My Maverick Experience

It feels good to have my own truck again. I've been out of a truck for 5 weeks. Just finished arranging all my stuff inside. I need to go buy a few things and set up my satellite radio still. Went through all the equipment to make sure everything was good. I also redid my tarps. The 4 foot drop was new so I had to refold it.

 

When I got back to the truck this morning the batteries were dead. Got a half a turn from the starter and it would die. Took about 20 minutes to get somebody out there with a jump pack to get it going.

Spent most of the day organizing things and trying to get stuff where I wanted. I'm not sure about having the fridge in the passenger seat. I had it in the cabinet under the TV cubby in my last truck but it had a door then. This truck has just a plastic frame around it that my cooler doesn't fit through. I can take it off, but I'm not sure if that's going to go over too well if the truck goes into the shop and they see it missing. We'll see what happens.

Finally got all my tarps and other equipment organized in a way I like it. I went over to Lowes earlier and picked up some new tools and a ladder. The shop doesn't have the parts right now for a ladder rack so I just bungied it to the headache rack. There's no way it's coming off. I was able to put all my weight on it and it didn't budge.

I did find the swiveling driver's seat to be kinda cool. Didn't know they could do that. My last truck couldn't. I just happened to see the sticker about it on the visor and then found the lever on the side.

I do like that the dash doesn't have the chrome trim rings around all the gauges. Those can be quite blinding on a sunny day. I also think the flat black panels look better than the fake wood in my last truck.

Got a new mattress from the shop as well. The last one was a spring mattress and was kinda worn out. The new one is about 6" of foam. I have a 2" memory foam pad on top of that and then all my sheets and blankets. My sleeping bag is under the bunk in case I have any issues with the bunk heater.

I am missing a piece of my catwalk on the back of the tractor. The guy in the shop said he would order one and I should check back in the morning to see if they've gone up to Freightliner yet to get it. Hopefully they can. I'm not sure why somebody would remove it. The rust marks are there on the frame where it used to be so I know it's missing.

Took me a few minutes to figure out the Inverter system. I have to manually push the power button on the inverter in the side box to reset it every time the batteries drop too low. At first I thought it was broken until I figured out it was just not turned on.

Can't wait to start working some time tomorrow.

 

Well today was rather long. Drove 667 miles total. They had me go from NLR to Guardian Glass in De Witt, IA. See if you can tell me what's missing here:



Yea, they had me Bobtail 700 miles from NLR to Iowa. It wasn't so bad at first, until I hit Peoria, IL and the snow started. It rained pretty much all day. The upside is that I managed to get almost 10MPG all the way here. That will help bring up my fuel mileage for the bonus provided they don't change it. They didn't have any glass trailers in NLR so this is what they chose to do. At least I still got paid while bobtail. I passed a couple O/O flatbedders who kept asking me where my trailer was.

I also had fun trying to buy fuel tonight. The girl at the register here didn't know how to start the pump for me. Then the trip number I was told to use wouldn't work. At least the call to Ext services was nice and quick and they gave me a number that would work. Took 15 minutes just to get the pump started.

Hopefully I'll do more actual work tomorrow. It was nice to get a feel for the truck without a trailer. I'm really liking the Auto trans but I'm still not overly happy with how it shifts. I'll get used to it eventually I'm sure. It just takes too long to shift for my taste. I'm used to shifting much faster.

Spending the night at the Flying J in Davenport, IA tonight. The entire parking lot is iced. So is the road out front. There's a local tow company with a small tow truck there that is just waiting for trucks to get stuck and then charging them to winch out. It's about 25 degrees tonight and dropping. I'll get to see just how well the heater works tonight.

 

I wanted to see just what Auto was like. I'd never had one before this. I may try shifting it on my own tomorrow to see how it works. I'm still trying to get used to not having a clutch.