Prime Tanker

Similar situation here. I have almost 8 months recent dry van experience. I'm curious about nonhazmat tanker jobs.

 

Y'all need to browse some of our threads... ie: "Where r' u tankers loading at today" or something of that nature. Hold on, let me bounce to another thread, and I'll elaborate.
Another addendum, check out posts by our member @Bud A. . He went from pulling flats to tanks, then back to flats, because it's HIS comfort zone. Tanks, however, are mine.

 

Okay, guys....I started driving my dad's trash route at a young age; dumps, of course...got my CDL at a young age....then the regs came into play. Had to go to "school" per se, to get into FedEx/LineHaul, Transport America, and USX in the early 2000's... and finally got into tanks almost 7 years ago; intrastate, and mostly local. Love it.

I haul asphalt products, so due to the viscosity, the surge isn't too awful, HOWEVER it still commands total attention, and respect (and preferably a manual tranny.)

Food grade tanker; I don't know much about, but there's plenty of info on here about such, and IMHO, it pays better than boxes, but not as much as, say, what I do.

Getting the experience y'all both seem to be doing, hauling dry van, is often recommended before pulling tanks only and mostly so you can actually drive almost like 2nd nature (the tractor) and THEN focus on your load (the trailer.)

Auggie (O/P) I've heard that Prime's tanker division has extensive training, pays well even DURING training, and isn't all that easy to get in to. If they'll have you and it's really what you WANT to do, I'd say go for it.

To both of you; again I can't speak for food grade, only asphalt / chemical but our load and unload times (except 19d that one day, i still don't know why) are around an hour; many of us (myself included and a couple other guys in that thread) pump on and pump off our own product, via a PTO. It's integrated into the clutch/tranny of the truck, and runs the product either on or off, depending on what you've got.

Lastly, even though you may not "plan" on hauling HazMat (I know most guys don't wanna start out with flammable/volatile chemicals, understandably) sometimes you may get some "weird load" that doesn't even SEEM to be a HM product, but actually is...ie: paint products.
It would be beneficial to get the endorsement, unless you go food grade.

Tank washes, I don't deal with; hauling the same 2 products regularly between the mfg and the pavers, but I hear they take a while. The hoses/couplers/etc; you'll learn, just like anything. I guess it IS a bit more involved, once you add all that in, but if you are comfortable in the skin you are in, I've got nothing bad to say. The pay is almost 2x better than what I was making hauling boxes OTR.

Best of luck to y'all; ask away, and come over to the tankers page too!

 

There is no negative to hauling tankers.

 

Read above.

 

Go tanker you will not regret it.
Absolutely nothing hard about this job at all.
I take the above statement back the hard part of tanking is watching uncle sam take my money lol.
Im chemical tanks and do alot of unloading.
Not sure but the food grade side might be mostly no touch.