Comments By Turbo Dan

Solutions ? wish I could say I had some, even if you do vote in a union at your trucking company and got them to pay like they used to, they would end up going broke because there would be a thousand other companies to under cut the rates they would need to charge.

Of course in a perfect world every Driver would be in the Union no matter what company they worked for. Sure if every driver (including Owner/Opps) parked it for 5 days then a Union would have the power to make the companies step up to the table.

We are considered non skilled labor so work Visa arn't avalible for our jobs, think it's bad now, wait till the Govment changes the rules and lets in imigrant truck drivers.....

I don't think it makes any difference anymore if we get a union or not because the root cause can't be fixed by a Union...

I remember driving OTR with my race cars in the mid to late 70s and over nighting at truck stops. The union drivers were paid good, wore clean and in uniforms and worked at the same companies till they retired.

Same thing with with the Airlines, big saleries, life time jobs. Problem being the companies were pretty much garanteed a profit even if the trucks or planes flew with less than half a load, I remember flying a red eye back from LA to Chicago with maybe 6 other passengers on board. The fare was like $700 round trip as there were no discount airline competion or discount fares.

I don't know how Deregulation came about , but the result was cheaper transportation cost to the general public. With deregulation, anybody who jumped thru the right hoops could start a new trucking company or airline and go anywhere anytime they wanted. The result was that companies and unions melted away.

Same thing happened to Xerox, FTC gave away our Basic Patents (we had 98% of the copier market). Worked there 35+ years, the last 20 I hated to go in to work as the bean counters seemed to make it impossible to keep all the balls in the air, I think it was by design to make us quit, we were talking about going union but could never get it done.

Great Thread, just read it thru and got to see both sides of many topics.

My first official job out of HS in 1966 was at a Factory that custom built Mining equipment, I was a Production Electrician at 18 years old. we had a Union,, United Electrical workers union something or other. We went on strike one time for a couple days, union and management did their thing, few cents raise and we were back at work. Worked there 2 & half years then left for a new job at a fast growing company,,Xerox. It was non union, in the field (Service Technician), they were growing so fast that they paid good and had all the great free bennefits you could think of, so we didn't care about being non union. The point being Skilled (Technicians) Labor was in short supply so the company had to pay good $ and bennefits to aquire a groing labor force. So at different times having or not having a union made sense to me.

Thru this whole thread I only read some one mention DEREGULATION once I think. Before Deregulation Trucking and Airline companies were granted charters/ monopolies for different routes and the rates they could charge without competition from other companies,, If some one remembers better than me, please feel free to futher explain it.

So I think all trucking and airline companies were unionized back then, If a union went on strike, there wern't a thousand companies to take their business.

Last summer I ordered a load of siding for my garage from Menards, textered hardboard, 12" by 16', enough to reside my 24' by 24' garage myself . I paid for delivery, came strapped together on 4 by 4's, 2 wide like 16 pieces high,,, pretty heavy.

I live a couple blocks blocks east of Midway airport ,close to 60 th St in Chicago. I assumed delivery would be a straight flat bed or box truck. Driver rings my front door and asked where to unload,,,,,,,, He's got it on an 18 wheeler Flatbed,,, we're on 30' lots here and I need it in the alley behind my garage. I told him what I needed, he said OK,,, I said how you going to do that. His plan was to drive to the cross street at the north end of my alley, drop the trailer, unload and bring it down the alley to my garage ( I'm in the middle of the block).. I said Ok but I don't see a lift truck on your flatbed,,, he tells me he has Built in Forks & hydraulics built into the back of his tractor,,,, I've seen alot of things in my life,, but never saw that before.

After about 15 minutes I see him back his tractor up to the 16' wide load and pick it up with the forks,, manuever the tractor 180 degrees with the 16' load on a narrow cross street so he can back up a half block down my alley.. Thing was those siding planks spanned the width of the hole alley, he had lift high enough for the dropping ends to clear the garbage carts,, had to drop lower sometimes to clear wires, and steer/jog around power poles, then crab the load the best he could behind my garage to drop it were cars could get past we broke the load down to carry it into my yard.

