE A FORKLIFT TO REMOVE SOME OF THE LOAD! Gee that was a good idea that someone had. LMAO.

Anyway did some laundry had a shower and am chilling tonight. No pressure tomorrow. An easy 350 mile run and I am staged for the 2 stop Monday deliveries in Louisville and Lexington, KY.

So I have been getting up predawn every day since Tuesday. Yes I do believe I'll let myself sleep in tomorrow morning

Stay safe and have fun.

Perpetual.

 

Got permission from the weekend on-call guy for the customer in Louisville, KY to stay the night at their facility so I am parked at the gate. He said they should be able to start unloading me at 08:00. I-65 near downtown is closed to thru trucks; it will likely be a mess so I am happy to be staged here instead of having to fight Monday morning traffic.

 

Both loads off the trailer by noon. Now sitting at a nearby WalMart in Lexington waiting on next assignment. "Hello (hello... hello...)... is there anybody.... out there (Pink Floyd, The Wall, 'Comfortably Numb')..."

 

Recap:

Date Miles
---- -----
4/3 477
4/4 405
4/5 447
4/6 228
4/7 338
4/8 277
4/9 171

Total 2,343

As one can see, it started strong but the miles diminished as the week progressed. Today was a pretty big faux pas in terms of the company operations process, in my opinion. Waited over 4 hours to get a load assignment. Called and sent messages but not very responsive at first. Finally got my fleet manager, who had just gotten back from lunch, on the phone and he was surprised to see the planning department had not sent me a preplan this morning. Anyway, once he got the word I received an assignment fairly quickly. The next load picks up tomorrow morning and delivers Wednesday at 13:30. I could have easily picked that load up and had it to the consignee tomorrow. I had 9 hours of drive time left at noon today and it went to waste.

Oh well; guess that's trucking. I am not complaining, just telling it like it is. I am still happy doing what I am doing and realize it's only the first week. I am quite sure there will be weeks with less that 2000 miles and weeks with more than 3000. It's all good as I am still learning and there is no point having too much stress caused by tight deadlines and constant running.

For now I am at the Love's truck stop in Sparta, KY off I-71, not too far from Cincinnati, OH. I am to pick up a preloaded trailer with 45,000 pounds of stainless steel and take it to Wisconsin.

Stay safe and have fun.

Perpetual.

 

Hooked up to the preloaded trailer at the steel plant in Ghent, KY this morning. I have 4 coils totaling 47000 pounds secured with 2 chains and 1 strap each. Took around 3 hours to do all the securement and tarping. I'm sure it will be faster next time. Fueled up at the Gary terminal and am there for the night. 2 hours to make it to consignee in Kenosha, WI by 13:30 tomorrow.

My former OTR trainer is here in Gary also. We borrowed the company car and went out to a tasty but inexpensive restaurant.



The coil in this photo is about 9000 pounds. The nylon strap is not needed per the securement rules but it never hurts to have extra. After taking the photo, I also put two crossed chains in front of the dunnage cradle on this coil, even though the cradle was nailed together.