other dog

naw, you can turn the google earth street view pictures 360 degrees-you can look ahead,look behind,up at the sky,or down at the pavement. It's pretty neat,almost like being there.The picture I took was from about the same place but a little closer. I was probably up around where you can see the truck coming down the hill, but I was indeed in the northbound lane when I took it. There were some good pictures and some short video clips on that second link I posted. Had pictures of them blowing the old bridge up too. It was almost 300 feet down to the creek below it said. And they moved more cubic yards of dirt and rock to build the turnpike-mostly rock-than they did building the Panama canal.Neat stuff,eh?

forgot this added bonus picture. This is the old power plant at Glen Ferris, also closed for years, which they're now putting back into operation. Nice fishing spot here! Up ahead and to the right, out of sight between the mountains, is the town of Gauley Bridge. Rt. 60 is pretty flat from Charleston to here, but when you leave Gauley Bridge you start climbing up over Hawk's Nest.

yessir, you pretty much came off the bridge and into the tunnel. I don't remember how high the bridge was, but it was a long-ass ways to the bottom!

Not sure what they keep in there. It's probably about half a mile long. It's 2 lanes through it,and i've been through it hundreds of times but it's been closed for years. Used to cross a real high bridge going in from the south, but they cut a new 4 lane highway across the mountain,closed the tunnel,and removed the bridge. http://wikimapia.org/8269980/West-Virginia-Turnpike-Memorial-Tunnel More tunnel info here. And a picture I got from google earth street view,similar to the one I deleted.This shows the south entrance.I remember they worked on that cut for the new road,seen to the right,for a long time-years it seemed like. It's all solid rock as you can see. More good stuff and pictures here- http://www.roadstothefuture.com/WVa_Tpk_Photos.html

Slightly modified joke Bollweevil sent me- > Subject: Texans Declares War on The United States Barack Obama is in the Oval Office when the telephone rings. "President Obama," Barack said, as A heavy southern voice said "Barack this is Randy P, down at the Joes Crab Shack in Daingerfield, and I'm callin' ta tell ya'll that officially we just declared war on you!" "Well Randy," Barack replied, "This is indeed important news! How big is your army ?" "Right now," said Randy, after a moments calculation "there's myself, my cousin Harold , my next-door-neighbor Archie, and the whole dart team from Hooters. That makes eight!" Barack paused, then said. "Randy, I must warn you that I have one million men in my army waiting to move on my command." "Wow," said Randy. "Guess I'll have ta call ya back!" Next day, Randy called again. "Barack, we're still gonna' fight you! Since yesterday I have have managed to acquire some infantry equipment!" "And what equipment would that be Randy?" Barack asked. "Well sir, we have two combines, a bulldozer, a B-model Mack, and Harry's old farm tractor." Obama sighed. "I must tell you Randy, that I have 16,000 tanks and 14,000 armored personnel carriers. Also I've increased my army to one and a half million since we last spoke." Randy said, "I'll be getting back to ya." Next day Randy called and said, "Obama , the war is still on! We have managed to git ourselves airborne! We up an' modified Harolds' ultra-light with a couple of shotguns in the cockpit, and four boys from the Legion have joined us as well!" Barack was silent for a minute then cleared his throat. "I must tell you Randy that I have 10,000 bombers and 20,000 fighter planes. My military complex is surrounded by laser-guided, surface-to-air missile sites. And since we last spoke, I've increased my army to TWO MILLION!" Randy said, "l'll call you back tomorrow." Sure enough, Randy called the next day and said, "Obama! I'm gonna' have to call off the war." Obama said, "Why the sudden change of heart?" Randy said, "We sit ourselves down las' night and had a long chat over a bunch of beer, and we done come to realize there is jes' no way we can feed two million prisoners.."

The story continues... Got the truck from Cat Tuesday afternoon and headed to the shop to get fuel and then go load kyanite for Orchard Park,N.Y. Made it all the way to Thomas Terrace before the engine light came on, or about 10 miles. So I went straight back to Carter Cat and they replaced the wire connectors on intake valve actuators 5 and 6. Now 4 days of trouble free trucking! I reloaded at Roll Coaters in Weirton,W.V. Thursday morning. Could have got loaded Wednesday night, but I had to wait for one coil that was over across the street at the sand and gravel place and they didn't open until 7am. Turned out pretty good because I was tired from the late start going to Orchard Park anyway, and I took some pictures of lots of trucks and equipment at the sand and gravel yard. This is a 992 Cat loader-makes a Peterbilt look tiny. GMC dump truck good looking old Autocar.While I was taking pictures of it a dump truck driver coming in stopped and yelled "that truck still runs good". I noticed it has current tags on it. The plate on the door said it had a 335 Cummins in it and rt915 trans. Might have a 335,but I don't know about that 15 speed! The little coil I picked up-had to use 2 extra pieces of wood to keep it off the floor.You don't want your coil touching the floor,or bad things could happen! ...especially on a big single like this. This was in the Clark loader beside the Cat loader-a V16 Detroit Diesel. and the added bonus pictures- This is what the north entrance of the old tunnel on the West Va. Turnpike looks like now. I used to have a picture of the south entrance,but must have deleted it. The south entrance is still open and the tunnel is used for storage. A closer look.Kinda hard to see any more. This is where an old weigh station used to be on rt. 60 between Ansted and rt. 19. It was still there since i've been driving, but I never saw it open. They only used portables there and it's been closed for years.

