Irrigation load

On that load I posted a picture of - I ended up adding more and more straps as the journey went on. Even had to strap the product to itself here and there because it was falling apart. Ended up with twenty 4" straps, and three 2" straps when it was all said and done. Basically had to use straps to make the product sturdy enough to actually strap it down without destroying it. It sucked!!! My straps flapped the whole trip, because I couldn't even take enough slack out of them to make them tight without buckling everything.

I keep an endless sling on my truck for lifting certain things. The receiver wanted to just fork them off the truck. He tried to grab two at once, and they fell apart all over the deck. After we got that mess cleaned up, he was happy to use my sling for the rest of them. Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast.

There are certainly loads that will give you a few more grey hairs.

 

Maybe it’s a stupid English thing, but those loads feel like an egg and spoon race to me.

 

Definitely are. A mixture of going as fast as you can as careful as you can. And every good bump on the road, you expect to see an explosion of crap all over the interstate.

 

The two inch on that square tube was a good idea, but don't use two. You essentially want to, as AllowMe suggests, gut wrap that tube around those other pieces, to hold it to them, and that may hold the dunnage, if you're short of straps. If you can, gut wrap that top level with your 4" strap to cinch them together and pull them down at the same time. If that box is metal, take that strap and gut wrap that one around the whole lot, too. If it goes, it's gotta take all of it with it. Gives you a little bit more time to recognize a problem if stuff starts shifting when you increase your load checks....you know those usually first 25-50 miles and then every 150 miles or 3 hours whichever one comes first. Stop more often to check until you're fairly certain it's holding and not moving anything or sliding out and keep watch.

In the future, reload before you leave, if they have equipment to help. I had to completely reload a gas pipe load out of Catoosa, OK that was preloaded, and was horrible. worked into the night/heat, 9 hours, and the guy on their day shift helped with what he could with the hilo, but it was a total cluster ____ . Read someone the riot act and they agreed. From that point on, loads were much better, but it was "a new guy" that was responsible. I didn't buy it either, but no matter, told them next time I will refuse the load if it's like this again. What good is a preload if it has to be re-pre-loaded.