Me being a driver, I had to ask him what his deal was with Menards,, It was His truck and trailer and he was a contractor to Menards. I didn't ask him what he made for a job like mine,, think I paid Menards 50/75 $ ... Of course I Tipped him, and I totally realized what he had to go thru for my delivery... I'm Glad I'm not an Owner Opperator on Contract to Menards....

I don't know about Pro Stars, I was a truck mechanic on Macks, whiched used a cable to actuate the clutch fork. When the cable breaks, the clutch peddle goes to the floor and can't dissingage the clutch.

I've seen drivers start the truck in gear and float the gears to get back to our local shop. This is just an FYI option, not a recommendation.

Errol thank you for your Service, I was Army, Pleiku, 70/71,, used my VA education for Flight Training back in 79/81 to get my Commercial/Inst Pilots Lic.

Problem was I could'nt afford the cost of another 1000 hours of flight time to get a job flying, I stayed with my corporate job at Xerox. I would have liked Flying for a living, but it would have still turned into a Job. I ended working for Xerox for 35+ years,, After an early retirement (buy out age 53 bridge to 55) I did a couple of other careers and ended up in Trucking.

At least I got to get the Government to pay for my Flight training,,,, A little payback for Drafting me and sending me into a War Zone.

Thanks for the added info guys. Ill take it all into consideration. I was thinking I would get my permit since that is easy enough and hopefully my buddy can get me into where he is working as a crane operator and if I can prove myself as an asset maybe they will help me get my full CDL. As for why the oil field is slow its mostly do do with we basically have too much oil right now. Our cupith flowith overith so production has slowed and the price is really low cause we have no were to put it. At least that's how i understand it. I could be way off base though.

A couple of other things are, we have a Federal regulation against Exporting crude oil because of long time ago shortages I think, so we have to much on hand right now. Second A lot of our oil is Light Sweet crude (Bakan) which is great except it takes a different refinery to process, which we are short of and nobody wants new refineries built near them.

Here's the Kicker, most of our refineries are set up for heavy crude, which we are still importing, go figger ? Our $$$ still going out of the Country while we're swimming in Oil...

Ya realy want to get All those Federal agencies involved in your personal business ?

A Dot physical dosn't cost that much at those chain medical centers, yes if you have medical concerns, then you need to address them. Do a dry run where you pay cash (insurance will put you in the system) no DOT form to find out if you have any problems. Then if you pass, transfer the info to a DOT form, or else get in shape to pass.

Last year I needed my Race Car physical updated (which also requires an EKG), I went to a different Med center than the one I do my DOT at. I paid cash, when I was filling out the Information form, it asked for my SSN# ,,, I left it blank and asked the Receptionist why they needed my # , as I was paying Cash and I prefered to protect my ID, she thought about it, then said to leave it blank.....

Most States have been raising their speed limits for years, ILLinios has been one of the stuborn ones to stick to 55,,,$$ ?

Any way just brought it up since I've lived and driven here since before they made it 55,,, Been driving my Combination (Goose neck) Race Car rig, Interstate all over the country since 1990, hated it when I would get back to my home State, slowing down to 55 felt like I was going to fall asleep ..

Current company trucks Governed down to around 60 is probably just about Fuel milage $$

Drove to WI this past week end, north of Ohare on 294 the speed limit is finally raised to 60 mph for cars AND Trucks. North of the Edens merge it raises to 65mph for cars and busses but still stays 60 for trucks over 4 tons or trailers. North of Great America it goes up to 70mph for cars,, 65 for busses and still restricts trucks to 60,,,

2 months ago Wisconsin raised the limit to 70mph for everything north of IL on I 94. A year and a half ago IL raised the speed limit up to 70mph for Interstates outside of cities, pending local approval.

The 55 mph speed limit came about in1973 because of the Oil imbargo and should have gone away a long long time ago but every time the debate came up it was met with the Safety ? interest....

I still feel having 2 different speed limits for cars and trucks causes more accidents than not....

The only Speeding ticket I had in my life was in 1974 when I was driving (late) to the dragstrip by Rockford in my 1967 Bonnieville wagon with an open race car trailer with our Pro Stock Hemi Colt (named Hot Pants).. Got pulled over on I 90 by Belvedeer going 70 in the new 55 mph limit... The cars owner paid my $20 fine......

It only took ILLinois 40+ years to stop making everyone a criminal,,,, OK of my Soap Box now, Dan