Dry van vs reefer

Yeah although that is one of those shipping container reefers by the looks not sure how that would of caught on fire that would be very rare? If It happened I'd try and get a fire extinguisher onto it although this fire looks like its beyond that level, best call in the fire brigade to deal with this incident.

 

PM me when you get a chance

 

I picked reefer and am happy with it. One thing I learned, before I made my choice, has to do with the industry in general. Reefer loads are almost always food. Food is about the most recession proof loads that exist. With dry van and flat bed, the availability of loads can vary. Some parts of the year, there will be tons of loads and other parts, loads will be more scarce.

It is true most reefer loads are not drop and hook and you end up taking way too much time getting loaded and unloaded. If you have patience (and I do), it's easy to simply go with the flow. My company does pay detention, so I usually get paid for my time sleeping while in a dock.

I get paid a few more cpm doing reefer compared to dry van.

For my company, all our reefer trailers are air ride suspension verse the spring suspension of our dry van trailers. So, our reefer are simply smoother to pull.

Never, from day 1, have I had any problems sleeping with my reefer running. When I first started, if I was pulling a load where the reefer was set to cycle instead of continuous, before I went to bed, I'd switch it to run continuous so I wouldn't be woken up by my reefer suddenly starting. In the morning,, I'd just switch it back to cycle. However, not long after I started I discovered it didn't really matter. I slept just fine either way.

 

I have had a few that didn't tell me the price until it was unloaded.
Then they call me and say it is this much, come in with the check.

The trailer is locked in and I don't get my paperwork until I pay, so that end is safe for them.

 

I never encountered this. It's also been 8 years since I last used a lumper. This is why I phrased my comment as I did.

 

I have recently switched to dry van from reefer. Reefer definitely had its perks. The biggest thing I liked was driving mostly nights. Driving through major cities with multiples lanes empty at 3am hits differently.

The cons of reefer for me was wait times. Longest was 32 hours at Americold in PA, this was just a few months ago. Dealing with jumpers was also pretty annoying.

Had multiple pickups on farms which you have to take dirt roads to get to. Any wrong turns and you'll be in a world of trouble.

In my experience:

Dry van = appointments during the day
Reefer = appointments during the night.

If you can work at a mega carrier I doubt your wait times will be as bad as mine were.

 

I don't have any delay getting a money code to pay the lumper. Once at Safeway in WA the lumper unloaded me and I waited for over an hour before I got the text telling me the lumper STARTED unloading me. Then about an hour after that I finally got the "we've unloaded you and the cost will be X". That customer uses a no-contact smartphone system for payment.

At another reefer customer the lumpers took 6 hours to unload and then I stood in line for 2 hours, expecting to give them the check for the lumpers, only to find out after X a.m. I should go to the other line to pay the lumpers. That line only took about 45 minutes of waiting to pay the lumpers. I was at that customer almost 10 hours to unload and get my bills so I could leave.

 

Me also, but I cannot pay them online until their online system notifies me they are finished and gives me the cost of their service.

 

As I stated in post #55 its been 8 years since I last used a lumper. I have had lumpers to unload me hundreds of times over the years. I don't remember having to wait long to get processed in, get a door, and get that comcheck/EFS check in that head lumpers hand. My biggest problem has always been having to wait for a complex load to get yanked off and broken down. This is what takes so dang long most of the time. These lumpers are in essence hand unloading. Back to paying lumpers. A lot of the places I delivered to the lumpers had a credit arrangement with my carrier. I hardly ever paid that $50 to Walmart, I just signed the paper and went and waited.

 

I’ve never paid before being unloaded. It’s always afterwards so they can determine amount of breaking down and restacking.