Car hauling vs dry van vs reefer

I pulled reefer for 6 years. Reefer driver does alot more all night runs, alot less drop n hook, trailer washouts, more midnight deliveries, more lumpers, and longer load and unload times. Not to mention reefer breakdowns.

 

I did well my first year hauling reefer. You have to keep an eye on reefer temp and its an extra tank to fill when fueling. Its steady work regardless what the market is doing.

 

If u like cars why not try out flatbed? Car hauling is probably the toughest job in trucking there is. If u enjoy the work and getting out of the truck then try flatbed, u get to use ur brains and the people you deal with are worlds different than the ####ty warehouse idiots at the reefer and dry van places.

 

A different devil?

Ok. I can answer your wish for a week really easy.

You will be hopping one foot to the other like a Teddy Bear whose Ride has come in style up the street to pick you up.

You will manage to get into everything within the hour.

You might even sit for your very first greasy truckstop meal finished off by coffee.

Now it's time to GO.

to the shipper 40 miles away.

Are we loaded yet?

Suns setting. Finally loaded whoo hoo...

10 PM or so you realize that the truck aint stopping for a #### thing for near three days and nights.

Are we there yet?

 

If you are like me and enjoy driving overnight then try reefers. No traffic, closed weigh stations, no bs.

Sometimes reefer unit breaks down. In the almost 2 years doing it so far ive had 2 reefer breakdowns. And one time in Pheonix my reefer couldn't hold temp under AZ insane summer sun. Fortunately a storm blew in and once it did it was fine after that.

 

The only way I'd do reefer again is a company truck by the hour. I did that in the midwest for almost 4 years in the 80's. You get to know the people at these warehouses, Super Valu Green Bay was the worst and Certified in Chicago, they wouldn't let you on the dock.and they know who gets paid by the hour, and they mess with the other drivers. They take 2 pallets off and are gone for 15 minutes. I didn't care, I was making money sitting there, the only bad part was telling MY boss what took so long. I've also seen places that have no room for your product and they can't put it on the floor, so guess who's reefer is keeping it cold, out back? Years ago, we used to trip lease from reefer brokers shadier than a grove of oak trees. I'm sure mega carriers put those guys out of business.

 

My average wait to get loaded is about 3 hours. Then I take that stuff to one of my terminals and it gets unloaded and reloaded in the same time. One time I waited 6 hours for a single pallet of 4 drums. But I suspect that was because my codriver kept going inside and trying to hurry them.

I dont do only grocery mind you, I'm on a dedicated deal, so my company doesnt want me sitting around for very long. We get priority when we help out doing food. The solo guys that do only grocery wait longer.

 

I did reefer and cars and dry van. I liked the cross country dry van the best. Cross country reefer was pretty good. Yes the pick up and deliver sucked but the driving for days and days was the fun part.

I did inclosed car hauling the 8 car stingers. They had soft curtains sides. I did BMW Mercedes Benz and Porsche. The money was good and Driving the cars was kinda fun. We had little cab over trucks. It was not fun car hauling. It was pain. Since we hauling high end cars people with the money to buy them lived in the northeast. Monday - Saturday we did NJ and northeast. The BMWs come in NJ from the boat. Then we did longer runs to Wisconsin or Chicago over the weekend for Monday delivery. It was cold in the winter and hot in the summer. It took 3 hours load the truck. Then they changed stuff like the Porsche cars used to pick up in Charleston SC and they moved them to Baltimore that was a lot less money for the drivers. Today the trucking company is out of business. It was BMT Bavarian Motor Transport