Need Advice on becoming an O/O

sorry about your luck charlie. i bought a perfectly good working truck. i was in it for 1 year and put 100k miles on it. i'm now up to 200k miles in that truck driving it MYSELF.

you see. no one can predict breakdowns. and i don't just go out and buy anything knowing absolutely nothing about it. so you can forget that someone else's headache theory.

i'm also a retired mechanic. i can probably do a better job at looking over a truck then you can.

i saw your truck. it's also a lemon. new trucks are in the shop just as much as old trucks. and you got more emissions and electrical crap to worry about then i do.

all trucks are lemons. all trucks need repairs. and it's really not surprising considering the amount of miles they do in a day, week, month, and year.

and you see, i've learned a lot about this truck. things that you have no idea about. but your time will come. if you keep that newer truck of yours that long.

 

Ok so what about that 12K dollar truck that somebody buys in cash, does an extensive inspection, dyno and oil sample on before the purchase, they drive it for 1 year while saving say that 1500 a month payment they would be paying and that truck doesn't break down or need any major repair for that 12 months. You decide to sell the truck and get 12K for it and you take that additional 18K and decide to buy a 30K truck with a years worth of 10CPM roughly saved for a Maint. account. That has worked for people on here and I dont see it as a fairy tale or far fetched... Oil samples can see that inframe coming before major damage is done to the internals of the engine like a rod saying hello to the outside world.

All trucks are lemons????

 

Well excuse me. The way you post, you seem pissed at the world you have to spend money on it.



You saw my truck? Really, where at?

 

My impression is that he is one of the few that have actually shared that information. The majority on here are so worried about keeping up appearances that you'll never know about major setbacks they've experienced. Human nature at work.

Maybe, maybe not. Probably more of a case where a larger carrier that has a fleet of trucks like his. They either dump them shortly after the warranty expires or at some mean time to failure statistic. Really no way to tell unless you are buying from the actual first owner versus from a second or third owner, auction, lease liquidator, or the like.

Pre-purchase inspection tells you what's happening now. No dyno or oil analysis is going to predict many things beyond an imminent failure. The stuff I've dealt with has been things that could not possibly been predicted by an inspection. A few were expected based on trend. For example, I knew going in that a DD 14L S-60 of my vintage has a turbo life expectancy of around 750k. The truck I bought with 715k on it had a replacement installed before I took delivery. It was worked into the deal.

Snowwy has already responded so I'll add to that. IMO he did his due diligence. As a mechanic he knows the difference between a systemic failure and normal wear. I'm sure he did his homework and looked into the stories on the street about what he was buying. If he believes he didn't buy a lemon, I'll take that at face value. I've dealt with enough of that on my own. I did my due diligence too. Nothing I've paid for has been extraordinary for the trucks at their age. Knowing nothing about his truck or the problems he's had to resolve, neither you or I are in no position to make a judgement on lemon or not.

I wish you no ill will and the best of luck. You certainly did your due diligence when you bought your truck. IMO you need to put a couple hundred thousand on yours before getting too condescending about someone else's troubles.

 

mn has a newer truck. i'm guessing at least a 2009. probably with low miles.

and you could say i'm a little pissed. becuase of my experiences with repair shops.

when people came to me with broke cars. i fixed them and there kids still got to eat.

take your truck into a repair shop. they want your bank account. and give you an attitude if they can't get it. IF your lucky enough to drive into a shop that knows how to fix trucks.

MOST SHOPS DON'T.

i got lucky in that the problems i have. NO ONE WANTS TO TOUCH becuase the isx sucks to work on. specially with all it's typical common problems.

when cars came to me with a problem. i spent no more then half hour. if i couldn't figure it out. i tell them where to go and didn't charge them.
take your truck in with a problem. you sit at shop all day. pay $500. and drive down the road with truck still broke.

you see, MN. i'm experiencing trucking reality more then you. my truck is older then yours and has more miles then yours. i'm learning more then you. becuase all you gotta do is drive and make money. ME, i can't drive becuase i can't find a mechanic that can fix my truck.

i drove my truck 18 months and put almost 200k miles. my truck was a mighty fine truck. just like your shiny newer rig is.

there are lots of reasons for my stories. and it has been a great learning experience. but you'll never know. cuz i'm just gonna let you continue theorizing. and wait for your time to come to learn what i've had to deal with.

not all of us can afford a fairly new truck like you.

