Superior Carriers 2013-2014

Thanks She is doing pretty well. Only 1 more week of radiation. There is actually a little less stress on her since Pappy died from her not having to deal with getting her Mom over to see him and consoling her constantly about him worry.

8/11-8/13

I got a run up to N Chicago loading up there at 05:00 AM Monday. I have been dealing with some back spasms lately that makes it hard for me to sleep more than about 3 hours straight. Flipping my sleep schedule to start running at 2 AM proved a little more difficult than normal. I went to bed Saturday at 8 PM planning to get up around 3 AM. Started cramping up around 11 and got up to sleep in the recliner which helps sometimes. By 11:30 I realized that wasn't going to work. I would have sat there wide awake until 3 and then had to run on minimal breaks to make my appointment. I decided to head on and stop for a 2-3 hour nap enroute. I can sleep with these spasms if I am tired enough so they really aren't a big factor out on the road.

I got on the road around 1 AM and shut down around 7 AM at the AA in Jackson Oh and slept hard for 2.5 hours. Made it to my normal staging area for the turn and burn back and had no problem sleeping the next night heading out around 2 AM. I stayed on the same 0 dark 30 schedule and got home around 15:00 Tuesday. I am off today and have a Plaquemine La out and back scheduled for Thursday getting home Saturday.

I had my first little run in with the new HOS rules. I am having to get a restart now even though I was off from Thursday afternoon until Sunday morning. I only had 5 hours left on my 70 when I got back to the yard.

I was off 4 days for the funeral, and then ran a N Chicago getting back Sat afternoon. I was off until Tuesday and ran until Thursday. Because my last restart began the Saturday before I couldn't start a new one until Saturday. I only ran 6 days out of the last 14 but can't reset hours. I could have declined the the reset before and been able to keep going with about 35 hours. Dispatch tells me they can't edit whether you accept a reset or not after you approve it.

That to me is a flaw in the Qualcom set up. We don't know ahead of time what we will be doing in the future so making the decision to accept or reject the restart is a shot in the dark. Computers can do millions of calculations per second. I fail to understand why this one won't allow us to edit one restart back and see where that puts us. FMCSA only requires that we note it on the log and that we run under the rules. Many times we would be legal either way but are forced to lock in a possibly disadvantageous solution before having all of the information..

 

8/16-8/22

Not much to report. I got home from Plaquemine around 5 PM Saturday. They had me drop it on the yard for a local driver to deliver Monday morning. I headed back up to N Chicago Tuesday morning and got home around 3PM Thursday. Dispatch told me I am off until at least Sunday.

I have been declining my 34 hour resets on the Qualcom the past couple of times. Running 3 days and taking 2 days off I never run out of hours. Surprisingly I really haven't seen a drop off in revenue. I am running about $1000 ahead of this pay period last year YTD.

FYI once you push that button to decline a reset you lose the option to change it back. I was hoping I could look at it and change it back up until I approved the logs for those days but that isn't the case. On a positive note it may be possible to use that function to control when you will need a 34 to get a specific day off.

 

8/24

Well it looks like I jinxed myself posting that I am $1000 ahead of last year revenue wise. It appears that they a throttling me back a little. I am off until Tuesday when I grab a loaded compartment tank going to Jasper In. Since it's a 3 holer I will probably run right back with the empty. There is not much use for those out in the system. At least I have some beautiful weather for this unscheduled 4.5 day weekend.

 

8/27-8/29

The Jasper load was somewhat of a Pain. It took just long enought to unload that I couldn't make it home Wednesday. Dispatch called on the way back and gave me a choice of 2 loads to finish the week. One was a short 500 mile round trip delivering in Charleston SC Friday that would get me home for the holiday weekend. The other was a 1500 N Chicago dedicated that picks up Saturday.

I opted for the bigger miles and that turned out to be a mistake. That load was originally scheduled for pick up Friday but the customer was not able to get the trailer empty on this end. N Chicago told dispatch not to come get it until Tuesday. I guess no one up there wants to work the weekend. More than likely I am off until Monday if they leave me on it. If that happens this will be my worst week of the year....1200 miles. Back to back 4 day weekends though.

I got my raise letter today. Effective Oct 7 we go to .47 loaded and .40 empty. We also got a raise to our hourly rate. My terminal its now $15.08. The letter said they increased empty miles more than loaded because we are seeing an increase in dedicated freight. It also said that our driver turnover is less than 20% measured annually and that includes retirements, medical issues etc.

 

Out and back is 50% empty. They raised it more so Dedicated would pay better.