mercer transportation

I see you're in TN too. What Cat shop did you use if you don't mind me asking? I need to start shopping around for a good shop.

 

Have you considered doing it yourself? I did my last one and gona do my next. I took 2.5 weeks off to do it. Came out nicery than I expected.
But then I tend to jump into things over my head alot.

 

Well I picked up my 1st load since September 15th. Picked the load up drove about 100 miles got out to fuel up to see oil leaking out the exhaust. Drove it home my mechanic is putting on new turbo tonight.

 

Hello Truckers,been reading ya'lls thread for couple years now,used to own my own truck and ran under my own authority,got to where I couldn't compete and sold out.Been pulling chicken for Tyson Foods for 2.5 years now and I'm sick of it.home for the weekend and called in monday for load assignment and was told that they had put a broke down truck driver in my truck and I could drive someone eles truck or stay home till Wed,stayed home and got my truck back Wed,smelled like something died in here,throwed my mattres cover,blanket,and pillow away,still stinks riding with the window down,point is I'm ready to quit a $67.000 a yr job over it and buy another truck and come join ya'll,am I crazy to want to be around like minded people and my number away?some one tell what I want to hear

 

PM sent.

Great way to save a nice chunk of change if one has the place to do it. A member from Canada, BillandLori, did his own at the same time I had mine overhauled. He'd never done one before. All he had was the manual and other TTR members to ask questions. His motor turned out good fully un-bridged. I wish I could have done the same. Would have been nice to put a 6NZ cam in mine. That was one line the CAT shop I used would not cross but really who could blame them.

 

all you guys talking about replacing cams and cranks are scaring me. either I've been doing it wrong or been really lucky cause out of over 30 diesel engines I've only had to change one crank and that was on a lil bitty w18 case

 

What you want to hear-you'll get rich with very little work and nothing goes wrong with no worries or stress.

It really helps if you can go into it with a paid off truck so as to not be dedicated to a payment. Especially in the winter months.
Here it's little like having your own authority with picking your own loads.

 

What you want to hear? Well you wont have to worry about money anymore. You wont have any to be worried with. Truth is it is like anything else. Its what YOU make it. Yes there are a different breed of people here but like any group there is always the 10 percent. You go where you want when you want nobody is gonna hold your hand so big boy britches are a requirment. It does take a while to learn the ins and outs of the system and since I'm still learning new stuff everyday I cant say how long that takes. I'm sure its different for everyone. No one can predict how you will do at it cause what one guy thinks is great money another guy will say he goes broke at that amount. So find a truck that isnt very expensive but has plenty of life left in it, be computer savy, be passivly agressive, and get the idea that you have to be moving all the time and you will do fine. As we all know the way to make a little money in trucking is start with alot of it.

 

Very good words and advise. But I'd have to disagree with one aspect. "get the idea that you have to be moving all the time"
So many times, I find it better to set a day to wait for the better paying freight. It cost me so little to sit and wait for the cherry load. But it can cost me plenty to run the cheap freight. So I rarely take a cheap load to get out of an area. Not that I'm against deadheading a few hundred miles out of a bad area.
The biggest thing I had to learn was to base my deadhead on the load that took me there not deadhead to the load I'm going to pickup. If it's going to a bad area, I get deadhead money out, figured in the load going.

 

Another big tip to some of the newbies, spend some time with the older guys especially when at the yard. Even out on the road, I've sit and had dinner with several older mercer drivers. They seem to want to share the tricks.