Flatbedding pros and cons

Your nuts. Grocery houses are my favorite loads. I flat out live those loads.

Pull in at 8, crane crew helps get the chains off, they finish the last lift just as I'm putting the last chain away in the rack. Pull out at 830 and wave and smile at the line of drivers in the dock.

Bonus points if its associated grocers.

 

At least its not the 27% 5 mile long grade in Vermont story yet again. Or running the cross Bronx at over 100 mph in that awesome ffe truck.

 

Or 25 1/2" chains on a 90,000 pound coil.

 

???

 

Oh just nonsense spewed by a certain member here.

 

10

 

I thought it was 2 90k lb coils. On 1 tandem axle trailer. And it broke the scale in Ohio but he called President Reagan's personal phone and the federal marshalls came and escorted him to the reciever.

 

Sounds right.

 

You guys crack me up!

 

Ok. Now before i get banned from this thread i should probably add something productive to it.

Cons: you will get hot sweaty and dirty. And you will get cold and wet and covered in mud. Probably in the same week. sometimes in the same day.

You will get your tarp spread nice and pretty and a gust of wind will come along and take it right off the trailer.

Rolling up frozen tarps sucks. Unrolling frozen tarps sucks even more.

Pros: no matter how bad it gets, it's still better than pulling a van or reefer. Your customers are almost always happy to see you and will speak to you like a human being. This is the exact opposite of vans and reefers, for them its rare not to be treated and spoken to like some bum off the street.

Another pro, with time you will learn how to lessen the impact of the cons. Especially when dealing with tarps.

I wouldn't worry about your age or back. For open deck to negatively effect your back, it would have to be so screwed up that simply driving any truck was not an option. Anyone that tells you flatbeding is hard work has never done a single day of real work in their lives. Baling hay is hard work, that's some seriously physically demanding labor. Rolling a tarp out or hooking a chain is not physically demanding.

Oh another pro. The entry level open deck companies are miles upon miles better to their drivers than the entry level dry van and reefer companies. Example: tmc and melton vs crst and cr england.