CRETE - A Year in Review

Supersnack wrote:

That was a bad one. Cost 4 people their lives, 3 days before Christmas to boot. Those dust storms kick up out of now where down there. The freeway was shut down for the rest of the day and night over that one. My sister and her family had pasted through there only a few hours earlier on their way to the parents house.

I can't complain myself. After delivering my load up in Stockton I got the feared "no freight" message and was told to check back in a few hours. After reading Truckindogmon's post about her problems getting a load in the same area I wasn't the least bit surprised and had already put myself in the mindset of spending most, if not the rest of the day waiting for a load.

I was unloaded early in the morning and it was close to 5pm before I heard anything else from dispatch. They must not have had any luck finding enough loads for the drivers in the area because I was sent a load offer that was to pickup in Ontario making it one of the longest deadheads I've had in a very long time. The load didn't pickup until 7am the following morning, but that was no problem because I had close to a 7hr trip ahead of me to get me there.

The one thing that made it a little tough was that by the time I got the load offer I no longer had enough time to drive down there and then put in my 10hr break. The only option was to sit tight until 11pm and or so and then drive all night in order to make my appointment time. Not a perfect situation, but considering it was a 2400mi run going to Chicago and delivered Tuesday morning (no downtime) I was all for it.

So I put in a little nap and did just that and have been driving solid 600mi days ever since. It is now Sunday night and I'm sitting in Lincoln. Got here in time to watch the last half of the Cardinals game. I can't believe they pulled off that wild win against Greenbay. It was an oddly pathetic and yet vastly entertaining game with a post season record of 96 points being scored in the game. Who needs defense?


I had purposely pushed a little further than I wanted to last night so that I would have just enough hours to make our Lincoln yard so that I could finally get my truck serviced. My plans of having it done in Phoenix was squashed by Crete because the Phoenix yard doesn't have their own shop. It is actually an independent truck shop and yard that leases some space to Crete. When they do work on a Crete truck, Crete gets the bill and I suppose it's a little higher than they like to see. So even though my truck was over due for an A service by 5000+ miles, it wasn't enough to warrant the work and I have been looking for a company shop ever since.

I had hoped that little problem would have been solved when I pulled into Lincoln, but the answer here was the same one I got at the last two shops I stopped at. "Can't get to it till tomorrow."

So I will continue my woeful wondering into tomorrow and try to work it in at the Ottawa yard. I'll take off in the very early morning hours so that I can arrive there shortly after noon. That should give the boys at that shop plenty of time to take care of a little ol' A service. I've always had good luck with them and have high hopes.

Anyways, I have now been on the road for 6days since departing Phoenix and by the time I pull into Chicago tomorrow I will close out the 7day week right at 3300mi. I'm not breaking any records, but considering the way the week started out it turned out to be alright.

 

Here's a little bit of good news for you. They have backed down on the "no idle" for these trucks. Until recently, the trucks would only idle for two minutes and then shut off automatically. Once the batteries drained while parked in 7-10 hrs, the truck would not idle to recharge them. This of course makes absolutely no scents and should have been addressed from day one that these trucks were put into service.

That was the very reason I have not gone back to training after having a chat with with a driver of a Prostar on my way back to the house before Christmas because my current APU truck would be given to the first driver that completed their training with me due to it's mileage. I have always kept my idling to an absolute minimum, but there are times that it is needed. Like when I'm sitting in TX in the middle of August for a day or two waiting for a load. Now that they have made this concession I will rethink my decision.

I'm sure a large number of complaints had something to do with the change. The trucks can now idle 3hrs once the batteries are drained to recharge them for drivers that are stuck in one place for an extended period of time waiting to make deliveries, pu's , get a load offer, etc.

I don't know about you, but I would certainly welcome a truck that has headlights that actually shine bright enough to see while driving at night, or have windshield wipers that actually squirt fluid on the drivers side windshield while the truck is moving (oddly enough, the passenger side is usually clean as a whistle), or a truck doesn't have a continuous flow of noisy, whistling air rushing in from almost every "seal" around the doors and windows, or a truck with some insulation around the sleeper to keep things quit and help maintain a constant temperature in the cab while sleeping, or a truck that rides like a truck built in the 21st century as opposed to the rattling rat trap that is a Freightliner. Need I go on.

Can you tell I'm not crazy about Frieghtliners. Oh, if only I could get my Volvo back.

The only thing I can give Frieghtliner is that they seem to have more storage than any other truck.

Let us know what you think of the truck once you are settled in. I'm would like to hear your opinion of the thing.