Trailer advice

What product you plan to haul, area? Ice cream in Arizona or cheese in Wisconsin?
Great Dane or Utility with Thermo King. Lower hours is better. Good source to buy is RB auction. Do your home work come ahead to inspect as many as you can. Set the priority which trailer the best and the next you wish to buy. RB can finance you if you need with very decent rate.
Carrier reefer unit is cheaper but loud as hell and less reliable.

 

Orlando RB is the place where i got my current trailer. Looked online what inventory they have for next auction. It was a lot of decent reefers from one company, possible company was out of business. I made the list of priority for trailers I was interesting to buy.
Later came with load to Orlando and took 34 reset by RB. Love's truck stop just across highway. Inspected all trailers from my list. Few trailers was rejected due to poor frame or suspension condition or other defects not reflected in auction pictures. Applied for RB financing. At auction day focus on auction. Stay in area with good internet and be free of any disturbance (dispatch call) until you done.

 

Keep in mind that if you want to run in CA, your reefer has to be newer than 7 years from the day it was first sold when new. There are models, however, that allow for more than 7 years but will have a higher cost.

I’d go with a Thermo King and a Utility trailer. The Great Dane trailers I’ve used did not impress me. Their floors had problems. Utility is the largest seller of reefer trailers.

 

Great Dane. Usually a big TK reefer up front. Aluminum wheels. (Not for looks, but for weight vs steel wheels) ABS and airride. You do need to take care of the floors on there.

Do try to avoid trailers that tout roll over technology, I still don't want to think that one side of tandem braking will do anything to save it from going over anyway.

ALWAYS put a 100 gallon or bigger fuel tank under there. DO NOT CHEAP OUT and put say a 30 gallon dinky one on there, you will be sorry.

 

I've always been partial to TK, never cared much for Carrier. Both Utility & Great Dane are good trailers.

I used to run Californica ('80's), hauled fruit out the Bakersfield/Ivanhoe areas to Montreal/Boston/NYC markets. Now, you couldn't pay me enough to enter that country.

I always live loaded, checked out what they were going to load, and watched what was being loaded. Accordingly, I never had a load rejected.

Reefer trailers have come a long way over the years, used to be a significant fluctuation in temps between the nose & tail of the trailer, but no more. It was for that reason I always shied away from hauling berries, no cans of ether for me.

Like I tell my son, don't be in a big hurry, check it out real good, have a checklist so as to not miss anything, bring along a second set of eyes experienced in semi-trailers. It's really a buyers market right now, you shouldn't have much problem picking up a good trailer at a really good price, just do your homework, good luck...

 

I’ve been rolling under my own numbers for over 1.5 years and with a new reefer. No insurance claims at all. The OS&D I’ve had were minor and not my fault. There will always be OS&D in reefer. However, your success boils down to experience doing reefer and screening all your brokers. All my brokers are from DAT, have at least 3 years in business, a good credit score, and a reasonable days-to-pay. I currently have 7 years doing reefer only.

 

My husband and I are in the same situation. I am going with Great Dane and Thermo King SB330 unit, with 7,000 reefer hours on it. Also, I picked the Hendrickson suspension vs Meritor. What I don’t like about the trailer we picked is that it has steel wheels vs aluminum wheels. The tires have PSI. But that’s the only thing that bothers me. The reefer works well, so it seems. The trailer has no damege. Clean. There is just body over the Thermo King cracked in a few places and bent. Otherwise , great condition. There is half life on tires. The brakes are ok.
Anybody knows why whisper units are way cheaper. I was just wondering because the regular unit is way more expensive than whisper unit. How do you find that auction page?