other dog

I was whining about that this morning- "Sure wish I had my non-ethanol gasoline powered STIHL leaf blower so I could blow all this snow away from here!"

He told me me to "not be surprised" if he showed up this winter, and that he was going to bring some "real" beer. Wanted me to barbecue something, because he wasn't allowed to. But he hasn't mentioned it since- he did make a solo trip to the west coast last fall, at 80 years old. I haven't talked to him much lately, but he did hit me up on Skype a few weeks ago and we talked for a pretty good while. I don't know if he'll ever actually come here or not, but I think the notion could strike him at any time, and he might- I would not be surprised.

I saw a big Holstein. A barn. and a couple of big Mack trucks.

I was looking around on Hank's Truck Pictures the other day and clicked on the William Weatherstone Collection. I found that when you click on his stories he has all the stories that used to be on his website there, just like in the book that he sent me. Might be some good reading for a snowy day....like it is here- already got about 8 or 9 inches and it's still snowing. http://www.hankstruckpictures.com/pix/trucks/weatherstone/stories/weatherstone_newest_book_print.pdf#zoom=100,150,50,200

Yeah, they had the "Fall and Winter" catalog, the Christmas catalog, and then you'd get the "Spring and Summer" one, and they had just about anything you could think of. My Ma would order our school clothes from the Sears catalog.

I went there one time in the 80's to pick up a load. One thing I remember is that they would not let me take my binder pipe in. They said it was because so much pipe and tubing was used in the submarines they would not take any chance of any piece of pipe getting on the base and being used accidently. Sounded kind of far fetched to me, but that's what they said. I picked up two 50 foot long tubes there going to some place off of I-64 between Williamsburg and Newport News, Va. I think they were for periscopes, but i'm pretty sure they were empty. I was supposed to go all the way back up to Maybrook, N.Y. to pick up some permits when I left Groton, but I couldn't see doing all that, so I just opened the stretch trailer I had one hole and rode on, hoping no one would notice. No one did. Supposed to have a permit for a 50' load then...times sure have changed, eh?

What's the saying- "there but for the grace of God goes I" ?.. it's something like that...kind of meaning that it could be any one of us.

I just saw this on Facebook, so I guess it would be OK to post here- maybe we could all step up a little, just what we can... ‎Mike Harbison Sr.‎ to MACK trucks 45 mins · For those of you that haven't heard,on Dec.26th I suffered a stroke.Luckily all functions returned and I'm "fine" as I'll get,but the drs. also discovered some heart trouble which in ordered to be corrected,I'm going to have to have a major lifestyle change.Also,because of my current condtion,the took my CDL for a minimum of 6 months. Because of this,I'm going to have to sell a vast majority of my trucks and parts. I hope I'm not wasting my time by posting this and I'm sure I will offend some,but #1,I don't need sympathy,I need to sell trucks,I've posted stuff for sale in the past and seems like only get tire kickers and dreamers,if you are one of those,read this and pass by,I don't need the stress. #2 I'm not posting pics,I have several B models,F models,R models,E models,C models,H models,G models,U models,MH's,Cruiseliners,etc,parts to projects,PM me for details if you are a seriuos buyer. #3,I'm in Iowa,if thats to far away for you,please don't add to my stress. #4 Just because I'm sick,don't mean I'm not going to be fussy about where my old trucks go,I'm not selling good stuff to see get chopped up or rat rodded. Thanks,hope you all understand the way I'm dealing with this.

That's the tractor I grew up on, except it was a tricycle type- narrow front end. I was driving a C in the hayfield before I started school. I would just steer it between two rows of hay bales while my Daddy and Grandfather would load the hay on the wagon. When we got to the end of the field my Daddy would jump up on the back and start me up between the next two rows, I was about 4 or 5 years old. It was great.

The best tractor pull I ever saw was a showdown between an 830 John Deere and a Farmall Super M at the antique tractor pull. Long story short, both made a full pull, they put all the weight they had in the sled, both made a full pull, then they had several,about 6 or 8 ....uh, we'll just say "large" men get in the sled, and the M finally won it. The funniest thing was when the John Deere came unhooked on the second pull, and the driver just kept on going, never looking back. The official was jumping up and down,waving his arms, yelling,..and the 830 just kept on chugging along. But I have to give him credit, it never seemed to strain, never changed it's tone, it just kept on pulling when it was hooked to the sled.

And, one time a Midway Trucking (out of Brookneal, Va.) IH was waiting in line to get unloaded at the Westvaco paper mill in Covington. He was parked along the road where the trucks were always lined up, along side the rail road tracks. Trucks were backed up a little because they had a bunch of train cars to unload too. One of the FWDs came over to grab the wood off of a train car- they would pick up the whole stack,one lift- and when they slide the forks under the wood, they would lower those curved prongs over it to clamp it all together. And when the operator closed those curved forks they caught the cab of the Midway truck, ripping almost half of it off- good thing nobody was riding with him! The operator couldn't see the truck at all, because it was on the other side of a train car.

