Combine transport

I hauled glass for a different company, and as long as they're building buildings, they'll need glass. The problem is, if the housing bubble bursts, glass freight drops dramatically. With Combined, you'll do a fair amount of tarping and untarping glass. They have some conestoga and double drop trailers, but a lot of the loads I see are what the company I worked for called double hump man killers. Basically two sets of A-frame racks with totally removable tarps. The glass plant will help you position the tarp when you live load, but it's on you to pull and fold the tarps at the delivery. And I think Combined has you disassemble the A-frames on those type trailers from time to time to backhaul general freight when things slow down. On their double drop trailers, the tarp stays on the A-frame and you just pull it forward and secure it to the front of the rack so the receiver can unload. Conestoga are much easier, roll the tarp forward, unsecure the load, roll it back and you're off to the next glass load. It's more work than tanker, but not as much work as regular flatbed. They'll train you on the securement(every glass hauling company does it a bit differently, so they all run new hires thru the training class), but it's not tough. The biggest thing about hauling glass is how you drive...no hard braking, no hard cornering, no hauling arse thru the truckstops who's parking lot looks like a lunar landscape. Basically drive glass like you would drive an unbaffled tanker and don't baja thru rough parking lots. Believe it or not, todays screwed up roads don't cause damage to glass loads like you might think. I'd probably still be hauling glass if my previous employer wouldn't have been merged with E.W. Wylie, I just didn't feel like going thru retraining at another glass hauler after the merger, and I couldn't stand working for Wylie.

As far as pay, not sure about Combined, but I grossed $80k my 1st year at my old company, and that was 4 1/2 years ago, pay rates have gone up a lot since then. A fair number of my former co-workers that stayed with Wylie topped $100k last year.

One thing to keep in mind, with glass, it's not "if" you get cut, it's "when" you get cut. Keep small tubes of super glue handy, you will get glass cuts. We're not talking limb removal type cuts, but your hands and forearms will get small cuts once in a while, no matter how much safety gear you have on...super glue is cheaper than new-skin and it works just as good.

 

I drive for Combined Transport in the glass division. There are some manual transmission trucks still in the fleet, but are slowly being phased out with automated manuals. They do a pretty good job keeping up with maintenance on the trucks and trailers, and with the dedicated Fresno account, you will be passing through Central Point, OR a lot if you need maintenance done at the yard. The dedicated account out of Fresno isn't terrible, and the drivers who are on that account get preloaded trailers vs OTR glass drivers who have to live load at Fresno.

 

When I was living in BC I did a fair bit of inter-line with them. My trucks would bring a b-train load of board down from up in the Cariboo somewhere and cross it onto a pair of Combined trucks at a lumber re-load just north of the border at Sumas. They were still running cab over Freightliners then that’s how long ago it was, but I found them and their drivers awesome to deal with.

 

@wa6ems -- this thread simply wouldn't be "complete" if someone didn't ask you.....
why would you leave the tanker world--to haul glass?

My concern here is that....in 6 months, or less....you'll be back to tanker yankin' again....

--Lual