CRETE - A Year in Review

Thanks agin...another couple good posts.

 

I have enjoyed following your threads, evertruckerr. They have been informative and I have learned a lot. You ought to think about putting some of the pointers on how you do your loads (early drops. tracking customers) into a book and sell it at truck stops. People could learn a lot about being successful with some of things you have shared. I also appreciate your honesty to admit the times that the problem was really yours not that Crete was screwing you. Keep positng your helpful stuff.

 

Thanks for the great posts, Evertruckerr! Crete sounds like a good co. to work for. Would you happen to know anything about the Schaffer side? I'm scheduled to start with them at the end of the month. Does Crete/Schaffer allow you to cross over to the other side if you want? Thanks!!

Be safe out there!

 

As for the APU installs, I spoke to the Marietta shop foreman. He said initially it will be done by the APU dealers, until our shops get trained and certified so they don't void any warranty.

And ya'll are right, it was 62, not 63...My memory is as long as my ... uhhhhhh ....... Big toe But the Marietta shop guy said the same about the software... It hasn't even been written, the guy that is responsible for it is out for family matters.

As for the difference between Shaffer and Crete, The majority of Shaffer drivers I find waiting at terminals aren't getting anywhere near the miles that the Crete side is right now. Next month, who knows, it may be the other way around.

I have been really surprised here lately. I have been working on refi-'g my mortgage to rid myself of some high interest stuff. Which means getting by the house more often than usual. And to my surprise, I have had less problems then any other time here. In fact this time I was only out 7 days when the mortgage broker called me and said he's ready to close, I immediately put in home time for my 14th day out with an explanation, and it now only 12 days since my last hometime, and I am sitting at home, with a 'take what time you need to finish your business'. They bent over backwards to get me here

And this morning (saturday) I got a msg from my terminal manager 'thanking me' for my compliance on the fueling requirement. Why is everyone being so nice... AM I DYING

 

Thanks, Supersnackbar! Guess I'll just wait and see.

 

Heres the million dollar question...(I guess I should be asking my terminal mgr, but the office is closed for the weekend, so Ill ask you all). Regarding the 62 MPH limit. Now that we all know about it, would there be any penalty to continuing to run 65 until we get turned down? Im on my first run since hometime and have been running 62(or 63 as my dash speedo says-it reads one MPH too fast) trying to get used to it. Any opinions or facts? Thanks!

 

longbed, dont think it matters man. i talked to my terminal manager a week ago and he asked me to run 62 mph to save fuel (i already knew it was coming but complied), and ive been trying it for a few days. with the crappy 9th gear we have, there is really no difference in fuel economy. i averaged 5.64 mpg for 6000+ gallons, on the last 350 im getting 5.66 # 62 mph, bogging into 10th seems to kill any hope of getting better fuel economy, but maybe i just need to burn off some more gallons. im at 35 percent idle time for the week, but ive only idled 3 days since it reset monday. meanwhile its 97 degrees inside this truck, and i need to sleep before i run the last 470 miles to georgia.... i dont know how they measure idle time, but its borked.
the only thing i can really see happening is it pushing back your eta/pta a bit and allowing other drivers to get loads who arent as productive. and maybe pushing up the sheer volume of freight we move, other than that, i dont see how were not losing as much as we save. as the demand lowers for fuel the price is just going to go up anyway, gotta keep the fat cats at exxon, et al smoking the good cubans ya know.

i strongly suggest you guys go back through your pay stubs and check for erroneous comdata charges, it might just be me, but you dont know til you look.

 

Crete has a customer in Dover that we have regular outbound hauls. Getting to that part of the world for home time is not a problem for Crete.

It's because of these two factors that I would recommend Crete and not Shaffer for you. Yes you can switch companies, but I would avoid the headache of doing so by starting at Crete.

 

This is why they have to re-write the software that runs the engine. Right now if I run through a communist state (55 mph for trucks) My truck gets 7+ mpg as long as I don't have too much of a head/cross wind. On the older trucks the software will compensate and adjust the sweet spot so that running 62 will make a difference.

The idle time is taken from your qualcomm, and it gets it from the ecm. It also keeps track of overspeed (over 66 is overspeed) and over RPM (over 1800). But they, so far, have never bothered me about either one of those last two.

And it only takes one day of idling for me. I checked it before I went to bed one nite, it was at 19%. It was a hot and humid night, so it ran off and on all night. When I checked it again the next morning, it was at 36%. The suckey thing about it is, the qualcomm is checked and reset on Mondays, and at months end. You can be rolling along all week doing good, but then have a short run weekend, and blow your good idle time out of the water. They need to realize that dispatch/ops have as much to do with idle percentage as the drivers do when they don't run you. Because if you are waiting to get a load, or hear back about a question about early delivery, you have to sit and stare at the q/c. (and you know what they say about a watched pot never boiling) And the key has to be on to keep the q/c from shutting down after 5 min. They want you to spend time in the T/S's tv room, or anywhere out of the truck when you can. But you can't do that, and keep an eye on the q/c too. As for me, the more I stay out of the T/S's and terminals, the better my attitude is. So with my new-found positivity, I stay to myself as much as possible.

Has anyone seen the new Cornbinder Prostars in any of our terminals yet? The mechanic at Marietta said they have ordered something like 4 or 500. Sounds like they may be doing more than just testing them to me...Maybe making a statement to Freightliner as to the quality problems they have been experiencing. (although, once they got the bug worked out of my truck, this has been a decent truck...except for the new windshield they put in leaks a little. But it's a Century class, it's gota' leak somewhere )

 

snackbar, the prostars are for north platte and senior drivers afaik. maybe some trickling down through to the rest of the fleet, but not many.

i went by the freightliner plant in nc the other day on a load and there were probably around 600 cascadias sitting there in very familiar colors.

i heard a while back that they were putting team drivers in those long nosed volvo's, ive seen 2-3 of them but never gotten to actually check one out. would figure theyd have more by now if that were the case.