Where is everyone #5

Don't encourage him 379, don't!

 

Thanks, I'm fine, just at that point of being done and ready to move on.

Not sure if they did anything recently, but our shop notoriously doesn't retorque the lug nuts when they change out wheels (or send drivers to get them done at a tire shop, or tell them they've done work), wouldn't surprise me if they started wobbling and broke off.

The wheel had thread gouges in the aluminum, and all but one post snapped off clean. Only found one wheel and two lug nut covers. Walked a good half mile back and couldn't find anything else. And the wheel I had was the outer.

I'm sure they'll try and come back at me and tell me "you should have checked your lug nuts before driving away". Yes, I should have, and you'll bet your ### I'm going to be checking every one on every hub now, but don't tell me this is MY fault. I didn't change the wheel, nor was I made responsible for getting them retorqued.

This is cost-cutting gone too far, and I'm not risking mine or the safety of others ever again. If the pretrip takes 30 minutes, it takes 30 minutes. And if it's no good, the truck isn't moving till its fixed. Period.

 

Thanks Crusher ! ( I just love that ending shot. )

 

That’s one of the reasons I’m not a fan of the wheel covers. Yes I have the lugnut covers on my front axle but......

It makes things like this obvious while approaching the truck and much easier to catch.

 

Where's the coffee ! Service is a mite slow today. Did somebody stay up late celebrating ?

 

Thanks. And I did speak well of them and still will where it counts. Lots of the people there are great, and they offer a great way into the industry for newbies that doesn't involve van work.

But, things have gone downhill in the last couple years. Two years ago I was an office shill just looking to impress in my new position (of trainer). I excused a lot of things that my instinct was yelling at me about. I just wanted to do my job and keep getting paid. I didn't realize I should have been making waves and affecting change.

They are notorious in the industry for being cheap (like incredibly). It's all about profits and the "bottom line". I had my rose-tinted glasses taken off sometime last summer/fall when I started to realize this. They don't really care about the drivers, but the loads. Detention is almost impossible to get as a driver, but they'll be on you within two hours of sitting to start recording the times so they'll still get paid (and only give your 30% of what they get).

They run PC Miler routing, and squeeze out between 50-70 miles a trip by using it, screwing the driver out of an hour a week of pay, amounting to almost $2000 a year. And if you go "off route" they'll pull it out of your compliance bonus. They'll make a big deal out of 20 miles further, but ignore the fact it's the hillier and longer route.

They prefer to send drivers through Ontario down the 17 because its the "shorter route", even if they have little to no experience DRIVING let alone in Ontario, with 65,000 lbs of steel on the trailer. 5-7% grades, 1-2 miles long, with no descent lanes. It's scary.

I'm just going to stop ranting now, so you get the point. There's other problems too, but I'm not sure sharing them is the brightest idea in case they are actually watching my posts here.

 

Learn something new every day. I didn't have a block or a chain, but it's good to know for next time. Hopefully there won't be one though.

Yeah, that's a good point. But I can tell you this, if I pretrip a truck for them, if something's wrong, it's not moving to its fixed.

That's right on, they use a big air gun to put them on, then check them with a torque wrench. Probably forgot the torque wrench, or yeah, even broke them. Wouldn't surprise me if the guy doing had no idea what to look for when inspecting it, and might have just shrugged his shoulders had he heard a snap.

It's pretty high up on the list. Still waiting to hear back from the recruiter about seeing her today. If I get to talk to her, and she tentatively offers me a position waiting to see the road test result, then I'll give notice on Monday. I wish I could just up and quit and not have to continue driving their equipment.

 

You didn’t get any? Shucks I done about drank all mine....

 

A tire fire. Someone was having a bad morning. Spotted this on my way home the other morning