First Truck

You're only going to average 9mpg on the internet.

 

I haven’t in a few months, I bought mine in 2017 tho, I’ve also got a red head in mine, i know yellow motors also bring a premium, every once in a while though I do see a ~20k truck from someone going out, most trucks are either worn out that someone buys to run to turn into scrap or puts a wal mart special paint job on it and thinks it’s all of a sudden worth 50k, then people buy it and ##### about how much old trucks suck because they have to work on them or spend money for someone that actually knows what they are doing to work on them.

Also right that I will never get 9 mpg out of that truck, but it’s also been paid off for ~20 years, and neither of us run the balls off anything or have the desire to run 80-100k a year like the megas slave driving these rookies, so fuel is a lot less of a hit

it’s not free fuel, but any half decent accountant with a little extra spent should be able to take 100k profit and knock it down to 50-60k, a whole bracket, even if I pay a little more on fuel, there’s always room to “put back into the business” on something else,

 

Or in nebraska

 

Of course you could be just coming in this business......listening to advice from people you don't even know.

And not having much experience, if any, you drop $80K on a truck and trailer, fail a DOT inspection or two, now you have the most unsafe carrier rating in the universe.

Worse......you get in an accident. Now you've lost your ### altogether.

People that ask these kind of questions about trucks, are really not ready to be on their own yet imho.

 

There's been 359 long hoods on there for over 100k, more than a few wanting 50k. I don't know where you're running but I see about a dozen 359s every week running around, cabovers all over running around. Not many people are scrapping the old stuff out anymore.

 

I actually looked for a 359 for over a year, I finally got so irritated by people owning the things that couldn’t answer the most basic questions or hack job repairs about them I called a friend who was mutual friend with my current KWs original owner and set everything up, turned out i really couldn’t turn it down at the price and specs.

fully rebuilt trucks I can see bringing 100k, but just because you have access to a case of rustoleum spray paint and replace a couple air lines doesn’t mean the truck is rebuilt….

 

Well they're getting a lot more than 8mpg. When I was training for my starter company, one of my students later rolled up with a new 2017 Cascadia automatic, showed me his dash reading 10.5 mpg with him putting zero effort into mpg, though to be fair they were governed at 61. Plus PM's every 50k instead of like 10k, factor in the semi-synthetic upcharge and you're still looking at savings right there of like $2000 per 100k miles, depending on how you value your time. So $8k less in fuel plus $2k less in pm's = $10k saved per year, so $100k saved over 10 years minus say $30k for emissions repairs, still not bad. And he's saving a lot more than $8k per year in fuel. Probably close to double that. So basically a free truck after 10 years.

 

Ya but to be fair that's true everywhere since new trucks are impossible to get right now. It's either fix up an old truck or let these killer rates slip thru your fingers. Fricken Daimler has disabled Freightliner salespeople's ordering software. They can't even order trucks if put 100% cash down on the counter.

 

Exactly those "good" old trucks are getting hard to find. Those old engines are great the rest of the truck is wore out.
I just got out of a 06 kw with a c13. Motor is getting due for a overhaul but the rest of the truck was eating me alive to keep it on the road. I was running it long haul and it just wasn't cutting the mustard anymore. Now it runs regional and the doing that job just fine.
As far as just going and getting a brand-new truck I think they are just as rare as the unicorn pre-emmision trucks at the moment.

 

There haven't been many 359s for sale for a couple years now. There's all of around 25 of them on there right now. I suppose the truck manufacturers are having the same supply issue with computer chips that every other vehicle manufacturer is.
There's a thing or two DC is looking to pass that I figure will probably swamp the used truck market if they go through, you know what I'm talking about I'm sure.