Update

So not a lot to report really! The poultry market is usually slow early on in the year, but it will start to pick up as the barbeque season gets underway. The volvo has been running really well so far with no problems whatsoever. The big Cummins is starting to pull really well. It tripped over 100,000 km last week, so its on target for approx 180,000 per year, and Sunrise plans on keeping it for 7 years! This weeks a 3 day week for me, but I've got the same amount of loads in 3 days as all the other trucks have in 4 days, so I'm pretty happy about that.

2500 hp Kenworth at last years Lethbridge 

tractor pull event.
      

Inter Provincal Live Haul

For the first time since august 2011, I get to go out of province by road. I'm running to a farm north east of Saskatoon on sunday night, having my time off, loading turkeys on monday evening, then running back to Taber with them. It was about two weeks ago that I was asked if I would do it, and I've been looking forward to it ever since, until I saw the weather forecast tonight! A major winter storm is heading east from BC and going right over Saskatoon, wonderful. Still, I've got plenty of time, two days to do a 1500km run so shouldn't have to rush.

Driver wanted

Sunrise contract hauler, El Trison Trucking, has asked me if I know of any Lethbridge based class 1 drivers that would be interested in working for them. You must be a permant resident or a citizen (sorry no twp's). You would be working nights/ early mornings collecting chickens and turkeys from farms around Alberta. We don't go out of Province, our furthest chicken farms are Tofield (Camrose area) to the north, Bow Island to the east and Pincher Creek to the west. The working week starts on a sunday night and finishes thursday night, only 5 shifts everyweek! So finish friday morning and back to work sunday night everyweek. Your not expected to sleep in your truck (unless you really want to!) If anyone is interested or requires more info email me and i will answer any questions and pass on phone numbers etc.

The story so far

Last time I posted, I had been helping out at the hatchery picking eggs up, after that I spent three weeks delivering chicks. During this period I was going on ride alongs with live haul drivers so the transition from chick truck driver to live haul driver would be almost seamless. Sunrise had planned to finish a driver, then move me across to live haul driving the old Kenworth. However a higher authority had a different plan. At the end of August, their 2010 volvo was rolled onto its roof, the driver escaped with minor cuts and bruises, but the truck, trailer and load of chickens wasn't as lucky. The truck was a total loss, the trailer was rebuilt into a turkey liner and most of the modules which were on the trailer were bent beyond repair. The driver had his nephew in the truck, who also had a lucky escape with only a minor cut. Carrying passengers is totally against company policy, so the driver was fired. So all this meant I got my position on live haul two weeks earlier than I expected. After many phone calls Sunrise managed to acquire a rental truck for me from Ryder in Calgary. It was a vermillion red freightliner columbia!!!  During September we had a trip back to the UK, it was good seeing family and friends again, but it made us realise we had done the right thing moving out to Alberta. Before we left for the UK, I was told that Sunrise had bought a brand new volvo to replace the wrecked one, and that i would be getting it. During the last week of September, the new truck was delivered. And what a truck it is. Its a 2012 volvo twin bunk sleeper, it has the office pack, so i have the bottom bunk set up as a table and two chairs, built in fridge freezer, cb factory fitted, big big bunk heater, 3000 watt inverter, shore power, leather seats, walnut effect plastic dash! (it can't all be perfect) and all the other boring stuff behind the switches (no qualcom is good too). The truck is limited to 117 kph and the boss doesn't mind us doing it when the need arises. It has a 15 liter cummings 500 bhp and a fuller 18 spd, so its a pretty sweet set up, at 40,000 km its starting show real potential for being a good puller. The other odd thing is how unusual it is to work for someone again who buys their trucks and cares for them. It's been serviced four times in 40,000 kms, they spent nearly $2000 having half fenders fitted to protect the paint work! They pay for diesel additive and insist we use it, and any problems with the truck it goes straight in. As for the job, what can i say, picking up live birds is definately not for everyone, I did it for a long time in the UK and love it, and i plan to do it for a long time here too.

Update on the new job

So this is what I've been doing for the last three weeks, going to farms and picking up eggs, and I must say what an easy job its been. Hourly pay and overtime, no qualcom messages to send, all in all very laid back. Next week I start training for carrying chicks, which will be interesting. Back home I've carried chicken thats been two weeks old right upto eighteen months, but as I've never been involved in this side of the business, I havn't done day olds (well about two or three hours actually!). I'll be doing the chicks until september, then I'm hoping to get back onto the big stuff again. Will keep you posted as things progress.

Pics from our last trip with H&R

Wood Bison, Liard River BC

End of the line

Its official, we are no longer working for H&R. The moose strike Barbara had, had completely shattered her confidence, so much so that she couldn't even sleep while i was driving at night. So we made the decision to come off the Whitehorse run and give someone else the chance to learn the road before winter. When Barbara started truck driving, i knew it wouldn't be for ever, so i decided that when the day came, i would quit too. I didn't think it would be quite so soon, but anyway no problem. So what next? Well i got a job the next day driving a city truck, pulling a 40' trailer. I get paid hourly, i get overtime, a meal allowance, 4 day working  week ( we dont work wednesday, saturday and sunday)and best of all i get to go home every night. Barbara hasn't decided want she wants do yet, but it seems likely that she'll try for a job with the same company, but working inside the factory. As for H&R, i mostly enjoyed my time there, saw some great places, made some good friends and we got our residency. If i had to go back in the future, i dont think i would hesitate. So our next goal will be citizenship, which if my maths is correct, we should have in about two and a half years.

