BillyT

Hurst Scrambler,Wal Mart is WELL aware of the value their drivers bring to their overall operation! As I mentioned earlier the spectre of being out of stock in the store as a result of driver incompetence is not something they care to confront! Every one of us is aware of going to K Mart for a "blue light special" and them being out of stock! I'm not convinced that they didn't deliberately stock less than anticipated sales to avoid selling nonprofit items! As part of their p.o.s. style of management! I've heard that a prospective Wal Mart driver goes through up to five interviews before being hired,no small number number of Wal Mart drivers are former master freight drivers! Wal Mart is a master of paying for their higher wage employees (drivers and mid level managers on up) by screwing their low level managers and associates! Also by hiring the bare minimum number of store associates needed to serve their customers. Did anyone notice that Wal Marts much ballyhooed pay raise occurred right after their lowest profit quarter in decades!😁

Hippy, and UD,you are correct, the " nut behind the wheel" Eh!?

Interesting, again,KSB! There was an article in Car and Driver on the abysmal lack of defensive driving and even basic driving skills! No surprise to any of us! Mostly referred to motorists,but is tragically noticeable in too many so called professional drivers! As most of us know talking on the phone while driving is statistically comparable to driving drunk! I predict it will get worse as the younger drivers learn to depend on the " incompetence mitigation" devices on mom and dad's car! In Florida the drivers test no longer features parallel parking!

"This is verrry interesting KSB! You would have to be a Philadelphia lawyer to keep up with with all the nuances of federal and state labor law and I'm not even close!. Having said that, it is well known that Wal Mart drivers are among the best treated and paid NON UNION drivers in America! When forming an opinion I try to go by what I see not what I hear! I have hauled many Wal Mart loads and the only time I ever saw a driver hug his fleet manager was at Wal-Mart! Barring any "personal" implications which Wal Mart wouldn't put up with for a second being the politically correct pricks they are I find this very telling! Wal Mart definitely pays the driver for layover,I assume only when he is not at his home terminal. UD,I agree layovers and inspections are a part of the job but the unpaid layover time is part of the screwing that most truckers including most union truckers put up with! As a union car hauler,paid twice master freight scale,My motel was paid for,but not my time! Wal Mart has set the "precedent" of paying the driver the 42dollars for layover so it will be interesting to see if they appeal .An interesting side note to this is the fact that most grocery chains have their own(not lease drivers just like Wal Mart but many are union unlike Wal Mart and Publix in the southeast) The reason is simple! They have more control over an employee than a lease driver! If they were out of stock on a regular basis like K Mart and Sears to a lesser degree they would soon lose market share and possibly go bankrupt! Any freight jockey will tell that you can tell a well run company by their freight dock! K Mart used to be the worst,slow unloading, rent a cops at the gate etc! Wal Mart gate guards are employees,usually polite and efficient, and a 3 hr limit on your unloading. The Anomoly in this is Target, which is a well run operation that uses leased drivers and I think gate guards.Mostly drop and hook and few delays!

Heavy Gunner are they "badged" Deutz or only Belarus

Teamsters are no better or worse than any other people,I've known I've known lazy ones and I've known hard working ones,I've seen hard working ones give the lazy ones hell for being lazy! Anyone who has loaded a 12 car rack when it's 90 degrees isn't lazy! Anyone who has pulled a set of light loaded pups over Elk mountain in Wyoming in midwinter with a 40 mph crosswind isn't lazy! Working people however well paid(actually properly paid) aren't the ones that bankrupt companies it is poor management and ridiculously high CEO salaries! I haven't heard anything recently about UPS being bankrupt! The last of the teamster fixed pensions only stand out because they are the last! I can remember when all workers at large companies got fixed pensions! When the 20 year teamster freight haulers and car haulers were fighting the ice and snow on the Pa turnpike the 20 year United steel workers were taking a 20 wk paid vacation(1 week for each year worked) By the way happy thanksgiving and hope you beat that thing,Hat City ! On a sour note...now I have someone to blame for how small the Twinkies are inside the big wrapper😁

Interesting topic! I am reminded of the procedure the U.S. Postal service has for accepting contractors (owner operators). The bidding contractor submits his rate per mile and an estimate of his costs(insurance, repair costs,fuel, truck pymt. Etc) so the postal service can determine if the bidder can make a reasonable enough profit to stay in business! This helps alleviate contractors quitting in the middle of a contract and requiring the p.s. rebidding the contract.You bid the contract at the current price of fuel, and the only adjustment the P.S. will make is if your fuel or insurance costs go up.The contracts run for four years,and can continue for another four years if you are providing adequate service and are willing to work at your existing rate.If you feel you need more money,the contract will be rebid.Ksb does Australia have at present an established rate per mile,hour,ton etc for various truck related contracting operations? As you know America "deregulated in 79, Opinions vary, but many claim it was the worst thing that ever happened to the trucking industry! I agree,Canada told em to put it where the sun don't shine, and refused,and still refuse to work for nothing!