 

I have an 07 Century with now 735K miles on it. DD S60 EGR 14L, 18913 Eaton Fuller Tranny, and 3.42 rears.

 

I EXPECT to spend $2-4K per month on my truck for the first 6 months.

I also expect before or shortly after my 30 month loan is up on this equipment to be forced to look at either a replacement engine or a newer truck.

Attitude means a lot. And some here write as if they are pissed at the world, it comes across that way and people looking seriously at getting into being an O/O pick up on that.

It's one thing to share with newer O/O or wanna-be's that this stuff breaks expensive. The reality, take anything that might break on your car, multiply it by 10 and you might be in the general area of cost to repair this thing.


Mechanical lifespan is not something a lot of people start to really consider. Trucks you HAVE to. Especially if you are buying into the used truck market.

I'd much rather buy a truck for dirt cheap with 900K miles on it with no documented engine repair than one with 500-600K on it. One I KNOW that an engine is likely imminent. The other, it's a crapshoot for the next 3-4 years when, not if, when it will be needed.

when you are financing your equipment, the banks don't look at it the same way though.

People need to look at opportunity cost as well. Is it worth it to wait another 24-48 months to save up the cash to buy a truck, or is the opportunity cost better to finance more now with a respectable down payment and will the ROI be there to cover your interest of those 24-48 months.

I talked to 3 financial advisors this summer before I made that decision. We all had the same conclusion. Buy the truck now. Looking back, I was scared to death to go into this undercapitolized. I still felt it was a bad decision up until my exhaust gasket went out.

I rolled through two equipment failures costing me $4000+ in my first 7 weeks as an O/O. It isn't the end of the world. But you need to be able to look at what a "minor" repair will cost you and if you DON'T make that repair, what will it lead to in failure and the cost associated with that. Suddenly $1000 is a cheap repair compared to $7000.

Not IF it's going to happen. Just when.



But I don't have to come across to people as a hard assed crusty driver that is "telling the truth".

 

This is the curse of having mechanical know-how. You positively know when you are being screwed with. The bad dealers know you are at their mercy at a certain point, facing at least a high dollar wrecker bill if you don't like the bill of goods they are pushing on you. My trucks have been through a dozen shops for various things over the past year and a half. I really only trust 3 of them for skill/professionalism, and of the three only one and maybe a second on truly fair pricing.

I can relate with what you're talking about here.

 

Sorry if that's how my posts came across. My intent was to point out that few will admit their failures and share my own tale of how good planning wasn't all as good as I thought it would be. Face it: the OP on this thread is rare. She seems to be taking the negative stuff at face value. Most of these threads fall apart because the critical input is dismissed as someone having an axe to grind or being a bad decision maker because wishful thinkers just don't like to hear any bad news. It's the old "won't happen to me" syndrome.

For example when I said I can't fathom someone starting in business with a $1,500/mo truck payment, let me qualify. I am not implying that this is the exact finance term you did personally. It's just a common scenario I see a lot in these threads. So, generalizing about finance or lease payments on start-up. 18 months ago I'd have said it's risky but doable. That is, my rationale being pretty much in line with the entire context of your last post. Which is why I said I wished you no ill will and the best of luck. Seriously, at the same point in business that you are now, I'd have been in the front row of your bandwagon.

Fast forward to July this year, 8 months into a 12 month loan that I really did not need to take out at the time of purchase. Throw in a couple of major equipment breakdowns approaching $20k, doubling down with out-of-service time (no revenue from affected equipment), and all of a sudden that "unnecessary loan to build credit in the company name" turned into a life-saver and a curse all at once. Life saver with respect to not tying up capital that turned out to be more critical than ever expected. Curse due to an extra $800+ to pay out a few more months while simultaneously recovering from said setback. I think back over the past few months and consider how that would have played out if my equipment payment was twice as much and thank God it wasn't.

Obviously places like Lone Mountain and the like, along with carriers that offer leasing, are doing a lot of business. I'm sure not everyone that signs up for those deals is failing. On the other hand, I look at my own experience and it tells me a large monthly note on equipment is not something to be taken lightly. Definitely something that I would think a lot harder about now than I would have back in March of last year when I got my authority and got started.