Good Night From II

Nobluffbuff...You need to have a serious talk with your DM.and/or your Fleet Mgr. They should not allow that to happen. This Company has freight and your DM needs to make sure you're covered...or FIRE him/her and get another. Even when I was brand new 4 years ago and didn't know squat I NEVER had miles that low. Many of us here on running steady 3,000 mile weeks and so could you.

 

I'll be honest, Houstank, any time I need to "point" my truck is when this gets painstaking. I couldn't control things like having three people pass away since December, in between a home time and my vacation. My best weeks are always going wherever and not having to point this truck around. So, it has been a rocky start to the year...not entirely anyone's fault. A little bit has to do with planners saying all there is to p/u are 44k loads. It's very hard to believe any of them...it's not in their business model to disclose all available loads, and harder to swallow the fact they want me to haul around 44k @ $1.15 per mile, which is not my business model.

 

Ok yeah I'm sorry to hear that about family. Sucks for sure and will make it tough to run miles when those issue are hitting you.

80% of what I've been running has been heavy but I'm a Company ####### so I kinda expect it from planners. I get lucky at times though with them. Mac30 breaks that up too. I think it also depends on the season and region. Not long ago I was getting hammered with short heavy loads, mostly crap sitting at Costco in Morris and terminals like Gary, Columbus and Edwardsville. Bad weather had caused a glut of local tcalls that needed delivering. Planners were just trying to clear up the mess..but OTR was made the whipping boy to do them. I kept having to get my DM to put a stop to it whenever I went up north. I don't mind doing one or two but after that...

 

Chilling at Loves in Ottawa KS on I-35.

Had a nice ride up from KY this morning but ran into some brief but fierce thunderstorms on 70 west of St Louis. Made my drop, scored a new trailer and parked. Have a live load tonight up in Lawrence but only have 20 minutes left on my 70 so I'll just hang here till midnight when I get back more hours.

Will be taking this one down to Brookhaven MS. Swift routing has me taking 2-lane roads all the way down thru the Missouri Ozarks with tons of small towns etc. Uh no!!...not doing that especially with 43k lbs in the box. Will take interstate the whole way..longer miles but shorter total travel time. No need to tell my DM.

Will start fishing on Mac30 ASAP to see what I can find before a Memphis planner gets their hooks into me.

 

I did a mac 30 last night and again this morning. The same loads on each one, 2 picking up and delivering at the same places.
PU Tuesday afternoon, 850 miles, and deliver Thursday night at midnight.
No thanks, plus I wanted another smaller run during this pay period. My last 2 checks have been very bad because of shop time and home time; I really need a killer week.

So the pplan sent to me was picking up this afternoon near Nashville, TN and delivers tomorrow morning in West Memphis, AR.
Another 240 miles for the week, and I'll have time left to get on another load after delivery. That brings me to just over 3500 for the week.

I was too close to running out of hours when I picked it up so I made a b line for the TA in Nashville. 11 minutes to spare on my 70 after scaling and post trip.
I'll need to be driving at 0330 to make it. Hopefully west bound I-40 isn't too bad at around 0730-0800.

 

how long can your truck sit with the real fridge? Some weeks im off 1 day and some 2 days, sometimes one other driver uses my truck but not always and I would not want to go back to completely dead batteries. Its the reason I have not used a 120v dorm fridge either, one driver told me he had to start his truck every single day with it plugged in. I have considered dropping the $500 on the 12v but havent pushed myself to do it yet.

Home for at least a 34 now, when I got to Vegas last night I go to unhook my trailer and what strange issue do I have? My release handle for the 5th wheel was completely missing, I called onroad and while waiting around I got creative with a rope and metal hook and got it released so I did that a few times moving the trailers around and getting my delivery finished before the guy ever showed up, he got there and said he wouldnt of been able to fix me until today, I told him I dont think so then drove back to the dc, called onroad again and they found a shop locally who had the part and said they would be out at 0800 to fix, left a voicemail for the DM then went home.

 

I was in Wycheville,VA this morning for a pick-up off I-81 (the exit with the TA) and as I stopped at the end of the ramp to turn left along comes Swift going to the on-ramp to my left. He procedes to make an extremely wide turn towards the ramp. I thought to myself he isn't really going to....well yes he was doing a u-turn on an on/off ramp. Since he didn't have enough room I had to pull up into the intersection. At this point I thought he might procede. No I had to go further and turn around his trailer before he would go on with his middle-of-the road/ramp u-turn maneuver. I was proud to be driving a Swift truck as I pulled away from the 4-wheelers watching this.

 

The website says it uses 6A on the 12V socket. You would have to figure it from there.
I assume that would be the power required once it is to operating temp.
Coleman gives no information on the power my cooler uses, so I have no baseline for comparison.

Personally, I try to take any perishables out of the cooler when I'm going to leave it for very long. Using the Coleman the power cut-off will keep by batteries in condition to start the truck, but the cooler will be shut off after a day, or two at best.

Recently, however, after the TA cleaned the batteries properly, I've been able to shut down while I sleep with the Coleman running (and even the bunk heater last night) with no problems.
Having the oven and computer on still drains it to the breaking point very quickly.

 

My fridge will run at least 48 hours but when batteries were about a year old that starts dropping . I replace my batteries every two years regardless their condition .
Frank

 

Sitting at home in mi. I have a toddler alternating between jumping on my face and screaming at me because i will not let him carry around an open bottle of water that will be poured on the floor as soon as i turn my head. About to do final diaper changes and storytime before bed.

My trucker was sent to battle creek this morning for a load that picked up at 1:00 pm...it is just now ready.