Raider Express - Ft. Worth, Tx (New Solo Driver Blog)

Well, homefully you've found this thread after reading my two previous ones on my experiences as a student at IPTD Schools and my Training Blog of my student driver time at Raider Express.

If you haven't read them, and are interested, follow the links above to read all about it

In this thread I'll be reposting some of my experiences that I post on my personal blog, so other new drivers can read all about it if they wish. And to give those friends I've made here at the forums more junk to read, and of course bump my post count some

If you ever have any questions, or want to know anything in particular, please PM me here, or email me from my blog site (if you want my blog address, just PM me and I'll give you the URL, it is also visible in my profile.

Thanks, again for keeping up with my stories.

 

Last night after Tom and I went and picked up the abandoned truck and spent nearly two hours moving my junk into it (can't believe how much I'd accumulated on the road, buying stuff in preparation for getting my own rig), he took me out for a steak dinner for a send off.

He said he'd miss having me around, and that I was the best student he'd ever had, and the one he had been the most comfortable with. As indicated by the fact that we started running teams on the fourth day out ... LOL.

So after dinner he went and checked back into his hotel because they said they would not be getting him out till the next morning, and my load was going to be ready sometime between midnight and 6:00am so I went back to my truck and parked at the Valero truck stop near the Wal-Mart.

Just to digress a bit, as I had an email asking about it; Here are the statistics for my time in training with Raider Express.

Total Days Training: 24 (Including Orientation)
Miles Driving: 5950
Time Off Duty: 241.25
Time In Sleeper: 168.25
Time Driving: 122.75 (Average MPH: 48.47) [Our trucks are governed at 62mph)
Time On-Duty (Non-Driving): 19.75
Total Hours: 552

Pretty pitiful really, students are supposed to do 12,000 miles before being released. But considering we spent five of my training days sitting, it isn't really too bad.

Ok, now for the rest of the story

Swift called my cellphone at 2:30am to tell me the load was ready, so I got up and drove up there from Dumas, Texas (about 13 miles south of Cactus) and checked in and hooked up the trailer.

After getting cleared out of there about 3:30am I headed towards Amarillo, Texas. I needed fuel bad, as the truck only had about 400 gallons left in it (our trucks hold 400 gallons).

Once I got to the Love's in Amarillo, Texas and fueled up I had to hang out for an hour because my EFS card wasn't working and dispatch couldn't get the thing straightened out and I ended up having to use my ComData card. Thank god we have them, or otherwise I'd been screwed and would have waited for a ComCheck transfer for over $1000.00. Ugh.

I got headed out after the fuel mess was taken care of and was ready to just push on towards Ft. Worth but it was not to be. Once I got near Hadley, Texas I stopped at one of the new Texas Safe Haven rest areas for a nap.

After three hours I woke up to the truck swinging back and forth and loud bangs outside. It appeared that the front had passed and the winds had kicked in. According to the XM radio weather service winds in open areas of Texas were going to be in the 30-50 mph range and from the south east, lovely a huge headwind. There goes my fuel mileage.

The banging was trucks being pulled into the rest area by Texas DPS DOT inspectors. They were hauling everyone in for level one inspections. Great, and they were doing it right in front of my truck.

Luckily for me, once I got up and sat in the seat a DPS officer saw me and walked over to my truck. I rolled down the window and said morning to him and he said, "no worries son, I know you were asleep so I'm not going to inspect you today. But I would like to see your logs if you don't mind". What do you think I did, yep! Handed him my logs. He spent about 10 minutes looking at the last ten days of my logs including today and said, "Perfect, good job. Have a good one." Then handed me my logs and walked away.

I didn't have to be told twice, I hauled ### out of there ... lol. And was happy about it, because that trailer would not have passed inspection, I won't go into why but it would not have.

After my near disaster with DOT and hauled ### for Ft. Worth and got in about 3:30pm and checked in with dispatch.

My replacement truck wasn't available, the one I recovered had to go to Freightliner, it needed some serious body work as it had been damaged in several places.

So I packed out all my things in to my car and am taking two days off, my new truck is supposed to be back from PM at Freightliner on Saturday morning.

 

Too many!

One thing I've noticed about this company is you have to be agressive with them, give them a call and ask them flat out. They will give you a flat out answer.

Thanks Kinghunter, I enjoy writing so this is an outlet for me as well.

Thanks for reading everyone!

 

I got a call Friday afternoon from the company telling me that I was being assigned a new truck as the one I recovered would need quite a bit of work and the one I was getting was in good shape, and they said I could head back out again on Saturday on a Midland, Texas Albertson's run to start off my week.

It took me most of Friday to get all my stuff together and packed into the car, It is amazing how much stuff you think you need while out on the road.

Saturday at noon, I headed out to the yard to load up my truck and install all my stuff, including my CB and XM satellite radio. The whole process took the better part of five hours get it all in and get organized.

