My 2 & 1/2 Years with McElroy Truck Lines, Inc.

No problem Brother. In Baltimore, they have dedicated guys that run out of the U.S.G. yard. Sheetrock going mostly to Home Depot's and such. Two or three runs a day in a day cab. If they hired you, you would probably be put on that. Otherwise, if they hired you and put you OTR, they pick up coils out of Baltimore that go to W.V. and to N.J.

By "East Coast", I mean that I went as far North as Conn. and upstate NY and as far south as Florida, but that wasn't an "every week" type of thing. I usually ran VA., MD, NC, PA, and WV, but they sent me all over the Mid-Atlantic and South during my 2 and a half years. I never went farther west than Ohio, but depending on lots of factors things may be different for you. McElroy has a Terminal in TX and I don't know where they go (for example).

As far as the "physical ability" test goes, when I started with them, they had two tarps - 1)blue and yellow or 2)black and red. ALL the drivers coveted the blue and yellow tarps because they were smaller and lighter. But, McElroy is phasing them out as they age, and all of the tarps will eventually be black and red. Now when I went to orientation, they had each recruit pick up one blue and yellow tarp and walk it 50 feet or so and then lift it on top of a trailer. Those tarps are supposedly 50lbs or so (as I recall). The black and reds are heavier, like 75 lbs or so, and I don't know how they do that test now. But. keep in mind that with rain or snow, the tarps are even MORE heavy and cumbersome. Most forklift drivers will offer to lift them on to the trailer for you, but you MUST be able to do it yourself in order to be employed by McElroy.

I learned early on that it was simply faster for me to get the tarps on to the trailer by myself, so here is a "trick" for you. Once they are folded, rolled, and bungied, simply "walk them up" the stairs to the cat walk end by end, then from the cat walk, you can simply walk it onto the trailer. If you are on the otherside of the truck, you can lean one edge on the tractor's drive tires and then flip the otherside up on to the trailer.

Flatbed work is Hard work brother, but that is why the CPM is higher starting off.

 

The Eastern Shore wasn't a very often thing. I seem to recall going to a Lowe's in Salisbury, MD a few times. Went to Easton, MD a few times and Snow Hill a few Times. Occasionally I would run lumber from Plymouth, NC up to Eastville, VA. Lowe's Distribution in Hagerstown delivers to all of the Lowe's stores in MD.

The times they had me pick up out of U.S.G. in Baltimore it was almost always going to Home Depot's around the D.C. Beltway.

As far as the agility thing - I'm not saying you have to be Superman or anything, but if you aren't in shape now, after a few months on the job you WILL be I lost like 20 lbs and my beer gut LOL! Had to get a bunch of new jeans because all of my old ones were falling to the ground after a while I remember a really skinny young guy in our orientation class who claimed that he weighed 120 lbs and he was able to lift the tarps.

Now one thing I forgot to mention about the "agility" test - they have you climb on top of a trailer loaded with lumber and walk to one end and back and then climb off of it. I had forgotten about this previously, but sitting here typing I remember that one of the guys in our orientation class quit the last day and claimed it was because he was scared of heights and that particular "test" had totally freaked him out. Now most of the loads of lumber you get, not only will you have to strap them before you tarp them (so you will have the strap nearest the tail end to use to help boost you up), but the lumber will also be stacked in such a way that the boards kind of make little "steps" to help you out. Be advised, however, that occasionally you will pick up tall loads with flat ends that will require you to kind of jump up and at the same time plant your palms on the top to help pull yourself up by your arms alone. At least that's how I did it because I am about 6'2" Shorter guys would ride around with step ladders bungied to their headboards for just such an occasion (which is probably much safer than my way to be sure).

All of McElroy's trailers are 48' long, 102" wide, and are spread axle. None of the trailers have headboards. The biggest difference with a spread axle is that if you make extreme jackknife backing manuevers (especially fully loaded) the tires will have a tendency to "skip". Likewise. you want to avoid U-Turns, as you end up dragging the tires. Obviously, with a spread axle, you cannot "slide the tandems", so not only to you have to be careful with sharp turns, but you have to be careful about axle weight. (They explain all of this in orientation so don't worry). And GregLightning is correct, you usually have greater visiblility that with a van trailer.

As far as running dedicated, I was never "told this" by anyone in Cuba, but as far as I had heard, it's entirely based upon where you live. Because they pay you the same loaded or empty. They don't want to have to pay you huge empty miles to go home everyday from Hagerstown (for example). But you can always call them and ask them yourself, I'm just an ex-driver

 

I think the whole "ride around with a trainer for 4 weeks thing" is strictly for guys right out of school. If you have at least six months "recent" experience, I think they just make you do a week of classroom orientation and then give you the keys. Of course, during that week of classroom they will give you a driving test I'm sure, but nothing hard-core, just around town, turn here-turn there, back up in here type deal.

Coil securement is a seperate 3 and 1/2 hour training experience. They only made me do it once then sent me directly to go pick up a coil in Baltimore LOL! Other guys went through it like 4 times and never got a coil load

Now if you were to get put on a Dedicated Account, then I think they would make you ride/drive with a trainer for week just to get the hang of the dedicated proceedures and such. I would give them a call Ike and ask them what they would expect from you if you were to come on board, as I can only relate what I experienced and what I witnessed others go through.