New Driver... Need a lot of help, suggestions

It still comes down to efficiency. Why throw away money to go get your material resulting in a empty trip one direction when you can just pay the delivery fee to have it brought to your door by somebody who has already spent the time and money to get setup.

Maybe once you are established and are a profitable company you can think about the transportation side. For now focus on the thing you are getting funding for which is your engineering ability.

I doubt your investors would be thrilled to find their engineer was using their money to play truck driver.


Before I was driving trucks I worked as a CNC operator in a steel stamping factory. They currently use between 180-200K lbs of steel per day to produce parts. That means they take in 4-5 trucks every day of raw material. They don't go get a single pound of it themselves.

 

What do the truckers in your family think about your plans? Have you ever driven a loaded 18 wheeler?

 

Just a suggestion;
instead of loading the machines on your own truck and trailer go out and supervise or organise the preparation and loading of the first few machines on an experienced and qualified rigger-trucker and learn from him.

 

I moved about 70 tons of iron from SoCal and around the upper Midwest to the middle of nowhere Kansas. There is no way you will come out ahead transporting the stuff yourself.

There are several things you may not be aware of, first most auctions and factories will not allow unauthorized rigger to move equipment on their property. Riggers and insurance are two huge aspects of machinery that few outside the machine tool industry even consider. Next, I always rented lifting equipment at the load site if they shipper allowed me to remove the machine, if they couldn't. Even riggers rent equipment as needed, just having a big Taylor or Hoist collecting dust is not a great way to invest capital.

I have a 24K Hyster foklift along with an 8K and little 3K, the small forklift is used 85-90% of the time, my big Hyster is like a bull in a china shop. I ran a large CNC shop in California and did the machine set up/commissioning, renting the tools needed are far more practical than buying stuff for a few moves. I do use my big forklift don't get me wrong but, I also have 35K+ feet of space with 18' clear span eaves and, 3 acres of outdoor yard space.

Where in the country are you and where are the machines you want to move? I know several riggers and, can add my 2 cents to moving smaller machines on tag trailers. I moved a 10K K&T mill from Long Beach to Hutch behind my 1 ton pick up. I also went to Springfield Mo, to get a 13K lathe with the same set up. Moving individual machines from far flung locations with a pick up may be a better choice IF that is the case?

Steve

 

Truck driving is not a hobby.