2/1/08

I know I tend to be a rather unlucky fellow in matters of life, but somehow this truck driving thing just seems to go my way. Well, not completely, but for the most part at least. About five minutes after last night's blog entry, I got a beep...

I headed in and expected to hear some shitty run that I was being assigned, to be taken after I made my drop this morning. Instead I was told to leave my loaded trailer on the yard for a local driver to take in the morning. (I do despise Laredo deliveries, so this was very sweet news.) Then I was given the choice between an 800-something miler to Mississippi for Monday, a whatever miler to Illinois (that's where it's really cold) for Monday, or a 1284 miler to Tennessee for Monday. The longest one isn't always the best one, but in this case I took the Tennessee run because it's right on I-75 (Loudon, TN) and we always have shit running back and forth around Knoxville. It was a calculated move on my part. Plus I figured Tennessee shouldn't be quite as cold and snowy as Illinois, even if it is on the chilly side.

I rolled out of Laredo this morning and headed up US-59 toward Houston. Things were going smoothly when my truck decided to play some games with me. It started sputtering pretty badly going up a hill. I basically concluded that it was going to stall. It didn't stall, or even lose a lot of speed actually. It just kept sputtering, sometimes violently. Then it started running fine again. A few miles later, more sputtering on another hill. Across the top of the hill, everything was fine. This repeated a few times, so I pulled into a truck stop to have a look (as if I would know what was wrong if I saw it). Nothing is dripping, nothing is broken, and nothing is loose. That's about all I can tell. I put in a call to road service to see what they had to say. "Maybe fuel filters." Nope, brand new. "Maybe loose bolts on the turbo." Every bolt that I can see is tight, but I have no idea what a turbo looks like. They said I should stop at the T/A in Ganado if I could make it there, so they could have a look. I drove the hundred miles or so to Ganado, only having issues whenever a long climb or abrupt increase in speed (leaving a town, e.g.) presented itself.

I got to the T/A and explained to the dude that the engine was sputtering any time it reached back for a little extra horsepower. He asked how it was idling. It idles fine. He asked how fast it goes before the problem comes up. Really, the speed is irrelevant. If I'm cruising at 65mph on flat terrain, it's fine. If I'm accelerating from a given speed to a higher speed, or trying to pull a hill, we have issues. He took a look, saw whatever I saw apparently, and said there was nothing he could do. He mentioned the turbo thing too, so maybe that's my issue. I don't know.

So I placed another call to road service to see what they wanted me to do. The guy asked me what model of fuel filters had been put on. I checked. They were the right ones. He thought maybe they were too tight, so I checked that too. I could rotate them by hand, but they were pretty snug. He said that's about right. Oil is good. Fuel isn't low. So the conclusion was that I needed a dealer to look at the engine.

Apparently nothing good can happen if you have engine trouble in the Houston area. The road service guy named a few places and, each time, said that CTL doesn't like to use the place in question. There was some place north of Houston on 59 that is apparently okay to use, but they closed at 8pm. It would be a pipe dream to think I had time to get through Houston during a Friday rush hour and up to the location in time. Then there was some place in Louisiana that was open until noon on Saturday, but that was too far away. Then there was the Peterbilt place in Houston, but I called and they couldn't get to my truck until Monday at the earliest. So I basically had to say screw it and keep driving. I guess I could have made CTL send someone to take this load and then sat in a hotel all weekend, but that sounds pretty shitty to me. The truck runs fine 90% of the time, so I'll just have to deal with it until I catch a break. As long as I keep the boost gauge thing from going over 20, I seem to do okay. Only the climbs are a major issue. The hills in Tennessee... shit, I don't even want to think about it. We'll deal with that one in a couple days.

As all this was going on, I got my next load assignment. Not just a plan summary, but an actual assignment. I've never seen that before. Even when we're pre-planned like this, we don't get the assignment until we're empty. The reason is that we respond to that assignment and then get dispatched. I wasn't sure what to do, so I shot a message to my fleet manager. He told me to confirm the assignment once I'm empty so that's what I'll do. I'll be picking up in Loudon, Tennessee and going to... Laredo, Texas. Creative planning there, eh? At least I'll be familiar with the route. I have to admit that the number of pre-plans does seem to be on the rise. We were told that we would see more of that after the merger and for a while we really didn't. Speaking only for myself here, I have definitely seen more pre-plans in the last month or two. I guess anyone who reads this on a regular basis could tell me if it's just my imagination. Not a ton of pre-plans by any means, but definitely more than before. That's what it seems like to me.

So I suppose the truck issue is going to be played by ear for a few days here. I hope I don't have to pass on that next load, as the miles will fit nicely within my available hours in the early part of next week. Then I can bobtail to a shop in Laredo or something.

I'll finish up with 3,216 miles for this week, in addition to $35 for the cleanout at UPS and $35 for the extra pickup in Ohio. Pretty good week. Sunday (first day on the next check) will be burned finishing off this run, but I already know I'm getting a few good days of work starting Monday so I'm feeling rather fortunate. At least I'll be as fortunate as the engine situation allows me to be. As long as my truck gets me to Tennessee and then back to Laredo, things will be A-OK with me. I may very well take it in the ass for a couple days trying to get my truck fixed down there, but I'm trying to stay optimistic.