Glad I moved over to Poly Trucking

Pretty rough day at the office yesterday. Unloaded in Loveland and made the trek over the mountains and back to pick up a load of soda ash. I-70 over those mountains has to be one of my least favorite interstate stretches. The road heading west bound is higher than the east bound side in many places and that puts the oncoming head lights right in your eyeballs. That combined with the fact that the paint demarcating the lanes needs some serious updating makes for some real strenuous night time driving. Add to that my truck hit the old auto shut off due to my coolant temp getting too high on the climbing side of the mountain near Frisco in a really bad spot. Got the triangles out and examined the truck and my radiator fan had quit working to cause the issue. Waited about 30 minutes for things to get a little cooler and cranked her up again and the fan started working to get things straightened out. No problem since then so hope it was just some anomaly that doesn't rear its head again.

One of my favorite things about driving here is the ability to choose my own routes and go up to 10% over the short miles if needed. Dropping down to take the southern way to Asheville, NC instead of having to go through that ice storm coming through Kansas and MO is a real stress reducer. Adding about 260 miles to the trip to help the old pay check along with less stress for the win

 

Thanks jd. I got 'er faxed in this morning, so now I just have to play the waiting game. Hopefully it won't be too long until I hear some good news.

 

Made it to Florida to find out when I turn on the ac. I only get heat to heat. Strange.... I think the temp control know Is broken. Other then that I must have gotten a good one. Smooth and runs as expected. ...

 

After K/C I was given a backhaul from Joplin to Kilgore, TX for Monday. Then pick up a homebound load Tuesday. Once I get to GP I have to see if they can reprint my trip sheet. When I was getting caught up on all my paperwork, I discovered that I have lost it somewhere. I swear, that hooplah with Mike over this trucks problem(s) has me out of sync. That and having to split log to deliver on time kinda threw my sleep off some.

When I was in the shop office discussing my regular trucks list of issues, Mike noticed that the expansion valve for my a/c that was supposedly on back order, had it's purchase put on hold by Poly's purchasing department. Maybe they thought that since it was winter, I wouldn't need a/c...except for a defroster

My a/c is also acting up on this loaner. But I think mine is a result of not having a working bunk blower, and the freon going thru the bunk unit w/o it losing it's cool is causing a pressure problem so it shuts down the compressor....it cycles for 10 or 15 minutes, then the compressor shuts down until you cycle the key off and on.

Maninthemoon also had an a/c issue..he noticed that the entire belt that drives the a/c compressor was gone. And when you try to spin the compressor...the bearing sorta lets ths pulley just flop around...

Sometimes I think this company would be better served by turning that shop into a trailer inspection/repair bay and doing the rest of the repair and maintenance work to the trucks at outside shops(non-International shop if possible). Think of the money they'd save. It would lower the payroll to a few trailer tech's...no inventory to pay for, less delay for the driver thus better productivity. Since many of the repairs done in-house have to be done over and over before they get the right part replaced, they'd save money. Because if an outside shop screws it up, they would have to eat the cost of the screwup, not Poly.

 

SS, I completely agree that the truck shop work should be outsourced.

 

I think this truck has ghosts. Sitting here charging my batteries and all of a sudden the bunk fan starts blowing all by itself. I have tried everything I could to get it to work yesterday. I needed it for a/c yesterday but don't today because it went from 80 to 30 in 24 hours.

 

Just had the opposite turn around heat wise Went from Wichita Falls this morning in freezing conditions and sitting in Jackson, MS tonight and it is a real humid 73 degrees outside, I'll take it (wow supposedly dropping over 40 degrees tonight to below freezing, must be a hell of a front coming through). Think I made it through D/FW just in the nick of time as I was listening to a lot of wreckage stories on the Sirius weather channel just shortly after I made it through.

 

My hubby is going from GP to Waco tonight for his load that delivers in the morning. He wanted to wait for less traffic, but now he's thinking he should've gone earlier. On the bright side, we're from PA, so he knows how to drive in it. I worry about the others on the road, though.

 

No traffic to Waco he will be fine.

 

I am kicking myself watching this weather. I stopped yestersday in Mt Vernon, TX. By what the liars at the Weather Channel showed, I was just out of the worst of the weather. By 18:30 there was a couple inches of slush and sleet in the Love's parking lot, the traffic was moving at a crawl on the interstate and a truck had cut the exit of the truckstop and fell in the ditch. Had I known it was going to hit like this here, I would have tried to find a motel down near the delivery. I have to leave at 4 am and I have a whopping 13,000 lbs of weight and who knows what the US routes look like going down to Longview from here.