break down

Truckers are not the only ones who are often away from their families and miss birthdays and holidays... My father was in the Military and away for long periods often... and my mother was often in a foreign country with no drivers license and three kids all under 5 yrs old... although I know and remember missing my father.. I mostly know and remember being proud and having a lot of respect for him... and I do believe it is why I have a very close relationship with nim now...

I know it is not easy.. but at least he is out trying to provide for you and the children.... there are some men that are not doing that.. they are home but not providing...

 

They try to get you home when you request. If you break down all bets are off. As I just posted a couple hours ago. They do not bus or fly you home. You get a motel room and $50/day.

 

If it is the exhaust filter , actually diesel particulate filter , DPF , it is a fairly quick repair . That's if they get him in the shop quickly which might involve him explaining the situation and sweet talking the shop foreman. He also needs to personally talk to the planners as soon as the shop can tell him when the truck will be ready so he can get a load home . Swift won't pay for a bus ticket in either direction . If he leaves his truck and comes home his truck will probably be looted by his fellow drivers because the entirely worthless Swift grease monkeys will leave it outside unlocked .

 

I have had my truck left unlocked several times. I don't like it, but it does happen.
Not once has anything been disturbed.
I have also never had a problem with a plugged in power inverter.

I hear the stories, but have yet to experience any of them. After 4 years as a company driver, if there were things wrong I should have run across them.

From my experience the Swift shops are very OK.

 

Heh. I'm actually here at the Freightliner too in La Crosse, WI. Got towed here last night after breaking down just two friggin hours after being worked on all day Thursday by the Swift shop in Minneapolis.

 

What was it in for at Inver Grove, and what broke this time?

I've usually had pretty good luck there, and I use them quite often.

They have let me down, two times now.
The first was with an older ProStar that had a transmission output shaft oil leak. They replaced the bushing, but it was the race that was actually damaged. It took another trip back to get it done right.
The second was during my last home time. I put the truck in for 3 issues, one being a check engine fault.
The warning came back on the day I picked it up, and the display shows 2 faults. It is on constantly now, but the truck still runs fine.
I'll wait until my next home time in Denver, if it doesn't quit altogether before then, and see if they will fix it.

A qualifier for both instances.
The first... more than one shop had 'fixed' the problem, including a dealer. I had the problem from the moment when I picked it up at Martinsburg, WV terminal.
They all simply replaced the bushing.
It wasn't until the third time at Inver Grove that I finally realized that the race must have a scratch, and I made sure they checked for it.
Funny that no qualified mechanic at any of the shops or the dealer thought to check the race for scratches before they did the quick fix. In the end, I had to tell them.

The second... I had the check engine fault a couple months ago and a couple sensors in the DPF system were bad, and replaced. It seems much the same thing this time.
If the fault didn't show up when they brought in in the shop (and it was intermittent), they may not have seen the problem.
Now the fault is on 100% of the time, so it should be easy to track it down. I'm just not willing to give up drive time right now, unless something worse happens.

 

At Inver Grove, I had a check engine light on and my grill had come loose at the top. It was still pretty sturdily attached at the bottom, but all the waving it was doing at me was unsettling. Shop said the check engine light was on because my dpf filter thingie was clogged. They bolted the grill on at the top. And finally said that they also replaced the steer brake pads.

I left the terminal with a quarter of a tank of fuel, which should've been about 40 gallons for this truck. More than enough to make it my fuel stop 170 miles away. After just 60 miles, I noticed that I was already down to 1/8 of a tank(s). Odd. Finally stopped after just 130 miles for emergency fuel. My mileage was absolutely tanking. While waiting for the emergency fuel to open, had a bite to eat and came back out to find my truck had shut itself off. It would start but kept shutting itself off.

It ended up being a pretty massive coolant leak. Coming out of the EGR part? There was coolant sprayed all over and dripping from the engine. Tow truck guy said it might've taken time for the coolant to build up pressure for it to leak or something. I don't know. Got to the dealership at 3am and onroad was telling me to be at the truck at 7am. So tow truck guy dumped all the coolant that I had into the container so I could at least idle for warmth while it lasted. It barely lasted till 7am, I checked and it was down to the last 1/2 inch or so of depth. But there was a nice puddle of it on the ground.

Also, tow truck guy didn't recap my airtanks? My low air warning buzzed all four friggin hours. I didn't want to nap anyway. Dealership had a very nice bed.