I know-how about this? the next day...

Sounds like a great truck as it is! But since you've already got the headers and are going with HP heads,Edelbrock intake,and Holley carb, you also need 4 new 12.50/38 Super Swampers so you can take it mud bogging on weekends.

I've delivered a few loads of steel to Milton Steel, haven't been there in a while though.

OK, i've done all that...wonder what I should do next?

Another driver, Sam, used to tell this true story - He had to take a long load into Boston to a jobsite. He got to where he needed to make a right turn but didn't have enough room because a car was parked on the corner-illegally parked, imagine that! While he was stopped in the street wondering what to do, with traffic bottling up behind him, a cop strolled up and asked him what was going on. He told the cop he couldn't make the turn because of the car. The cop looked at the car and said "hit it, he ain't supposed to be parked there anyway"! Sam said "I can't do that", and the cop said "run over it, or i'll give YOU a ticket for obstructing traffic"! So he made the turn and ran over the car and went on to the jobsite. Said he never heard another word about it. Sometimes we'd run 84 and 81, sometimes we had to go 95 through the city coming back if we had to go to Baltimore or the D.C. area. Once a driver went down the 684 to 287 to 87 route. 87 put you on 95 right at the north end of the George Washington Bridge. He got to the bridge right in the middle of rush hour, and as he was on the ramp to get from 87 onto 95 some complete moron, female type, actually tried to pass on the right and squeeze between the trailer and the wall on the right. She got up beside the trailer tandems- then there was nowhere else she could possibly go. Trailer tandem to her left...concrete wall on her right. Traffic was bumper to bumper, stop and go. It was impossible for her to back up, because if you pull up half an inch the car behind does too. And if the truck pulled up at all the trailer tires would hit her car. And that's what he did. When the opening came he was gone, and the trailer tires caught the car just in front of the driver side door and mashed the left front fender in and pushed the car over against the wall. Nothing else he could do really. He never heard another word about it either, and the stupid bitch got what she deserved in my opinion.

...2 days later...

looks like they had some rain in Texas-

You were safe- I went to the Toms Brook exit and came south on rt. 11 so it would be easier to back in from the road. A driver who'd been there before advised me to do that. Went back to 81 the same way, so I never got into downtown Woodstock.

Load of Kubota tractors, and a neat little truck. The salesman told me this unit sells for about $15,000. Could be real useful on the farm or a big jobsite but you can get a nice pickup,or several not so nice ones for that kind of money. Old tractor in Woodstock, Va. Some older trucks on rt. 13 in Delaware. I stayed well to the right here. Annapolis Bay Bridge.

I've heard of a 6 and 4 but hadn't seen one before. saw this Freightliner with a 7 and 4 and a Peterbilt cap at the show in Colfax last year.

it is, it derates itself when the light comes on and it came on just as I got to Woodstock Sunday night,then I had 2 more stops in Md. and De. Probably came on because I was just telling another driver Friday that I hadn't had any trouble for a long time. This truck is a 2006 model and this driver that I was talking to was loading Kubotas in Ga. too. He drove for H.H.Moore a long time ago,then got his own truck,leased to Landstar now I think. He was saying Cat had a lot of engine problems in '06 and '07. He must be right. By the way, I was reading a truck paper a week or so ago and it said 55% of owners reported problems in new engines last year,up from 25% the year before,before the newest emissions laws took effect.Said the engines with the fewest reported problems was Detroit Diesel.

Hi,my name is Tom...and...and I...OK, I drive a Peterbilt! It's in the shop right now with the engine light on again.

"...about 5 gallons of orange paint". ...DoubleL? That's a masterpiece!

I was going to edit and say "sent in an e-mail from Old Bill,with a few minor changes". Now it's "from an e-mail from Old Bill with some major changes"...thank you Hatcity.