Westvaco used similar machines at Covington and on the local wood yards, but they were FWDs. I remember when "Chief", the switch truck driver, dropped a load of chips at the Dillwyn wood yard one time. He didn't put any wood under the landing gear legs and when he pulled out from under it it just sunk until the nose of the trailer was almost on the ground. They brought the FWD out there and slid the forks under the front of the van and it just picked it up so effortlessly it was amazing. I've seen them run the forks right through the frame rails of a log trailer in Covington- now it wasn't a new Pitts, it was like a converted, already-worn-out-old-flatbed-log trailer, but those machines just had awesome power!

I've read that the strongest securement point on an aluminum trailer is the spools, on a steel trailer it's the stake pockets. On the flatbed I usually pull i've bent and/or ripped several of the stake pockets by chaining to them, but sometimes you need a chain to be in a particular place and it might be at a stake pocket, otherwise i'll go around the spool with the chain and hook the chain back to itself, never had any issues doing that.

Happy New Year everyone.

Happy New Year Vlad! That big coil was aluminum cable, it only weighed about 25,000 lbs. I probably would have been ok loading it all the way to the front, but I put it in coil racks where it says "load single coil here" on the frame of the trailer.

...and here's a picture of two dogs' noses-

Turns out there's a lot more to this story- http://wset.com/news/local/man-charged-in-connection-to-deadly-mobile-home-fire-in-gladys The story going around here is that the man shot the women first, then set the fire to get rid of any evidence. I saw Gibson's Truck Parts in Cowpens, S.C. I've always wanted to stop there and look around. I could see the F model, a couple of B models, and a lot of other stuff from I-85. I saw a big Mack truck at exit 32 in S.C. too. Then I saw a lot of traffic in Atlanta. Here's the story- I unloaded a load of steel at N.B. Handy in Norcross Tuesday morning. I had a drop deck trailer so I could go to Monticello, Ga. and get a load of utility trailers coming back to New London Trailers in New London, Va. However, the trailer getting place was closed- all week- for the holidays. No problem, i'll just go to Spartanburg and get a load of skidded coils going back to Handy in Lynchburg. That was a lot easier than going to the middle of nowhere to get those trailers anyway, where they always try to get about 40 trailers loaded on you. So I drive 3 hours north to Spartanburg, and they will not load a drop deck trailer. I've loaded there before, and they load you from the side- you back in the door and keep the left side of the trailer as close to the wall as you can, the trailer floor is at dock level. I figured on the way up there that they would probably just set the coils on the edge of the dock and have me get in the other bay, over to the right, where they would have room for the fork lift to work, or just load them outside- which i'm sure they could have if they had really wanted to. Anyway, they would not load me at All Metals, so I figured on coming home empty. But they found a load in Carrollton, Ga. going to Mineral, Va. so I had to go all the way back to where i'd left from at 9am, and beyond. It was 1pm when I left Spartanburg- it took me three hours to get there from Norcross, took 5 hours to get to Carrollton. I got back to 285 right around 4 o'clock, and you know how that Atlanta traffic is... I picked up this big round thing at Southwire in Carrollton- good place to load, from the time I checked in to the time I was loaded, chained, and leaving- one hour. Waiting to unload in Mineral- Then I had to run a couple of mill roll rounds to Milton, W.V. I got my T shirt in the mail, but instead of wearing it myself for a picture I hired a model to wear it. She was really easy to work with- I just said "here, put this T shirt on and go stand in the pond." She said "duh...OK!"

Danged if it doesn't, I didn't even notice that!

hmmmmm... This was a neat picture on the Madison Heights page too, no date.

That green one, good googly-moogly!!!!

I saw these pictures on a Facebook page about Madison Heights, Va. Lots of old pictures of Madison Heights, not a truck related page at all, but there just happened to be some neat old pictures there, like this H67 moving a house- This one says Dec. 1968 on it- A Virginia-Carolina F model heading south on U.S. 29. I know exactly where this is, they've taken that zig-zag out, now the road goes straight from where the bus and what looks like a Karma Gia is, and from where the photographer was standing if he looked to his left he'd be looking at the Lowes store today. At the top of the picture is the old John P. Hughs motor Co.

Speaking of sheds, they tell me- ''they" is another one of our drivers that lives near here in this case- that I can get a wooden shed with a metal roof for $800 delivered from the sawmill that's right across the road from Walmart in Altavista. I need to go see them, but they're only open on week days. The metal shed like I had is less than $300 at Lowes, but then you have to buy the floor kit extra, and some 2x4's, and three sheets of plywood, and then you still have to put it together with 3,000 nuts, bolts, and screws and if they don't make Straub's any more how are you supposed to do that? The $800 dollar wooden shed sounds like the way to go to me- and, they're bigger than the old shed was.. I have a big pile of scrap metal piled up right where a new shed needs to go, so I need to get that moved because i'm gonna put it farther from the house than the old shed was, in case it catches fire.

I ran 160 from Berlin to Cumberland once. I was still driving the Peterbilt, and before I got to the top of the mountain a red light came on on the the dash- high temperature in the drive axle. Then another red light came on- high temperature in the other drive axle! I'd never seen that before, and never seen it since. I had them check both rears when I got in to make sure they were full of grease, which they were, but no doubt, that's a helluva hill right there!

Wow, that's some big machine!..kinda reminds me of something out of Star Wars-

Welcome, eh?.........just showing off my command of the Canadian language.