THE ADVENTURES CONTINUE - DFO gets a truck and hops on Schneider's IC Choice Program

Be ready for an all day event at C&S... sit and wait to get a door, then get to the door and think you're getting unloaded quickly, but in reality they'll unload most of the trailer quick then take a 4 hour break before removing that last pallet then take another 3 hours to get your paperwork done.

 

This truck gonna be ready the same time as the next one CW? BTW when you get up there, once you're done they'll send everyone away from Green Bay because there aren't enough loads/trailers leaving there, so they'll pay you to bobtail out. Keep a close eye on the load board and be the first one to raise your hand and choose a place to go because otherwise you'll end up last on the list with everyone else that gets sent to the same spots with the same crap loads. I watched carefully and jumped on the chance to go to Detroit, worked out very well. The remaining 3/4 of the class just sat there with this dumbfounded look on their face and got sent to VA, and you know how freight is there lol.

 

I chose a relay load as well, reason being I didn't have to go on a trailer search. Good way to get started IMO as long as the relay actually shows up, lol.

 

Hang in there, lol. My wait felt the same way, it just dragged on and on and on. I finally decided to just ask to go home for a week before I was scheduled to head up there, turned my truck in at Charlotte and took a week to relax and get all my stuff together. Sure went by a lot faster that way than spending that last week stuck running more crappy loads hoping they got me back in time.

Well, still looking for a load to grab after I deliver to NC and head back down to GA. There are a couple that don't have completed appointments that I'm hoping I can choose from, but I have bad luck when it comes to getting those loads, they take forever to complete the appointment and I keep checking and keep checking, then as soon as they complete they are gone, lol.

Getting close to another 15k on the truck, so in the not too distant future I'll be headed back to the house and dropping the truck off in Greensboro for a PM with an oil change. As long as the EGR system is operational on this truck I will be doing oil changes every 15k. EGR just soots up the oil too quickly, clogs the filter and I just don't like running 25k intervals with dirty oil. I don't do the PMs myself because I figure it is a good chance to have a second set of eyes on the truck that might catch something that I might overlook. Also its much easier for them to drain and dispose of 15 gallons of oil than it is for me to do so, lol. If this oil weren't so nasty I would dump it in the fuel tank of my deuce and a half as it would happily burn it, but not with all that soot in there, no way.

I'll also get the shop to install an inverter and cables that I will purchase and take with me to the shop. If something were to go wrong with the wiring and cause a fire I'd much rather the responsibility of that be on the shop that installed it than myself, so I'll gladly pay that. I believe I can use my maintenance account funds for the inverter installation, I will ask about that when I call in to schedule the PM.

I went back and fouth about which inverter to get. Eventually I decided on this one - http://www.donrowe.com/Xantrex-806-1220-PROwatt-SW-2000-p/806-1220.htm a Xantrex 2000w sine wave inverter. This will be plenty big enough to power my microwave, and it will be able to run other sensitive electronics as well. I'm going to use 0 gauge cable and probably have it installed right behind the drivers seat. Hopefully I can get away with only 3' of cable as that will keep the voltage drop to a minimum. I also considered one of Xantrex's 2000w inverter/chargers (as I could plug in the inverter when at home and it would keep the batteries charged and I could keep all my appliances and electronics on and running), but I decided against it. The 2000w inverter/chargers with sine wave output were over $1000, and I don't really find the convenience of being able to charge my batteries through the inverter to be worth $500 more. There was a cheaper 2000w inverter/charger that had the more common modified sine wave output, but these are less efficient and can be very hard on certain 120v appliances, so I decided against it.

In the end I'll have a nice sine wave inverter and will spend 50 bucks on a battery tender (http://www.amazon.com/Battery-Tender-021-0128-Plus-Charger/dp/B00068XCQU/) that I will plug in when I'm at home. I'll hook up a multimeter and see how much is actually being drawn from the batteries when the truck is sitting, fridge is on, etc., and choose the right model trickle charger for it.

Right now, I either leave my APU on (heater/cooling off, just monitors battery voltage and starts when voltage drops low enough) but that is a waste of engine hours and fuel to have that running when the truck is sitting. I can flip the night switch and cut all the power, but then I have to make sure to empty my fridge, reset all my radio settings, etc., which is a PITA.

Lastly, I need to service my APU. It's been about 500 hours since it was last serviced. I see no reason to pay someone else to do the service on the tripac as they are very easy to work on and I'm familiar with these little Yanmar diesels since I have a tractor with one in it. Hopefully I can get the oil and fuel filters from NAPA, we'll see.

 

I got a used truck, so they didn't kick anything into my maintenance account, but I was under the impression that they money that they put into your maintenance account if you bought a new truck stayed, kind of an incentive like a sign-on bonus? I could be totally wrong, but from talking with a new IC up in Carlisle that just finished his first week, I got that impression. Might want to make a call to SFI to verify that.

Either way, yeah that first week with a truck payment hits hard. Those first two weeks with no payment looks awesome, then it hits ya, lol. All I can say is man it sure will be nice to have this truck paid off so that is going to my bank account instead!!

I didn't know about the built-in inverters, did you get a Cascadia EVO or a different truck?

And yeah, I wouldn't trade my diesel APU for anything. I really like it EXCEPT for the fact that it doesn't produce 110V AC power directly.

If I built my dream truck, it would probably have a RV-style Cummins/Onan diesel generator for producing 120v power, and that 120v power would run either a backwall or rooftop AC/heat unit (although I would still probably use a diesel bunk heater, I love these things), and I could plug my block heater, etc., into the generator during the winter which would be really nice. One of the really quiet Honda generators would be an option as well, although since they are gasoline powered that complicates things a bit since you can't just run them off the main fuel tanks. Though I guess if I installed a 25-50 gallon tank for just gasoline you could run well over a week without having to fuel the generator. Better stop now before I go off on too much of a tangent, lol.