Flatbed Variety

Old School,

Absolutely zero complaints. A certain amount of luck and a whole lot of hard work made retirement a reality recently (Dec '16). Was really happy with Melton and I think they were happy with me. Have a couple of jackets for top mileage and another for becoming a Melton Blue Knight. They even thought enough of me to give me the 500,000th KW off of the Chilicothe line that was provided to Melton. Loved my work and was OK with being gone. But when you have checked the boxes and the accounts say you don't have to, then it was time to be home. Intended to drive part time, but after putting my brewery together in the pole barn, decided full retirement was sort of nice. I brew for me and my friends, mountain bike and trail run so I don't compete with the Goodyear blimps for advertising space. Can visit the kids and grandkid(s) when I want, too.

I can't help it, but I always critique flatbed loads when I'm out on the road and am as courteous as I can be for all those guys and gals that are keeping America supplied.

You (and any other flatbedders from here) that are in West Michigan, drop me a line since I lurk here and get notification of updates on this thread. I'll buy you a cup of joe or, if you have a reset, treat you to something a bit stronger from Airedale Brewing.

Life be fantastic. Live it without regret! Be safe out there.

This thread might've scared me right out of flatbedding I was thinking of TMC or Maverick some of these pics are overwhelming!

Don't let this tyhread scare you.my path was not typical. I am just as comfortable at 12' wide as I am at 8'6". Just another day to me. I could not do the dock bumping.

This thread is fascinating. Thank you guys for sharing all your expertise!

I'm just a curious fella, so I don't have anything to post (yet) but by replying to the forum I can get notifications of new comments, and I definitely want that because I'm finding every comment so enlightening and interesting.

Thanks, y'all, and keep up your good work. Stay cool!

I am on the way back from Temecula, California to Delhi, Louisiana tonight, but will be making a stop in Round Rock TX with this load of rocks I picked up in Tecate, California. Tecate is a little Mexican border town with no legal roads going into it for big rigs. In fact you are only allowed to have 30 feet from kingpin to your rear axle on the roads that lead into this town. So... I was an outlaw trucker this week. It was quite the adventure getting my tractor trailer around some of the tight curves in the roads without knocking some other motorist off the side of a precarious precipice. This is not something I recommend to anybody, but I can be foolish at times.

This load is a good example of the gray areas that exist in trucking. I had to break the law just to get to the shipper , then they had no scale (it really was just a dirt drop yard where Mexican trucks drop off freight which is then forwarded onto American carriers for the final delivery) And despite the weight printed on the bills, I knew that I was overweight as soon as I got out off of the dirt roads and onto some real stretches of highway. There was not even a scale available to me until I crossed over into Arizona - at least a hundred or more miles from the Mexican drop yard. That is when I was able to confirm that my gross weight was 82,380 pounds! I parked for the night at the Golden Acorn Casino on Interstate 8 and waited to leave at 1:30 in the morning, just hoping that no one would be manning the scales at the California/Arizona border.

There are times in this job where you just have got to figure out ways to get things done despite the fact that you could possibly be getting yourself into a jam. Once I got over into Arizona, I contacted the broker and let him know that I was going to go to our terminal in Phoenix and have them off-load one pallet of rocks so that I could get it legal, and he would just have to find a hot-shot carrier to get that final pallet to his customer. He didn't like it, but what's he gonna say? We're on a recorded phone conversation, and he isn't going to advise me to run like an outlaw on that line. He knew I had him over a barrel, and he just bit his tongue and agreed that we had no choice.

The good old Golden Acorn Casino. I live about 12 miles from there. I actually worked in that casino for a few years. I installed almost all the cameras and set up the wiring and DVR's

A couple cool ones I saw yesterday:

109 pages, I haven't finished one yet. But I love these flatbed photos, and don't have anything else to do with my life at the moment, so why not lol

Bump

This is Pat M.'s line of work.

Yup I've always loved these photos. Props to Pat and all the other dedicated flatbedders/oversized haulers. Those drivers have always amazed me.. especially the wind turbine blades and the setups with 8 or more axles.

Here is a video that my pilot took 2 summers ago of me making a right hand turn from 3 lanes onto a 2 lane. There is a car in the left turn lane.

I am using a 3 axle steerable dolly to move this 109 foot long beam. It only weighs about 55k. I am steering the dolly from the cab with a wireless remote.

https://youtu.be/8bauAyr5sdk

Wow. I'm surprised that it isn't someone in the Pilot car controlling it... Or, someone riding it (I've seen it done before). Must be hard having to steer 2 things; One is hard enough!