Muncho Lake BC

Muncho Lake, Northern Rockies BC

Alaska Highway Wildlife

Sh!t happens!

This was how our last load ended, not good. Barbara was driving, it was 0230, we were about 150 km north of Edmonton, at the very last minute she saw two moose in front of us, one in each lane. She hit the brakes hard and the moose just stood and stared, so when we hit we were doing around 80 kph, and you can see the rest from the pics. Barbara suffered a back injury and has been signed off work, i'm back to being a single driver who can't go south, as our PR cards are stuck in the postal strike. 2503 is in Freightliner Edmonton for a minimum of two weeks. Perhaps now H&R will put some proper auxiliary lighting on the front of these trucks that are running north, that would probably have given her another second or two of braking. The damage may have limited to just a bent moose bar, instead of an intercooler, rad, aircon condenser, grille and moose bar.

Long overdue update

Firstly let me apologies for not posting for over a year, i realised last year, that the people who this blog was aimed at, wern't reading it. Instead i had the anti H&R mob making out that i was lying or withholding the truth and trying to get me to bad mouth the company. As if i would with so much lose!
  Anyway , we had family out here last year, just after we bought the house. So it worked out that i didn't work much in May. When i went back to work i asked to go on Washington/Oregon only so i could get more home time. It worked well, i had every reset at home, and most were weekends. If Barbara hadn't passed her class 1 in November, i think i would be still doing that. Barbara started with H&R as my trainee, and we spent the next 5 months or so running wherever we were sent. In April we was asked to do a run up to Whitehorse, Yukon. Obviously we jumped at the chance just for the experiance, we are now on it full time. All we do is Edmonton to Whitehorse and back, straight up and straight back. A bit boring to some people, but to us the regular run means Barbara knows the road she's on, and i'm not having to watch her.
  Also we have been accepted for Permanant Residency by Buffalo, and we're expecting our PR cards anytime now. We have no intentions to leave H&R just yet, as we have a good run, new truck, good money and a regular routine. So now i can speak freely about H&R what would you like me to say?  I've had lots of ups and downs, but who dosen't. I've had problems and issues, but nothing that couldn't be resolved easily. At no point have i felt like jumping on a plane and running back to England, like others have.The biggest problem i see at H&R is the lack of communication in the office. Other than that it's just like any other big haulage company, with all the usual problems.
   I'm not sure what's going to happen with this blog, as it may get a bit boring hearing the same thing week in week out, we'll see what the future brings.

Pre-planed already

The load i picked up in Wisconsin is for delivery on Annacis Island, 7 days after it was loaded. At 3200kms your looking at 3 to 3.5 days to do the trip, assuming youv'e got the hours to keep running. I don't have enough hours to get it there in that time, so i could either run the hours i've got available each day or take a reset. When i was about a day and half from the collection, i got a pre-plan for Calafornia to deliver tuesday morning. So that made my mind up, i ran my hours and got as far as the flying j in Ellensburg Washington. I'm taking a 36 hour reset here, then sunday morning i'll run into the Delta yard swap trailers and head back south for Calafornia. I'll be taking the I 5 south through Washington, Oregon and into Calafornia, it's a great drive, and very scenic. Last time i did the I 5 i was empty and had great fun passing trucks on the hills, something which we don't normally get to do!

Reload

So from Chicago i got a reload out of La Crosse Wisconsin. A 280 mile empty run. I managed to get there and get a really quick load, scale and park on site before i ran out of time. When i arrived at the collection, there was another H&R driver there that had just finished loading, so he pulled off a bay as i went on one. While i was in the shipping office, he went to the on site scale. As i came out of the office he pulled up and came trotting over. He was more than 3000lbs over on his drives, and that was with the trailer axles as far forward as they would go. So i suggested he should go ask them to rework the load ( take it all off and reload it with more single pallets to the front or rear depending how you want to shift the weight. If you have to do this, it can make you really unpopular with fork truck drivers!!!) Thats when he told me, that he'd told them how he wanted it loading, double/ single/ double/ single/ double all the rest, which is fine for 40x48 pallets, but these pallets were much smaller, so the load wasn't spread out enough to get weight off the drives. When mine was loaded, axles set and scaled the weights were perfect, but mine had 5 singles. When i went to bed, he was still on the bay waiting to be reworked. I saw him again the next day and he reckoned they'd kept him 4 hours for his mistake. So think carefully before you do something that could have you sat about for hours not getting paid. If he had let them load it like all the other trailers they load each day, then he would have never had a problem.