Dispatch let me know that my load, which was scheduled for an 11pm pickup time, was ready at 8pm so I headed on down to the AWG DC to pick it up. Sure enough, I was in and out in 20 minutes, nice ... wish that would happen more often.

So off I went on my second favorite road, Interstate 20 east bound for Midland.

After making my routine stops every two hours or so, I arrived at the store at 5:30am. Thirty minutes early for my appointment, which is what I like. However, it seems that the store doesn't even open till 6:00am, so I knew they wouldn't get my unloaded on time.

Sure enough, they finally came out at 7:00am and said they were ready. Took just the one guy nearly two hours to get me unloaded. Thankfully for me, they didn't have anything going back to the AWG DC, which means I don't have to go back to Ft. Worth today unless there is a regular load going that way, and we do not have any shippers out here.

So, I called into dispatch and they are going to deadhead me to Cargil in Plainview, TX about 200 miles away to pickup a load going to Albuquerque, NM.

Should be fun, I've never driven into New Mexico before! However, it was not to be.

About half way to Plainview dispatch called me and begged me for help. They had a load which was missed and was running two days late in Friona, Texas at the Cargill meat plant.. The load was going back to Ft. Worth and they really needed it taken care of.

Being the nice guy I am I told them I'd take care of it. I turned through Lubbock, Texas and headed up the back roads to Friona and got there about midnight. Luckily the load was already ready for pickup, it had better been since it was supposed to be picked up on Friday and it was now Sunday morning.

I looked at my options in regards to how many hours I had left and how far I had to go and decided I'd make a run or Wichita Falls, Texas and then camp out for a few hours and then pull it in the rest of the way.

I got into Wichita Falls about 6:30am and parked it. I had only planned on sleeping 3-4 hours but ended up crashing for a full ten hours.

Once I got up, I checked in with dispatch, took a shower and started the three hour trip to the AWG distribution center.

I arrived about 9:00pm and dropped their load, then at dispatches request I ran up to the yard grabbed another trailer and headed back down to the AWG DC to do a midnight run to Midland/Odessa, Texas.

Luckily for me when I got back with the trailer I was supposed to drop my new load was ready so I picked it up and took off just after 10:00pm.

This particular run was a two store stop and I was hoping that each stop wouldn't take that long, and good for me it was. I got into the Odessa store and even though the store didn't open for another hour once I got there they got me unloaded and I was out by the time the store opened.

I hopped down Highway 191 into Midland and unloaded the second part of the load and made my MT call. Dispatch told me to run up to Plainview and pickup a load going back to the AWG DC, and since I was out of driving hours I told them I was going to camp out in Big Spring, Texas then drive up and pick it up. No problems there as the load wasn't going to be due till Wednesday morning.

After a good sleep and a shower there at the TA I headed up to the Cargill plant in Plainview and picked up my pre-loaded trailer and started to head out.

Now, things started to go downhill from there.

I got about thirty minutes out of Plainview and the truck broke down, it had overheated going up a hill.

After going over the truck to see if there was a problem I could not find anything, I even repositioned the trailer to redistribute the weight on the drives.

I spoke with Tom on the phone about it and he suggested I head up to the TA service center in Amarillo, so I turned the truck around and limped it up there. Luckily it didn't stall out again, but then again I was only doing 50mph instead of my usual 62mph.

I called dispatch and let them know the issue and they were glad I made it to TA without having to be towed. That would have cost the company close to $2000.00 to tow the tractor and trailer the 75 miles to the service center.

I got in just at midnight and checked into the shop. They said it was probably the thermostat as I told them I didn't hear the cooling fan kick on while going up the hill as it should. Unfortunately they said it would be 3-4 hours before they could get me in the shop.

At 3:30am they called and said they were ready for me, so I moved the truck into the bay and they got to looking at it and said they were unable to work on the engine due to the configuration of the system in this truck.

So, luckily again for me there was a Freightliner dealership with a 24hour shop across the street (if I had known about it I would have gone there first!) to get it worked on.

After calling dispatch I went over to the Freightliner shop, dropped the trailer and checked in at the service bay. They said it would be no earlier than noon before they could get to it as they had nine trucks in line ahead of me for service.

I crashed out in the truck. It is now about 10:45am on Wednesday and I'm watching them move trucks in and out of the shop. Hopefully mine time will come soon ...

 

Thanks Duker, I'll have to remember that. Since I'm a slow driver I have to watch the 80k leadfoots heavily.

I'm driving an 2007 Freightliner Columbia Condo Sleeper, with a Detroit Series 60 with a EFF 10-Speed, and it has just over 300k on it.

It is a good truck, I've had to spend a bit of time cleaning it though, the previous driver(s) were not to keen on cleaning it seems.