Differences between driving in the seventies and today

There is a well established company just down the road that I had my eye
on when I moved here. They were my back-up plan. They used to run older
trucks......had a decent shop, etc. Than they started trading off the good trucks
and are buying the new toy trucks.....now they are advertising for drivers.

I haven't talked to the shop but I bet they are kicking themselves everyday that
they sold the only decent trucks they ever owned.

 

Don't miss the good old days at all. Will take my plastic truck and big brother watching me over running around in that old cabover with no air, heat or power steering. Started out at Burlington Motors making 23 cents a mile never knowing when I was going home. Now home every other day, every weekend and fantastic pay and benefits. 11 more years to retirement.

 

I usually tried to locate the generator on the older cars and if I find it toss it in favor of a alternator that handles that kind of a load. Believe there is a regulator that follows a generator near the battery as well in the bay. I also carried jumpers because sometimes when a older car like that pulls up sick, it needs a jump. Battery has been starved.

 

What are you talking about? Generators are great! There's nothing like having your battery died as you idle in traffic lol

 

I worked fuel island at Union 76 in Blythe Ca,and had to fuel the truck,check the oil,and do the windows.

 

After 8 months of driving and after the IRS busted the owner I joined the Air Force. In 1980 while stationed at Nellis AFB I worked part time at the Husky truckstop on I15(Las Vegas) Pumped fuel, cleaned windshields check oil the full service works.

 

I think comparing engines of old to modern ones is a bit of a stretch.

Ok they both had pistons and burned diesel, but that's about where it ends.

Back then you had mechanical fuel injection and were LUCKY to get 4mpg. Read the specs on old engines. 250-300hp was the norm. Maybe 1350lb ft of torque. Now you can easily buy one from the factory with 600hp and 2100ft lb of torque. Oh and did I mention at cruise it would get 7.5-8mpg?

People curse computers on modern engines until they realize the only reason your engine runs as good as it does and gets the fuel mileage it does is because the computer is working every second to optimize the engine's performance for you.

I worked for a company that had a 750 truck fleet. VERY few ever went down with computer issues. What issues did they have? Little stuff. Lights would stop working (or wouldn't go off at all), things would start to rattle or the cab would leak water. One guy pissed into his DEF tank because he thought that DEF was just cow piss. So that screwed up the entire DEF system.

But old trucks you could smell for miles. New ones the air coming out is just about cleaner than the air going in. Yes, there are more things on modern trucks, but they ride like Cadillacs compared to the old ones and are much more reliable. There is just MORE OF THEM so they look like they break down more often but they definitely don't. I mean in an average 600 mile trip, how many trucks do you see broken down on the side of the road that are obviously not tire related? Me? Maybe 3? And I see probably 10,000 trucks in any given day on the road, if not more?

As for as engine longevity, that's more due to the better oils we have now than the engines themselves. We had a truck that we'd been using Mobil Delvac in and it had 450000 miles on it. They tore the engine apart and inspected it. Everything was well within spec and it still had very visible crosshatches inside the cylinder bores. And that was changing the oil once ever 75K miles. The mechanic estimated the engine could go to 1 million miles easily.

So people having all of these computer issues, I don't know what to tell you. Maybe change over to Windows 10 and get away from Mac.

 

Not even sure that was happening much "back then". I gotta say you are one of the very, very few that takes wrenching seriously. Good job! I mean that.

 

Now "they" tell us when to rest. Fleet trucks..very seldom grease it. 50 to 70k mile oil changes. When i see used truck..fleet maintained..i run the opposite way.

 

I agree. My dads old diesel engines would be doing great to get to 300k before rebuild. Same with old 238 and cummins 290. Now later years 1 million is not that unusual. Now think it has been regressing in the recent years. Most trucks on the hooks these days is wiring issues, and all this so called pollution stuff?. Have to admit i am having trouble with the 75k oil change intervals though. With a newer engine, and egr, that oil had to look like tar.