CDL in hand... Now What ? Decision time, that's what...

I have now been to all three of one customer's facilities in Wisconsin and Ohio in the last 2 days.

Right, so here is this steel making company (whose name shall remain unstated, per my company's policy) that specializes in steel rod that is wound up in coil shapes. All three facilities (near Milwaukee, WI, Cleveland, OH, and a bit southeast of Toledo, OH) have acres upon acres of slinkys of varying diameters from maybe a few millimeters all the way up to about 2 inches. Near as I can figure this material is used to make bolts and other fasteners and maybe other things as well. I guess the question I have is with all of these coils at all of the locations, why do they keep going what seems like around in a big circle. In other words the shippers and consignees for the last two loads have been the same company. Maybe it has something to so with the different diameters only being made at certain facilities. Maybe it is a logistics matter of them shipping to their customers. I don't know but it is interesting to ponder...

Anyway, here is the load I got today in Cleveland after dropping off the other slinkys in Rising Sun, OH.



This time it is eyes to the front so a different securement method was required. There are 9 coils: 4 that are about 3/16" in diameter and the other 5 that are about 1" in diameter. This load goes back to Saukville, WI so upon delivery the circle will be complete.

I am currently at one of the nice Ohio Turnpike (I-80) service areas just about 1/2 hour west of Cleveland.

 

Remember FORTRAN? (probably not). Anyway there was an action command called "do" and if the software was coded a certain way you could get into a "do loop." This would cause the program to try and execute the command over and over to infinity.

I only mention this because, now that I have done the complete slinky circle (Saukville, Risingsun, Cuyahoga Heights, Saukville), guess where I am headed? Yup, Risingsun, OH.

After dropping the last load I received a relay assignment to pick up a trailer loaded with slinkys from the Oak Creek, WI drop lot. Funniest part is that I saw that load being secured by another driver as I was leaving Saukville.

I talked to another couple of drivers and we have surmised at this point that this slinky customer must have different capabilities (alloy, size, etc.) at the different locations. Will continue to make casual inquiries on this matter.

Now at the Loves in Oak Creek. Supposed to go down in the 30's tonight and snow is being forecasted north of here. Will try to get going around 4 am to get through Chicago before the morning mess.

 

Are yu sure they are not giving you a dedicated route?

 

Sounds like your stuck in "The Slinky Zone"!

 

Well the merry-go-round spun faster and faster until there was so much centrifugal force it threw me right off onto another path. 3 loads of slinkys in a row traveling between 3 customer locations, 2 of which were visited twice. Whew my head was spinning.

Yesterday after the slinky load was delivered in Rising Sun, OH, I received a preplan to pick up in Walbridge, OH near Toledo and deliver to Morton, IL, near Peoria, a distance of less than 400 miles. The load wasn't due at the consignee until Monday morning, so I called my fleet manager who said he would work on getting me another assignment to leave from Gary after I delivered this one there as a relay. Walbridge is about 30 minutes from Rising Sun so I started heading there.

My appointment was for 16:00 but my fleet manager suggested I contact the shipper to see if I could get loaded earlier, since it was only about 13:00 at the time. They said that they had other trucks in line to be loaded, so my 16:00 appt needed to stand. OK no problem I will just show up and wait a couple of hours. Got there a little after 14:00 and checked in with the shipping office. They had me watch a 7-minute safety briefing that was auto-playing on a big screen TV. After that I was loaned some kevlar gauntlets for arm protection and told to listen on the CB radio to be called for loading.

So I am waiting in the truck, listening to music, playing a little guitar, eating a little food, and the time is ticking away. I see two other trucks in loading bays being loaded and one of them has been there since before I arrived. Finally he pulls out around 15:30 and I commented to him that it seemed like a long time to load. He told me his appointment was for 11:00 and they didn't start loading him until 13:00. The loading and securing took over 2 hours. Hmmmm... maybe I'll make a few more inquiries.

Talked to another driver who was waiting to be loaded and his appointment was also for 11:00. I talked to 2 other waiting drivers and their appointments were for 14:00 and 15:00, respectively. It is now 16:00. I call my fleet manager and let him know that the shipper is running 4-5 hours behind schedule and that I will be out of hours before I even get loaded. He tells me they work late so go ahead and stay there, get loaded, and head out in the morning; also to keep track of the time and I will get detention pay. My first experience with that.

Now it is raining and just about dark. The time is 20:15 and a guy waves me to an inside dock to be loaded. The load is bundles of steel tubing 20' long and varying from 1" to 3" in diameter. It took quite a while to load and then I had to secure and tarp. I finally got finished around midnight, put the truck back outside in the parking lot and passed out in the sleeper.

I was kind of surprised at how nice the tarp job looked in the morning:



Decided at the first load check stop to add an improvised bulkhead. Even though I probably didn't really need one, I had only seen them and never made one myself so after a venti dark roast Starbucks I figured what the heck I'll give it a try.

 

Made it to Gary around noon today and refueled. I called fleet management to see if they found me that other load to keep me rolling through the weekend.

"Nope unfortunately there isn't anything available, so go ahead take this load to a truck stop near the consignee today and you can take a 34 hour reset."

Hmmm I says, didn't I just do that last weekend because of a 400 mile load that picked up on Friday and delivered Monday? Why yes as a matter of fact I did. Is this normal I says? "Not really, we like to keep our drivers moving. At least you can apply for layover pay." Ok detention pay and layover pay on the same load assignment. Things are getting interesting.

So here I sit at the Pilot in Bloomington, IL, about 30 miles from my Monday morning drop off point. Already did laundry. Guess I'll be vacuuming the truck, etc tomorrow...

 

Honeymoon might be over then?

 

I was on the phone with both my regular FM on Friday and with a very senior FM (29 years with the company and a former driver) yesterday as they were searching to find me another load. The weekend guy took a significant amount of time to answer my questions not only about the current situation but about other topics. I genuinely believe both of these gentlemen were doing all they could to keep me rolling; it's just that there wasn't anything available. I am really okay with all that has occurred and choose to believe there will be lean times as well as more lucrative weeks.

Although I am keen on making a decent living from this job, for me it is more about learning new skills, improving my efficiency, trying new techniques, and generally staying positive throughout.

I am enjoying my time out here so far and am happy to meet each new challenge head-on to see how I am able to prevail.

There is no question that this is a tough job with many hardships and difficult situations. I have greater respect for truck drivers than ever, especially flatbedders, and even more especially the ones who can still smile and lend a hand to a brother or sister trucker, whether it be advice even help folding a tarp.

Thanks for reading and for encouraging me to share this rather philosophical post

 

Sometimes it can be hard to get anything after Friday afternoon depending on where you are many places are done shipping until Monday. I got a pretty short run myself this weekend, 560 miles Friday to Monday morning. Sometimes you just have to roll with it.

 

Thank you, Perpetual, for sharing your journey throughout choosing Roehl, and how the orientation and training is. I've read your whole thread within the past 2-3 days, and it is very, very informative. I'm 17 yrs old and I've always wanted to drive trucks since i was little. I'm very interested in going into flatbedding when i get my class A CDL. I've been looking at different companies and trying to figure out which one i would like and which one would accept new/student drivers. My original thought was either Maverick or Roehl flatbed division. After reading your experience, and how well they are at Roehl, even with some of the rocky times you have had recently during your solo trips, I'm leaning a little bit more towards Roehl. One thing i do realize that no one company is prestine, they all have their flaws sometimes.