Random LTL Rants (all are welcomed)

They already did. It's on the front, on the hood, it says "Freightliner" LOL

 

It should be at the rate it’s going a while before one of those trickles down to me I figure by the time that happens will be back to Volvo’s and Great Dane Trailers again.

 

Never ...

 

you can do a lot when there are no scales to worry about. i used to move equipment, sometimes with single axle trucks. a bag of fritos in the pass seat would put you over gross.

my tandem axle tractor broke one day so they gave me a single. i complained, as i had the heaviest equipment and tooling, heading out past a scale i knew of. weighed it on a cat scale and brought it back. owner of the company met me in the parking lot. then thanked me for not driving into a huge fine. i told him i was going home, as middle management more or less threatened me if i came back. my tandem axle truck was 75-78 depending on what tooling i had with me. the single was 71 that day.

 

Yes lol new trucks go straight to others and then from there go somewhere else lol.

 

so, the last week I've been doing flatbed (Conestoga actually) LTL work. there are a couple related mines up in the mountains, and so we basically act as their LTL carrier. pallet here, big pump there, and then stuff goes back up, including freight from the big LTL carriers (so we're their interline carrier). but no hazmat. Anyway
ABF is by far the best big barn we pickup and drop off at BTW. it's not even close.

anyway. @Radman will totally get a kick out of this story.

Thursday weather in mountains supposed to be 20% chance of snow. yeah. LIARS. dumping snow, chain law just got lifted at the top of Eisenhower tunnels (11,300 feet) and probably shouldn't have. massive wreck on the eastbound downhill side. And because Loveland pass is closed, all the hazmat guys have to stage at the tunnels (same place as overheight check) and they get let thru at the top of every hour. . The connie flaps and makes the overheight sensor go off almost every time. so the guy (who does this every day and is "training me" ) pulls in almost every day. Sensor goes off and he starts to pull in.
And this idiot is starting to back up


and he keeps backing up and ends up like that.
Awesome. There's freeway behind us. as you can see it's a bit slick and it's very steep here as Radman will attest. We throw flashers and i start to walk up (he's driving) and figure I'll help the idiot chain the outside rears enough to go forward.

I get close and realize his right rear outside tire is totally destroyed. Like let go miles ago and has just a few sidewall pieces left. (WTF?) and he has now not only put his tandems in the ditch but he's high centered the landing gear. Come back to our truck. I'm not even talking with this idiot. He needs a hook.

Our truck has sanders, but we need to back out onto the freeway. Sanders won't do us any good going backwards and we certainly don't want to slide backwards., so we chain up so we can back up (with me stopping traffic and making sure we have enough room) and go up to the stoplight (yeah, they'll flip the freeway light red if you blow the first sensor) and go to the 2nd exit to the overheight check station.

this actually works.

But the story gets better!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today we go thru and it's the same CDOT worker at the shack and he tells us about the genius above. They finally got him pulled out with a loader and not blocking the off ramp. Then the hazmat guys start to go (at the top of the hour) and he starts to go and CDOT guys come and say "you can't go, you're not hazmat"

Um yeah, he says I've got hazmat.

you're not placarded. (see pic)

yeah, no look, it's hazmat, here's the bills!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

don't care, you're not moving and you have a flat destroyed tire. he still wants to go so they finally have to call State Patrol who comes over gets him to back up with a wee more force and investigates further.

No chains (required to have with you in colorado and by now chain law was back up).
no placards.
NO AIR TO THE TRAILER. (thus no brakes, apparently either really old or adjusted way off).

Mr State Trooper gave idiotboy a list of do's and don't (quoted from the CDOT guy)

DO pay this massive ticket I'm writing you

DON'T come back to Colorado
DON'T MOVE until you get all this fixed
DON'T MOVE until you get chains from the mobile guy who's fixing your tire.

Guy was there for hours they said.

 

hahah! Yeah I-70 is attracting a lot of these professional drivers lately. Lol.