The journey begins - purchased a truck.

"Hard core pipe haulers - an education"



80 foot sections of 20" coated pipe - average of 550-600' of pipe per load at 63#/foot.

Arkansas to South Texas - 680 miles one way. I did 2 loads the first week, and some potting soil to get home for a restart, then 3 loads the next week. The second week I ran 4400 miles on e-logs - don't ask how. We'd run them down, and bounce back empty to reload.

At $3000 to the truck/load, I didn't do too bad for the fortnight. Arkansas didn't require a permit for daytime running, Texas, I bought a blanket length permit for 30 days.

The attachment at the end of the knuckle boom crane loaded and unloaded at each end, 30 minute load, 15 minute unload. It's a self powered vacuum device that picks up the pipe in one hit - I'd never seen it before, pretty amazing. Stretched to 73' and overhang the excess. Signs and flags and run like heck.

There may be more coming up in a different area soon - I think the short term project application of the stretch trailer may be fairly lucrative going forward.

Been home a week today, might look at some work on Tuesday.

TAXES

Gretchen's diligence over the past year paid off. She set aside 12% of gross, and paid quarterly taxes for the business as calculated from last year, and my payroll taxes weekly. The visit to the CPA was short - less than an hour, and we get to keep the 12% saved from lat year, and a $6,000 + tax return. My profit gauges accounting showed a $9 discrepancy, so we'll continue the same strategy going forward.

 

Thanks!

It was made up at the machine shop, and just regular eyebolts with large washers front and back.

The quick connect flag setup looked nice, but pricey and this is fairly versatile.

I saw another guy had a setup for the grommeted banner with the push through and tee-lock fasteners bolted to the plastic bumper that would have worked good too.