Two central Illinois rednecks are out hunting, and as they are walking along they come upon a huge hole in the ground. They approach it and are amazed by the size of it. The first hunter says, "Wow, that's some hole; I can't even see the bottom. I wonder how deep it is." The second hunter says," I don't know, let's throw something down and listen and see how long it takes to hit bottom." The first hunter says, "There's this old automobile transmission here behind this body shop by the corn field, give me a hand and we'll throw it in and see". So they pick it up and carry it over, and count one, and two and three, and throw it in the hole. They are standing there listening and looking over the edge and they hear a rustling in the brush behind them. As they turn around they see a goat come crashing through the brush, run up to the hole and with no hesitation, jump in head first. While they are standing there looking at each other, looking in the hole and trying to figure out what that was all about, an old body shop expert and master antique airport radar technician,as well as being a Mack truck enthusiast walks up. "Say there," says the old expert master enthusiast, "you fellers didn't happen to see my goat around here anywhere, did you?" The first hunter says, " Funny you should ask, but we were just standing here a minute ago and a goat came running out of the bushes doin' about a hunert miles an hour and jumped headfirst into this hole here!" The old feller said, "That's impossible. I had him chained to a transmission!"

indeed!

Back in the mid '80s we hauled structural steel from Montague-Betts in Lynchburg,Va. to Boston and the surrounding areas like mad. Sometimes we would load lumber in Palmer,Ma. to bring back but if we were real busy we'd unload and come straight back to Lynchburg as quick as we could to get another load of steel to go straight back to Boston. As you could imagine, the jobsites were a real pain in the ass to get into,the traffic was horrible,and all the ironworkers were assholes when you got there. We had a dropsite for a couple of jobs,and that wasn't quite as bad. It was in Everette or Chelsea I believe-I know you had to go by the big produce market to get there. I was driving a 1984 Kenworth K100 with a 400 Cummins in it-big horse at the time. I left one Sunday right after church going up and got to the drop yard a little after midnight. I stopped in the street and went to open the gate but it was locked.Sunday night...hmmmm...I sure didn't want to wait until morning when all the traffic was out trying to run over me,still felt good-I was young then-so I got my tools out and took the gate off the hinges. The truck was in the street with the flashers on and I was taking the gate off the hinges after midnight at a trucking company's yard. But apparently I didn't look suspicious. Got the gate off and out of the way,pulled in the yard and dropped the trailer,took my chains off,hooked to an empty and pulled it out into the street,put the gate back on,and hauled ass out of there. I stopped at the 7-11 store in Gainesville,Va. Monday morning to call headquarters,and was back at the shop in Appomattox,Va. by lunchtime. Didn't even have to go back out until Tuesday. We also used a different drop yard just down the street before we started dropping trailers at the trucking co.-or maybe it was a construction company where I took the gate off,I don't remember. Anyway,I got to this yard late one evening,around 4:30 or something to 5 o'clock. I dropped the trailer as fast as I could, found an empty, then pulled around to the load i'd just dropped to take my chains off and throw them on the empty trailer. About then some hateful bitch- I mean, a woman- came out of the office and pretty much told me to pack sand. I told her all I needed to do was snatch the chains off real quick,and I was done...out of there...gone.Oh, hell no you're not-"you're leaving this yard right effin' now,if not sooner" she said. "But all I gotta do is get these chains off-" "You're not doing anything but leaving,it's 5 o'clock and my guys get off at 5,and i'm not paying them overtime to wait on you,now beat it!". So I had to lay over and wait until the next morning just to pull 5 or 6 chains off the load i'd busted my ass to get there before 5 the day before. So I went over to King Arthur's Bar and motel and got a room,reserved enough money to pay the tolls to get home,and invested the rest in beer. And then there was the time I picked up a load of steel in Lynchburg,and when I chained it down I got up on top of the load to make sure my chains were in the right place-sometimes there might be a short piece you couldn't see from the ground that a chain wasn't over,so you always climbed up on top to check everything before you tightened the chains. All my chains were fine, but I did notice a dead possum laying in one of the beams. Obviously been dead for several days, because it had already swollen up and had a swarm of flies around it. I tightened the chains and went up 29 to the Tye River Truckstop,backed up to the edge of the lot,and looked around until I found a long stick in the edge of the woods. Figured i'd climb up there and push that dead possum off the end of the beam and into the woods-but it was gone. I looked at the beam it was on and there was a big rectangular hole cut into the web of the beam,and the possum had fell down onto the next beam down. Hmmmm....nothing I can do for it now without having to touch it. So I let it ride on to Boston and dropped the load,dead possum and all,at the drop yard. To this day I wonder what those a-hole ironworkers reaction was when they were unloading that load and got down to the possum-already well "ripe" when it left Lynchburg!