Abilene Motor Express....A New Place To Call Home

Going very well. Just can't seem to get away from these green trucks though.

 

Sitting on the Ohio Tpk just outside of Toledo. I have to drop there at 7am. I got both my drops off in St Cloud and Hutchinson Mn by noon yesterday and was reloaded in Shakopee Mn at 6pm. I made it to Portage Wi and took my break. I hate to say this, but I haven't had issue one with this Volvo, no warning lights, no buzzers going off, no fault codes telling me to shut the truck down, nothing. Nothing like the garbage I went through at the other place. I'm thinking maybe it's me, or maybe it's the degree of importance and how these trucks are maintained. In any event, I'm very impressed with the quality of maintenance and the condition this equipment is in. I'm still learning my way, and like I've said, if I was doing something wrong I would have heard about it by now.

 

We haul Hill Phoenix, which makes every cooler/freezer for every new and refurbished grocery store and walmart. We also haul for Amazon which is drop and hook, we haul for Sabra, which is the biggest producer of Hummus in the country. We also do a lot of work for Boars Head. These are just a few that I know of. The load I delivered yesterday in Mn had 5 other of our trucks there delivering coolers/freezers to a new WalMart. My return load was a broker load. We also have a big account with Pella Windows. I would say we do about 40% drop and hook, the rest live load and unload.

 

Taken at the Flying Hook in Wytheville Va last week

 

When I was at the yard on Saturday there was about 20 new ones ready to roll. From what I have heard they are getting 60 of them in.

 

Not Quite. It's a little lighter green.

 

I was empty in Toledo at 10am yesterday. My reload came over the screen while I was at the dock. I deadheaded down to Columbus at one of our customers for a drop and hook. I was done there at 3pm and on my way back to Richmond. I ran out of time in Raphine and took my 10 hr break at Whites/Petro. I got up this morning at 7am, showered and had 150 miles to my drop. Last week on Friday night it was my first time dealing with dispatch about keeping me moving over the weekend. All my worrying and it worked out fine, I was able to run all weekend and not sit. This week was my first time putting in for home time. I left Whites and all I was worrying about was how this home time process works. Again, I got myself all worked up for absolutely nothing.

I got to the receiver and dropped the trailer. They had no empties available so I did my computer work accordingly. I got a message back from my dispatcher to see if there was any loaded ones ready and if so to bring one back to the yard. None were ready so I was told to bobtail back to the yard. I sent my dispatcher a message telling her I had home time and she sent back a reply to see dispatch at the yard when I got in. I drove the 6 miles to the yard, fueled the truck, washed my windows then parked and went into dispatch. I told the dispatcher I had home time and needed a load to South Florida, it took him about 10 minutes to find one because he had so many Florida loads to look through. I was given a West Palm Beach load that was loaded at our other customer next door to where I had emptied out. It was loaded on a brand new trailer. I put in for home time the beginning of this week for Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, leaving out on Thursday. Because I'll be home around 2pm tomorrow, I'll unload Monday by the house and come back out Tuesday. I worry too much, it's always been my nature, after all these years I would have figured out by now that a system is in place for a reason. That goes for Abilene, and so far I'm liking this system.

Now onto something that I had the misfortune to get involved with. I bobtailed over to get my trailer, we have about 100 trailers at this customer but I knew it was a new trailer so it made finding it a little easier. I hooked up to it and did a complete inspection, inside, outside and underneath. Low and behold here's a trailer that's been in service about 2 weeks and there's a huge scrape down the left side of the trailer from the midpoint to the end about 4 feet high. There was metal lodged in the rivets of the vertical beams. It didn't look like a driver hit something while turning, it looked like someone rubbed another trailer against it, or that driver rubbed the trailer against something while backing in. In any event, being the new man in town and wanting to cover my backside, I filled out a trailer condition macro, called into safety and left a message, then drove back to the yard to show someone with more power at the company then myself the damage to the trailer I had just picked up. I'm sure they can get to the bottom of the damage, I just want to make sure I'm out of the loop when they do. Believe me, I'm not having any part of someone else's screw up.

That's all for now, I'm going to bed in Manning SC right now. I had a short day today because I ran out of hours. I pick up 9.5 after midnight and only need 8.75 to get home. Be safe all, God bless!