RowdyRebel

I use Motorcraft on my Fords...Mack on the Mack...Kawasaki (or Honda...same filter, different packaging) on the Kawasaki....and if I'm changing the oil in the fiance's Dodge, I'll use a Mopar filter. You drive a Chevy, get an AC Delco. Can't go wrong with an OEM filter...if it's good enough for the OEM to put their name on it, it ought to be good enough to use on their vehicle to protect their engine. The OEM filter should be the MINIMUM standard filter you use. If you want to buy a better one, go for it...but never use a lesser quality filter.

Google "oil filter test" and read the reviews of ANYONE who has ever cut one open...I have yet to see anyone recommend it's use.

I wouldn't put a FRAM filter on anything I own...let alone re-use one. My vehicles get the OEM filters...Mack's for the Mack, Motorcraft for the Fords, etc... You can get the AC Delco filters for the chevy at Wal-Mart, Auto Zone, Advance Auto, O'Reillys, etc...

The flat tax is what you are referring to, not the Fair Tax. The Fair Tax is a consumption tax...you pay it when you buy things. Want to reduce your tax liability? Consume less products. I do my own taxes...download the forms & instructions from the IRS website and work my way through the various forms. If you get a refund, you had too much withheld throughout the year and the government thanks you for giving them an interest-free loan. I'd much rather hang onto my own money for as long as I can...which is why I don't pay estimated quarterlies (even though they just sent me the 2010 quarterly forms in the mail...). I just write 'em one check in April. Yeah, I get charged a "penalty"...which I think is BS. If they aren't paying interest on money THEY take which they do not deserve, then why should I have to pay a penalty on the money they want but I haven't sent 'em? As long as I send it on or before April 15th, there shouldn't be any penalties.

eh....yer only in trouble if'n ya git caught

You shouldn't have to change your drivers license for mechanics school no matter WHERE you go. Keep your legal address at your mom's. It is only a "temporary" move while you are in school, and NO state requires you to change your license while seeking higher education. As long as you can still receive mail at the address on your license, you are OK. Go to the best school (the one with the best reputation within the industry for turning out students who know what they are doing) that you can afford to go to. Take as many electives as you can (even if it adds time to your education), getting certified to work on the widest variety of equipment the school allows. You don't want to limit who you can work for or what you can work on by only focusing on one particular brand...and you'll have the rest of your life to work. Especially with the job market as tight as it is right now, the more you can do, the more valuable you become to any potential employer. For example, if you are Detroit Diesel certified, but not Cummins, Cat, Mack, of V*lv*....and a company has Detroits and Cummins with a few leftover Cats...they are going to be looking for a mechanic who can work on ALL of their trucks, not just SOME of them. If you are limited in your certifications and competing for the job against someone certified in ALL of them, you likely won't get the job. Companies don't want to hire 3 mechanics who can only work on 1/3 of their equipment...it is more cost efficient for them to hire 1 or 2 mechanics who can work on ALL of their equipment....and it's cheaper for them to hire someone who already holds the certifications than it is for them to send you off to get certified.

Around here, it's the driver that gets the ticket...and the mine/quarry doesn't like it because if a few trucks get busted the cops start looking harder at the trucks leaving their facility...and the company doesn't like it because their equipment is being "abused" and if too many of their trucks get caught, cops start looking at their trucks closer & harder...not to mention if the driver wrecks while overweight, the driver, the company, and the mine can all be named as defendants in a law suit. We load some places that have no scales...not even on the loader. You don't know exactly what you have until you get to the other end and weigh in. Without the air gauges, there would be no way to have any clue how much we had on the truck.

If they come up with an air-camelback system between now and when I'm ready to start "upgrading", I may consider it...until then,

I would really like a better "off-road" suspension at some of the job sites I find myself in from time to time...better articulation on the drives without losing contact with the ground... ...but the best "off-road" suspensions are not practical for my use. First because I have an air gauge running up from the air bags in the air-ride suspension that I use to judge the load I have on the truck (dual needle gauge, second line running to the truck from the trailer air bags)...most places that I load at aren't fancy enough to have scales on the loaders (and even if they have 'em, they aren't always very accurate) and it takes way too much time going back for more if you are light or dumping a little off if you are heavy. Second, because a lot of the time (especially on tanks), I am loaded one way, empty back...so the ride quality would suck pretty bad +50% of the time in a non-air-ride truck. Something like this appears to be a pretty danged good "compromise"...walking beam style axle articulation with air ride quality ride & the ability to use air pressure to estimate my weight... http://www.hendrickson-intl.com/pdfs/Truck_PDFs/AR2/45745_225d.pdf I probably can't afford to do anything with it now....just getting ideas in mind for if/when I have the means to put any non-essential money into the truck to make it work better for me...

