Millis OTR journal

I shut the truck off every chance I had, I don't like the noise and vibration that comes with idling and never heard anything about it. My best sleeping were the times I could leave the windows open and the engine off.
I had an EPU on a truck and had mixed results with it. It worked great when you wanted heat but was terrible in the heat. Especially in a truck that wouldn't idle for more than 5 minutes. The EPU couldn't handle the heat and would shut down, as would the engine if you wanted to idle it. I called about this problem once during the night and the recommendation was to get a motel room. Like it would be easy to do that and find parking.

 

I wonder about that. The trucks that won't idle are probably doing that for short term fuel savings, and all that restarting the engine could add up to a lot of fuel if that's true.

 

I've read that the deal with the EPU is to pre-cool the sleeper as you are driving before you plan on stopping for the day and it will hold the cool if you keep the curtains closed. I have heard that it will not cool down an already hot environment. I have never experienced an APU or an EPU. Just speaking on research I have read.

I kept operating as I normally did after the message and never heard another word. I did reply explaining what I am doing. I think the start up fuel use was a thing with older trucks but not modern trucks. Gotta be ok to start them up because most companies do not want their trucks idling and if I owned one myself I would keep it shut down as much as possible to save fuel.

 

I thought along the same lines regarding the carbon monoxide detector. Hell, i would want one just after seeing most trucks are weed burners now and 100-400 trucks at a truck stop would leave room for concern alone.

Regarding idling, i wouldn't have minded the cold one bit had he informed me of the appropriate sleeping bag/environment. I assumed bunk heaters would be used but outside of a month ago had never plopped my butt in a truck. What did i know? Piss poor communication on his and Millis part there. He was definitely an interesting person. Most notable was talking about only himself, and his hardcore right wing wack job conspiracy theories. I swear, Ben Shapiro can make excellent points even if he tends to not debate intelligent people of opposing views but if i hear his nasally whiny voice in the foreseeable future i'm checking out!

However in spite of the challenges cold presents, that summer you all get out east or deep down, save it! I would have been dead in a truck. I'd be wearing a diaper like some of you. No way i could stay hydrated enough at my age to be productive and get miles. Maybe 2 hours non-stop before i need a rest area or i'm on the ATF radar making trucker bombs

 

I tried precooling the truck before shutting it down and the EPU still failed. I'd shut the curtains too, and it just took longer to fail. But not long enough to be really useful and the warning lights would come on before it shut down in both cases. According to the shop this was normal for them too. It's a great idea that didn't work.

 

Took 4 years but I finally went on the New River Gorge bridge. I never get queasy on a bridge but today I couldn’t see the ground that thing is tall. Now that I know where it’s at hope to convince wife to maybe spend a weekend in the area next summer.

 

I love that bridge. There's a lot to see in that area. Definitely worth a weekend trip. Make sure you check out the nearby town of Thurmond when you go. It's pretty much a ghost town way down in the bottom of the gorge but it still has an Amtrak station.

 

Been awfully quiet in here lately. I'm still in the "official" Millis group on Facebook and somebody posted in there today about Lexington Warehouse. I hated that place when I drove for Millis and still hate it for you poor people that still have to go there.

It made me think, though... Something that I did not anticipate at all when I started pulling end dumps was how often I would be maneuvering, loading, and dumping indoors. This load I'm under now is a good example because it loaded indoors and will also be dumped indoors tomorrow. My reload tomorrow will be dumped indoors as well. Even so, none of the places I've been in have been as big of a pain in the rear as that place in Rochester. Fortunately I never had the misadventure of going to the XPO place there.

 

The XPO place is a smaller version of Rochester located in an office park that looks like a mall. I was only there once, hated it and the whole experience seemed so wrong.

 

Pretty sure the XPO place was @JOHNQPUBLIC favorite place to go to….

Lexington warehouse did suck but the little cafe right there in the parking lot made it worth the pain in the ### back…..bfast was so good there. I see there’s a new place there now though