Thanks Vlad, that's interesting! My best friend and former trucking agent says he has seen a late 80s GMC 7000 with a Dietz engine,also a F350 Ford Chassis with one at the dealer.They apparently offered them in several medium duty American trucks in the 80s. Couldn't help but notice the resemblance in design to the corvair and VW flat four and six engines and The Continental aircraft engines they use in Florida on airboats!

I'm sure a man of his tact and diplomacy will have a bright future in such an "Americanized" country as Somalia! Perhaps he could represent a company selling bulletproof cab covers with anti Islam logos and chrome rhino guards for the two Scania trucks that will be sold there in the next ten years!😁 Or musk oxen diapers to meet the new emissions standards.Or even better! Manager at the new JBHunt terminal there,utilizing 100percent Sikh drivers! As lenny Bruce used to say "is there anyone here I haven't offended"

David,I feel your pain! My cousin was an o/o in the 70s hauling coal in a dump trailer.at that time he had more work than he could handle and not wanting to buy another truck he worked 12 hrs and hired his buddy to work the other 12. Wanting to "do the right thing" in case his buddy got hurt he signed up for workmans comp! Said the paperwork and federal b.s. was more aggravation then driving and maintaining the truck! He wished he had never "gone public"! That was in the 73280 days and they never turned a wheel unless the thing was grossing 96000! This was in a73 GMC Astro with 34000 rear ends! The frame twisted so much the cab mounts broke out! His buddy bought a Mack DM tri axle a little better suited for coal hauling on the back roads! Is Xerxes still in business?I used to haul their tanks back in the day!

Why are the frames on JBs rail containers orange?...So when they turn them over they look like Schneider trailers😁

Probably not much Hat City! However Schneider was at one time a union carrier, hard to believe I know, the last of their union drivers was in the tank division,still had a few in the 90s as they retired were replaced by non union drivers! The late JBHunt said if their drivers ever voted to unionize he would close the doors! His mechanics at the Springfield Oh terminal voted to unionize, he closed the terminal! Also Schneiders trucks are orange,JBs are white!😁

Vlad are there any Deutz trucks still running in Russia?

Engineers seldom have to work on trucks Eric!

Question...what do truckers and dogs have in common? They both sleep in boxes and pee on tires!😁

I was unaware that early Macks were positive ground until I tried to hook up a Buick radio backwards in a late 60s R model 😁

Having never heard of Deutz engines in anything but generators, compressors ,etc I googled them and found a pictorial of one torn down that a guy was rebuilding! For a truck! Very interesting design,supposedly bulletproof if you keep the dirt and debris out of the cooling fan and related components.I noted that Diamond Reo speed them on heavy vocational trucks,a testimony to their reliability!

KSB, there was an article in the Tampa paper recently concerning some workman's comp legislation/litigation. Being retired, I only skimmed the article, but Florida always seems to be in the forefront of any legislation which reduces workers rights! I see the old "employee as contractor" ruse is alive and well! Has been used for decades to avoid unemployment pay,taxes etc! Also takes away the right of the "contractor" who is actually an employee to go to the "wages and hours" govt agency to recover unpaid wages! That agency has NO sense of humor😣 My late son in law was complaining to me about a contractor who owed him wages and took money out of his pay for uniforms he never got! I got him in touch with "wages and hours" and the results were comical! He got paid INSTANTLY, and the scumbag was BEGGING him to get them off his back! Poetic justice!

I missed a supposedly running driving s/a Diamond Reo tractor 86 model with an air-cooled Deutz about 200 hp for 1800.00! On Craig's list in Gibsonton, Florida. It's a circus town, may have been an old circus tractor.

Yr,right it doesn't taper!

Gen Ike,looks like that B model may have started out as a factory sleeper.

GH 204, thank you for your clarification on the wage rate! I was ready to rent a van, fill it with workers and head to Washington as a labor contractor! We all tend to only see one facet of anothers life and judge them by that! There has been for decades in Florida a situation that heavily favors businesses over workers in every pursuit including agriculture. The enslavement I referred to was actual locked gate captivity, with the labor contractors raping the women and taking an unfair percentage of the workers already low wages! The minimum wage in Florida is around 8.00. I just naturally assumed the crops you were harvesting were high dollar like the cherries you mentioned,down here it is blueberries and strawberries. The citrus crop is down to 20 percent of previous years due to "citrus greening" a disease that kills orange trees! The researchers at UF are feverishly working to find a cure if they don't the majority of our orange juice will come from Chile and central America! A lot of it already is! I am familiar with the H2A program. The computer industry is replacing American workers with people from India under that program, and forcing the displaced workers to train them or they won't get their severance package! How the hell can you afford to transport workers to and from Mexico from Washington! It is obvious there is no one answer to the problems we face! It is also obvious we cannot continue continue to keep feeding,housing, and educating non citizens forever,would they do the same for us if we illegally crossed into Mexico?!

Politicians fascinate me in every election, especially this one. The two candidates call each other everything but a "nice guy". When it's over, they are smiling and shaking hands!

Gray hair, "broke" is a relative term.