They changed the withholding formula this year, so that people got to keep more of their paychecks each week....the upside to that is that people aren't giving the government as large of an interest-free loan, but many who have grown accustomed to getting a refund may even have to pay out. Personally, I wish they would just do away with the withholding altogether so that EVERYONE had to write a check to the various government entities for the entire amount of their taxes due each year....

If'n ya need ta shovel, it's time ta git a bigger truck!

Initially, I can see International's non-SCR route beneficial to them. DEF is not yet widely available, and without it an SCR truck won't run. Much like the ULSD conversion when DPF's were put on trucks, fleets aren't going to buy hundreds of trucks they can't fuel. O/O's aren't going to buy trucks they can't fuel, either. Until the ULSD was widely available, EPA2007 compliant engines were scarce on the roads. Until DEF becomes widely available, I don't expect to see many SCR-equipped trucks on the road either. Hell, here it is 2010 and there are still fuel pumps in the area marked "LSD...not for use in 2007 or newer engines" The one benefit SCR technology has over ULSD, is that fuel stops can provide DEF in gallon jugs or 5 gallon buckets for purchase inside until they have enough SCR-equipped trucks to make it beneficial to them to add DEF pumps. Personally, if I ever need to replace the truck I've got and can't find a decent used pre-emission truck...or if the company I'm at whenever that happens won't let me lease on a truck that old, then I'd rather buy a glider kit...rolling truck minus the engine...and pull a good pre-2002 block from a bone yard to have stripped to bare block and rebuilt. I don't care for any of the EPA BS, and would rather not have it on my truck.

Bring it on....

Rule #1 of gun fighting: Have a gun! Ya don't bring a knife (or rocks, in your case) to a gun fight.

I prefer my 1911A1 .45

Those are the cops that got beat up & picked on as kids, so they are out power tripping now.

Fixed it fer ya

Now if the cruise in his 1993 Mack is set up like it was in the freightshaker I used to drive, where tapping the clutch would turn off the cruise until I reached up and hit the resume button, then I would say that it may be a possibility....but if his '93 is anything like my 2001 Mack, I'm not sure the clutch switch would be a source of the problem. When my cruise control is set, I can touch the clutch to disengage the cruise control and shift, but as soon as I take my foot off the clutch pedal, the cruise control reengages. The clutch switch does not turn OFF the cruise control, just temporarily disengages it. If the problem were in the clutch switch, either the cruise would turn on again on its own, or he would be unable to reengage the cruise control with the resume switch.

I have always loved "Gas Guzzling Cars" for their comfort & safety. I took out a Cadillac Escalade for a test drive the other day just to drive that sucker before they become extinct. The salesman sat in the front seat describing the car and all its wonderful options. The seats were of particular interest. He explained that the seats directed warm air to your butt in the winter and directed cool air to your butt in the summer heat. I stated the car must be a Republican car. He asked why I thought it was a Republican car and I explained that if it were a Democratic car, the seats would blow smoke up your ass year-round.

Corporations are made of of people....people who run the corporation, as well as people who work for the corporation. If politicians can badmouth corporations (and in doing so, badmouth all of the PEOPLE who are affiliated with those corporations), pushing through damaging tax policies which limit the corporation's ability to remain profitable (thereby increasing the likelihood of "downsizing" or "outsourcing" positions within the corporation, where PEOPLE will be out of a job as a direct result)...why SHOULDN'T the corporation have the ability to speak out against the politicians? It's only "fair"...and I thought fairness was the ultimate goal of the left Politicians talk s#it about corporations all of the time. Now, corporations can respond with ads exposing the politicians for what they are. SCOTUS got this one right.

Wow...I just watched the video on his website. I knew he was pro-ccw...the 3 I had narrowed my vote in the primary down to all are...but he's got a pretty good idea about defense & jobs...wanting to bring all defense-related manufacturing back to the US so we aren't dependent upon other countries for our defense systems...which would spend a good chunk of the defense budget creating good jobs here in the states instead of sending the money overseas to import the stuff.

Ya think the black community will get behind this guy?

Just make sure there ain't a boat goin' under the "bridge" when ya dump yer tank

Nah...it just comes to me. I might've even been good at school if I would've given a damn about it....