Types of Trucks and loads???

Now that hurts. The bulk of my later years I spent draggin' a smooth bore food grade tanker around. I call it the Lazy man's trucking. Probably the least amount of trouble on the road.

I prefer it over most other forms of trucking in terms of work effort. I didn't even have to learn how to back in. Just get it near the hole in the wall & you're good...Just kidding.

Pretty much looks like it's described. The term is synonomous with "skateboard". I guess you could say that a "lowboy" & "step deck" would be a special form of flatbed.

It's like a box but has open sides & top. You'll see these loaded with items that are irregularly shaped, maybe too tall or too wide for a box. These trailers can be loaded from above or thru the side by crane or forklift instead of driven onto. Load securement is by strap & chains to the rails instead of load locks against the trailer walls. Kinda' simplistic but good enough.

Have you considered a union job with UPS? It's a bit of a paramilitary structured operation & management is truly against you in most aspects but the money can be good along with the bennies & retirement. At least it's a union even if it is their own. That union has a great deal of power.

Yes, the way I did it.

At 3:30 one afternoon, I went to the DMV, asked for & read the first pamphlet they have for obtaining a cdl. I took the first test-passed, requested the pamphlet on tankers, read it, took the test-passed. Requested the pamphlet on haz-mat, read it, took the test-passed. I was gonna go for the doubles/triples & maybe bus but it was almost 5pm & everyone wanted to get out so I settled for just those.

I set an appointment to take the driven part after I secured a truck. It happened that a local beer distributor/certified instructor was offering the use of their truck after they passed their new drivers thru. It cost me $125 to use their truck for the test.

Practice was using my pickup & a boat trailer, then I rented a UHaul with the longest trailer they had for the day. A short practice run with the class 8 before actually taking the test & I was good to go.

This doesn't make you a real truck driver, it just shows you can remember some answers & have a bit of mechanical coordination.

 

You can run a tanker/flatbed local and its pretty easy work. There is a ton of local work where I live on Class B trucks (which you can drive with your Class A of course). Pays about $16/hour 40-50 hours a week most places for a box truck.

Flatbed and tanker pay a little better depending on what you're doing. I run a flatbed a few days a week and the nice part is using the crane, I don't have to touch a thing but the controls for the crane.

Other days when I run a regular truck or trailer I am unloading everything by hand which gets old pretty quick. Keeps ya in shape though. Local isn't for everyone but being home every night makes up for the crap you have to deal with.

If you can deal with doing 15-20 stops a day across 1-3 states and hand unloading at every stop local is good for you. Some days I start in CT and work my way through NY to NJ and than come back. Other days I start in CT and work my way through MA or RI. "Local" can be a lot farther than you think its more regional driving. A lot of early morning hours and sweating it out in the heat unloading or freezing in the cold.

Cement isn't bad work but you'll be laid off during winter at most companies. I've hauled glass and it doesn't seem like a construction trade but it is, the glass shops order less and less glass in winter until theres nothing left to deliver. Be careful what you chose to haul as you want a year round job unless you are being paid very well.

Tanker you might want to consider, dragging a 40 pound hose around is a lot better than dragging 300 pound units of glass or other materials.

 

BobC said >> "
Quote:
Originally Posted by crazymama
Is there a way to get a CDL without going to a 4 week trucking school?

Yes, the way I did it.

At 3:30 one afternoon, I went to the DMV, asked for & read the first pamphlet they have for obtaining a cdl. I took the first test-passed, requested the pamphlet on tankers, read it, took the test-passed. Requested the pamphlet on haz-mat, read it, took the test-passed. I was gonna go for the doubles/triples & maybe bus but it was almost 5pm & everyone wanted to get out so I settled for just those.

I set an appointment to take the driven part after I secured a truck. It happened that a local beer distributor/certified instructor was offering the use of their truck after they passed their new drivers thru. It cost me $125 to use their truck for the test.

Practice was using my pickup & a boat trailer, then I rented a UHaul with the longest trailer they had for the day. A short practice run with the class 8 before actually taking the test & I was good to go.

This doesn't make you a real truck driver, it just shows you can remember some answers & have a bit of mechanical coordination." <<

I like his brain and his spunk !!....he will prevail long after most driving school graduates drop like flies !!!!

 

I keep seeing that tankers are easy work. That's a general statement that does not hold truth for all tankers. I worked for ARCO (a major oil company for those who are in the east) before I retired and a days work was not all that easy. I worked in Las Vegas NV where 110° heat was not uncommon. I'd pull 5 to 6 loads local every day.

After checking the truck at the start of the shift you'd go over to the loading rack and load. Not too difficult but you had to know what you were doing. Then drive to the station, spot the truck close to the fills get out and stick the tanks. Then drag out at least 4 hoses but most of the time it would be 6. The trailer hose is 35' long. You'd place the fittings on the fill pipe and connect the hoses to the truck. I drove a super tanker and it was a truck and trailer so I had 2 drop spouts on the truck and 3 on the trailer. You'd have about a 5 min. break in the work to do the paperwork right there on the drawbar. You'd change hoses to different drop spouts to unload the correct product into the correct underground tank. When one product was done you lift the hose to drain all the gasoline out and then store the hose. After all the hoses and fittings were stored you'd stick the tanks again and give the station the paperwork. You just unloaded 12,450 gallons of gasoline in 20 minutes and then you're off to get another load. Now try that in 110° heat 5 to 6 times a day. It's not easy.

It reads like it's not all that hard but I've see our own drivers come up from LA and drop from the heat and the extra work the super tankers would have. But I wouldn't want it any other way. I didn't like when the loading rack went down and we had to sit there and wait. You get a rhythm going and 12 hours would go by fast. It's a little easier at night but then you'd have other problems to deal with like drunk drivers. But either way it's not like the OTR tankers where you load once then drive. I've also heard that some of their jobs are not all that easy either but I'd rather driver tankers than any other type of driving. I've pulled box, and flatbeds so I've worked hard with other types of trucks and granted tankers are not the hardest but I don't think they're the easiest either.

 

GasHauler,

My apologies for minimizing the work that can go into tanker yankin'. When I speak of it, I'm talking about OTR smooth bore food grade stuff; Not you real tanker yankers running fuels.

I never envisioned myself pulling fuels around; too much like work for me. You actually have to be good at that.

Being the inherently lazy baztard that I am, I stuck with food grade after doing the refer & dry box thing. Spent entirely too much time totin' swinging beef, loading/unloading by hand frozen foods, produce & seeing the insides of places like Hunt's Point & Philly.

In the "old times" of food grade, there was a bunch of hose pulling, in-transit heat lines & pump riggin'.

I remember those cold days & nights of unloading some kind of veg oil that clotted as soon as it hit the cold fittings, hoses & valves. If it hit even the hot summer air it solidified instantly. My overalls have worn spots in them from all the laying on the frozen ground under the trailer with a plumbers torch to start the flow & then keeping the valves & fittings warm to keep it moving.

I managed to ease myself out of those loads into various fruit juices, alcohols, wines & whiskeys, eggs, yeasts, vinegars, milk, corn oils, chocolates soys etc. Stuff that would only hurt you if you ate or drank too much of it or didn't respect it in curves, stopping, starting.

In spite of that little bit of work in food grade, I'd never go back to a refer or box. To me, food grade tanker yankin' is a lazy man's ride. Perfect for me...cuz I'm lazy.