Chicago

So i got my load from Brooks after a bit of a wait for paper work, someone said the plant had changed brokers and the paper work was being delayed. Because of this, the meat plant had arranged for both the meat inspections to stay open until 7pm instead of the usual 4.30pm. I managed to get to inspection with 5 minutes to spare, so i was done and on my way again. Had a good run down to Chicago and parked up at my first drop. Did the first drop at 6am and had the other 3 off by noon. I have never been into Chicago before, only through it on the express way, which at the wrong time of day is really busy. So i wasn't sure what to expect. Chicago has an elevated rail system which runs in and out of the city, and some of the old bridges are very low. Standerd height for trailers over here is 13 foot 6 inch and some of the bridges are lower than this, some are not marked, some say '13 foot 6 inch EXCATLY'  then have street lights hanging under them. Is the measurement to the lights or bridge?  When you get your dispatch they give you the number for Chicago low underpass info. You ring this number, give the person your delivery address and they give you a route, its a good system that seems to work well. I rang the number and gave the women all my delivery addresses and the order i had to do them in, and she gave me the full route start to finish, she even told me on one underpass to drop my suspension! So if your going anywhere near downtown Chicago for the first time make sure youv'e got the number.

Back to work

I had a few great days at home, got lots of jobs done, did plenty of relaxing. A bit of snow shoveling! My dispatcher phoned me the day before i was due to return and asked me if i fancied going to Chicago and doing 4 drops. The truck was still shop coded, but would be out that evening. So i went in the next morning and there was no sign of the truck, it was still at Thermoking. We went up there to pick it up, and got talking to the guy in TK. They had managed to do the upgrade, great news. The guy told that the charging system had been fully re-wired, it now charges all 4 batteries, instead of just 1. The 60amp alternater was replaced with a 120 amp alternater. The bunk heater has been swaped for one that has twice the BTU's and is pshyicaly twice the size. The aircon and bunk heater now have their own air returns, which has made a huge difference to performance. The tripack engine shares its coolant with the truck engine, but it had been plumbed in to run coolant through the cab heater matrix only. This one now has a pump and circulates coolant right through the engine block. So some great upgrades, but i think all these things should have been done when the tripack was first fitted. Still better late than never.

Tripack problems

So after Edmonton, i ran down to Calgary and shut down for the night. I got up next morning and flicked the kettle on, and as usual, the tripack came straight on. Then after about a minute it stopped, unusual. So i looks at the controller and the apu ( auxillary power unit ) light is red and the display says ALT, anyway the kettle boiled, i made my cuppa, turned off the controller, turned it back on and the same thing happened again. So i figure ALT means there's something wrong with the alternater and fired up the truck. I ran round to the yard and went in to the workshop. After a bit of digging about, the guy in the shop found some corroded wires coming from the alternater and managed to do a temporary repair. While i was waiting, i got it booked in for the upgrade to be done while i'm off in may. So the repair was done and a few other little jobs aswell. I pulled the truck out of the shop and parked up. 2 minutes later the tripack stopped working again! AAAAAGH!!! So i gave up on it, i only had another day to do, then i had 3 days off booked, so i said stuff it i'll go home early, and let the Lethbridge shop have 4 days to play with the damn thing. So i rang in and got a trailer straight back, cleared the truck and went home. 

Arizona

At the moment i'm sat in the flying j in Ellensburg WA doing a reset. The trucks clean and tidy, i don't really need to do any washing yet so i've finally got an oppertunity to get caught up on here. After the short trip to Washington, i got a preplan for Calafornia, so i ran back into Lethbridge, dropped the trailer and had an afternoon and night at home. The next day i went in to the yard, and the trailer for Calafornia wasn't ready, so my preplan was changed to Nogales Arizona. Great result, i got another day and night at home before i needed to set off and a better run. The trip down was really good, in fact it was probably the best trip so far, and if i was ever given a choice of doing a regular run, i think it would be this one. Anyway i got down to Nogales mid afternoon the day before i'm due to tip, so there was still plenty of parking at the pilot t/s. So the next day i get tipped, but i was too late to get my reload same day. The day after i loaded a full load of melons  for Edmonton. So another great run back north. I dropped the melons in Edmonton and got a load back to Calgary.

Quick Update

Sorry for the lack of posts, but i have been so busy at work and home i just havn't had time. Everything went well with the house purchase, and we took possession on time. We had a few delays with the furniture deliveries so we didn't move in for 2 days. Next time i'm home i will try and remember to get some pics. Work wise, when my vacation finished i was given a San Diego CA. The shipper had made a cock up with bond docs and duplicated my bond and given it to another driver. So i couldn't cross the border until he went back to the border and fixed the problem. Luckily he had only driven 30 mins passed the the border, unluckily he needed a 10 hour break before he could return! I tipped the load right on the Mexican border then was given a reload in Yuma AZ, 21 pallets of lettuce (9500lbs), to go to Calgary. After i dropped that i picked one up for Lethbridge, ran back and reset at home. I'm back out on monday heading for Washington, a short one for a change. 

Back in town

Well thats me finished now for 8 days. We get the house on thursday, so we're going to be really busy shifting everything at the end of the week. Most of the furniture comes on saturday, so that'll be another busy day. I will try and get some photo's if i get time and post them.

Any closer and they nick your wheels!