KEEN Transport

***Disclaimer*** I have never worked for Keen.
However I do load at several of their yards frequently. I mostly interact with their HH guys, and they all seem like happy & good people.
Now I don't know what some recruiter promised you, but just look at the obvious right now. The economy is slow, construction is very limited, not just in the US, but globally. Keen hauls primarily Cat (as in they are Cat's primary carrier) as well as some other mining/construction mfg's. They have good equipment, and juicy freight. That means they attract a lot of drivers, and get to keep the good ones. With it being a slow economy, don't go in expecting to move up quickly or realistically for them to be really busy*. They do run flats & steps, and that is probably where you will start. But the "old gang" that have the experience & seniority are still there, and they end to make a living, and they will, so that alone should tell you that the extra specialized equipment load stuff will be limited to non-existent.
With all that said, if you can put up with being the low man on the pole until things begin to pick back up, it's a pretty good opportunity.


*If you want to know how slow the global economy is, I loaded D11 dozer S/N 00375 on 10/14/14. I went to Peoria 10/4/15 and loaded S/N 00407. That's 32 D11 dozers total, built in 50 weeks. At the company I work for, we move 20-30 into western Canada alone In a good year.

 

I used to have one of their recruiters call me every so often, if I remember correctly the get one day at home for every week their out. I waiting to catch one so I can ask about the hydraulic set up.

 

Electrically driven hydraulic pumps, powered by long "jumper" type cables from the tractor...

 

Yeah I understand that part, but the electric motors are 24 volt and they use a transfer switch of some kind to switch the truck batteries to 24 volt without sending 24 volts to the truck. I've seen the switch before because that's how they used to power the cranes on our service trucks. I can't remember what's is called and can't seem to find it on google. Do you know if they use the same setup on their multi axle trailers?

 

Uh, no! I wasn't aware of that. Are you sure they're 24V?
Some of our guys have electrically driven pumps on their boosters, and I know that they are 12V. I really considered long and hard about putting one in my booster when I was rebuilding the trailer to run steering assist (not full steering).

 

Yeah I'm sure, I talked to one of their drivers at the Flying J on I65 in northern Indiana a few years ago. I was asking him about it since I didn't see a wet line or a gas power unit and that's when he pointed out the dc power unit. He let me look at it and it was 24 volts. I didn't want to bother him to let me look in the battery box (seemed kinda rude to me at the time to ask) this was on a regular Trailking lowboy. We used to have a ramp trailer when we had paving equipment that had a similar set up for the rear ramps but it was 12 volt, it wasn't lifting near as much weight so it was plenty. I said something to one of our mechanics about it and he said "sure remember the crane on my old truck that's how it worked" he told me the switch you use and how it worked but I can't remember what it's called and he's long gone. I don't want to give up my wet line but that seemed like it could be a nice back up, plus maybe I could jump 24 volt equipment off my truck. It really isn't a big deal, I could get ahold of that mechanic if I really wanted to, it's just really something in the back of my mind and something for a couple of guys to chew the fat over on a lazy Sunday.

 

I believe those are called a "series-parallel" switch. We used to have that on our tug to supply +24v to the helicopters for starting so we didn't burn out the gel-cells on board.

 

That's it! Thank you.

 

Well that's obviously a starter circuit but I would guess a guy could modify the wiring a little bit and supply +24v to a quick-connect or set of posts etc.