Good Night From II

not a lot of info yet but found the story on a site, looks like I got through just in time since they closed the lanes for a bit

http://www.pe.com/articles/lanes-757438-trailer-barstow.html

 

Still at home. Finally getting over this flu. Friday IEL called me with my lease coming up and gave me 3 options. First they will finance 70% of the residual as long as I come up with the remainder. That one will not happen. The residual is about $57K. Option 2 was a brand new truck for 4 years. Not happening as retiring in about 30 months. Option 3 was a 2012 in the buyout program. It will take 24-30 months for the buyout and then it is mine. That is what I am going to do. They told about 2 weeks for my lease is up to call and they will let me know what they have in the fleet and where they are. Strange that mine will not be in it. Mine will be going back to KW for trade but a chance that I can get a Cascadia or Volvo or another 660 studio. The buyout program will be just what I need. At the end I can retire part time and leave the truck at a terminal and then when return to work for 4-5 months I have a truck that is mine waiting that is all paid for.

 

Shut down early at the Petro in Amarillo..stayed in OKC last nite.

I-40 is open but too treacherous for my tastes after all the overnight snow and deep freeze, plus it's still snowing in New Mexico ahead of me. So far no plowing on the westbound side of I-40 and its turned into a hard packed icy slick surface. I've seen several wrecks already, both trucks and cars. My trailer load of flammable totes has already come around on me twice. I'm gonna take a breather for a while.

 

Not that it matters, but the values they used for me was 30% of the market value, which wound up being about 20% of the lease residual value ... but then they throw 10% sales tax on top of that and it becomes 30% down anyway ... I just don't want to come out of pocket for that much cash on a truck coming out of warranty.

Like you I went with option 2, bought a buy out on a used truck. No cash out of pocket and my over mileage account was credited toward the buyout. The 10% sales tax will be tacked onto the sale price and they will stiff you on the interest rate. You're going to have a 30 day bumper to bumper, no questions asked. Take full advantage of it.

I checked out my truck at Phoenix about 3 weeks before my end of lease. I gave them a punch list of thing that needed to be checked out including new batteries. They fixed everything I had listed before I even signed the lease. Also have then bring the DOT current at that time ... Mine was out of date when I picked it up and had wait 9 hours for Phoenix to get around to it.

You won't have a payment for 30 days. Just like buying a car your payments are in arrears and the firs payment is a month after you take possession. I had my DM find me the heaviest load she could get to shake it down, headed home and put it directly in the shop ... Pressure test on the coolant system, air charge system, leak down test, oil analysis, flow and pin test the DPF, PM the DOC, DOSR, sensors and did an overhead - New radiator, DPF filter, driver seat shocks, and a new EGR cooler within 30 days ... all told Swift sunk $10k into the truck.

The reason they won't give you the no money down buy out on your truck has to do with the nature of your lease with PACCAR. PACCAR owns the truck and controls the buyout on the residual. The truck that Swift will offer you will likely be a company truck at the end of it's cycle, that Swift refurbed. The truck should have been dynod and the sheet will be in the truck. It won't have all the buzzers and bells that the O/O speced trucks have ... biggest thing was the transmission was not convertible to a 13 speed.

Last thing, you're going to be out of warranty ... just figure on a lot of ticky tac things breaking ... some small, some major - in addition to your routine maintenance ... over the past 250,000 miles it has worked out to about $.13 per mile.

 

Mystic, thanks for the great info. I will make sure to save it about 3 weeks before the end of my lease contact IEL and find the truck and get to a terminal and do all that you say. Hope that it might be Columbus. Now who paid for all of this??

Pressure test on the coolant system, air charge system, leak down test, oil analysis, flow and pin test the DPF, PM the DOC, DOSR, sensors and did an overhead - New radiator, DPF filter, driver seat shocks, and a new EGR cooler within 30 days ... all told Swift sunk $10k into the truck

 

Swift ... I was willing to pay for the tests and Swift cover the repairs ... When it was all said and done Swift never billed me and covered the costs.

Also as part of my TLC on a used truck, I change my oil filters every 15K and full PM every 30K and do an oil analysis every time I'm home, about 6 times a year.

 

Taking my break at a Loves in Tucumcari NM (I always wondered if this town was named after an Indian gal named Cari )

Started rolling west on I-40 again after a few hours after the plows cleaned things up a bit. Shutdown as the sun set. The roads were still wet and I have some concern about black ice forming over night as the temps are rapidly falling. I normally like to start my day at 3am but I think I'll wait till its light out in the morning so I can see the road better.

I felt sorry for I-40 east bound drivers going towards Amarillo as I left. The plows were still working that side and traffic was backed up from slow to stop for miles and miles.

 

delivered my load in Vegas then started heading back and stopped at the rest area before Baker, not sure what im doing tomorrow yet.

I asked my manager the other day about being an O/O but he claims he has to talk to his boss and make sure there is profit bla bla bla, I KNOW there is profit since the last manager before leaving told me swift still profits about 49cpm off most of the O/O's on the fleet.

 

Good luck. You might want to check with IEL and see if they changed their policy. I think that they want to see at least 1 month of you averaging 2800 miles per week before they will lease you a truck. Then also talk to the account manager for your location and see about the pay.

 

Kind of like a POV. Change the oil and filters regularly, do a tuneup every so often, and the car will last long enough to become a classic decades from now. Most people don't, though, do they? They just throw it away and replace it.